Transportation Advisory Committee

0:02I'm the clerk for today's meeting.

0:05Today is a little bit unusual.

0:07We do not have a chair or vice chair today.

0:11They were both unavailable.

0:12As such, I will be opening up this meeting as clerk.

0:17Our first order of business under

0:20procedure bylaw section 4.7.5 is that in the absence of the chair,

0:26we will have a vote to have an interim chair for this meeting.

0:31Do we have anybody either online or in person that would like to chair this meeting?

0:38Chelsea, thank you.

0:44We just need to take a vote.

0:47We can't vote to have member Chelsea Edwards as the chair for today's meeting.

0:54Can I get a mover and a seconder please?

0:57Moved by member Moore, seconded by member Dale,

1:02and any opposed?

1:04Seeing none, that is carried.

1:11Thank you for your chance.

1:13Is it just Roberts?

1:15Most we, yes, procedure bylaw is very similar to Roberts rules.

1:21I've also created a script for you.

1:24If you'd like, then I have a copy of your agenda.

1:26Whenever you're ready, you can kick us off.

1:29I'd like to call to order the April 16th,

1:332026 transportation advisory committee meeting.

1:37I will now provide the indigenous territorial acknowledgement.

1:41As we gather and let us take time to reflect on our privilege to live and work in wealth,

1:47a city built over rich indigenous histories.

1:50We are guests here and we should reflect upon the responsibility to care for this land

1:54and the people who live here today and the generations to come.

1:58If our actions today can move us towards reconciliation,

2:01we should take pause and make those decisions with intention and gratitude.

2:06This place we call wealth has served as traditional lands and a place of refuge

2:10for many people over time, but more specifically the Anurandraak and the Haudenosaunee.

2:16This land is held as the treaty lands and territory with the Mississauga of the credit first nation.

2:22Guelph lies directly adjacent to the Haldeman track and is part of the long established

2:27traditional hunting grounds for the six nations of the Grand River.

2:31Many first nations, Inuit and Mentee people who have come across Turtle Island call Guelph today.

2:42Committee members, are there any disclosures of pecuniary interests?

2:46If so, please raise your hand.

2:48I think that's financial. Yes, yes.

2:55Great. Not great that you don't have any money.

3:01There's no complex.

3:02No one here is getting paid by my project that we're sent to give out today.

3:10Did everyone get a chance to review the minutes? I hope so.

3:15If you did, if there's any changes, if life changed, please let us know.

3:20If not, I'm going to ask for a member to move for the approval of the March 9th, 2026

3:30transportation by June 20, meeting minutes.

3:34And in June, June, June is, can I get a seconder?

3:40Thank you.

3:42Any opposed?

3:44Motion carries.

3:49Our only item today is the transportation demand management action plan and developer toolkit.

3:56And I will now hand it over to Jennifer Juist, the manager of transportation planning for our presentation.

4:02Thanks very much, Chelsea.

4:04And it's nice to be back at the committee with everyone here.

4:08We came back in July of last year to introduce this project.

4:13It wouldn't have been me.

4:14It would have been my staff member, Kate Berry, who was leading it at the time.

4:18And then it was passed over to my staff member, Benita, who was about to go on her maternity leave

4:22tomorrow. So I'm taking over to take this to the finish line.

4:26And I'm here to present the preliminary findings of the TDM action plan and give a little bit of an

4:34overview of the work that's been done since last July to bring you up to speed.

4:39So you can go to the next slide.

4:40So just to have a refresher, this is a recommendation that came out of the 2022

4:48transportation master plan, which is a television for sustainable and resilient

4:53transportation system for the next 30 years.

4:55And in that timeframe, the wealth is going to grow by about 40%.

5:00So we are looking for strategies that utilize our existing transportation infrastructure

5:06as efficiently as possible, minimizing the need for big investments in widening and new

5:11infrastructure, and then really concentrating that infrastructure investment only where it's

5:17really needed. And so part of that strategy is transportation demand management, which is really

5:23about reducing traffic congestion at peak times and shifting more trips to sustainable options

5:29like transit, walking, and cycling.

5:31So again, just to review what TDM is, this is a term that's used to describe a suite of

5:39initiatives that are aimed at reducing traffic volumes, the demand on the road network,

5:44particularly in the commuter peak hours. And it really is about targeting driver behavior and

5:50mode choice. And the focus is on influencing how, when, and where people are traveling.

5:56So with TDM, what we're trying to do is making better use of our existing transportation

6:01infrastructure to meet people's travel needs. We're not trying to say you can't drive. We're

6:06not saying cars are bad. We're just trying to spread the love amongst all of the forms of

6:12transportation options that are available and really be more adapted to adapting the type of

6:18transportation to the type of trip you're doing. So for residents and visitors, a good TDM program

6:24is going to improve traffic congestion in their community and give them more options for their

6:28daily trips. And for the municipality, a good TDM program increases the diversity, the efficiency,

6:34and the economic performance of our transportation services that we provide.

6:39Next slide. So just a quick progress update. I'll go into some of these in a little bit more

6:46detail, but we've completed the background review that can be found on the project website.

6:52If you wanted to read through it, we've completed all of our public engagement, which included

6:57pop-ups at local events, interviews with key major employers in wealth, and an online

7:03Have Your Say survey. And then we did the household travel survey, which was over 2800 responses,

7:12randomly selected, random sample survey, very statistically robust. And we are currently

7:18finishing up on the other side of the courtyard, our second focus group with community members

7:24to finalize the community engagement component. And then next slide. We also finished our

7:33evaluation tool for development. So this is a toolkit that supports development applications

7:38and integrates TDM elements into how we build new buildings in the city. And lastly, we've received

7:45the first draft of the final action plan, which completes the consulting assignment,

7:52and we'll be presenting that to Council as an information report in early July.

7:59Bye. Okay, so key findings from the background review. This was looking at comparative municipalities

8:06and best practices, looking at some of the academic research around what TDM is and how it's effective,

8:13and really what the findings were. All cities seem to be really struggling with

8:18how to develop an equitable transportation demand management program, with clear performance

8:23tracking, and practical implementation tools. The planning environment has a lot of restrictions

8:30around what we can and cannot ask for, which can impact the effectiveness in the way we develop

8:38new buildings and communities. The most effective programs are the ones that are locally sourced,

8:44they're easy to understand, and they have high level leadership support. We also learned that our

8:51existing policy framework is really, really well suited to support a good TDM program,

8:57and we don't really need to do too much more on the policy developments on it. And then

9:04that led to some key recommendations to move forward with making a meeting wealth action plan,

9:09which is what we have now finished, that looks at measuring how to measure success,

9:15how to integrate travel choices into new development, and how to look at developing

9:19campaigns and strategies that consider all members of our community, including those who are equity

9:25seeking. Next slide. We did a number of pop-up engagements throughout the summer. I think some

9:35of the themes we cover in these slides I'm going to talk about in more detail when I talk about

9:41the survey results. So I'm going to skip through this, but you're welcome to read through the slide

9:46decades that I think it was provided for you in advance. And then I wanted to get into the

9:53Household Travel Survey. So again, as I mentioned, this is a very robust sample size. I think we were

10:00aiming for 2,200 samples or somewhere around that 2,400, and we exceeded our target, which is great.

10:10And the findings are really helpful for informing how to deliver programs and campaigns to help people

10:19overcome their perceptions around why they can't use modes of transportation. So it's really getting

10:24at perceived barriers to using other modes of transportation. So what we heard is that driving

10:31unsurprisingly remains a very popular and dominant mode of transportation for most residents.

10:38A lot of residents are driving every day because this is the most convenient and efficient form of

10:42transportation. It's easy to get to their destination. They often have free parking,

10:49and so it's a very, very free form of transportation. We also heard that resident satisfaction with

10:59other modes of transportation is actually quite high. So it was over 79% satisfaction for all

11:06modes of transportation. So while people say that they're very satisfied with their cycling

11:12network, they're very satisfied with our transit service, they're very satisfied with walking in

11:16the city, but they're not using it. So we wanted to dig into the why aren't you using it and how

11:22can we look for opportunities to address that. So for walking, for walking, cycling and transit,

11:31these were seen as obviously less efficient because they often co-with longer travel times.

11:37Service reliability was cited as one of the major concerns. Safety came up quite a lot as well,

11:44a perceived sense that it's not safe to walk or bike, and then challenges with carrying items.

11:50So trips involving equipment for going to a sporting event or activity or groceries or

11:57any kind of shopping, it was perceived that those modes of transportation were less attractive.

12:04We'll go to the next slide. So this slide is really interesting to see for the different

12:13trip purposes, which is the different colors of bars, what was the, what were people more

12:19likely to consider? Used like switching from a driver to these other modes. So the most popular

12:27option was to switch to being a passenger in a car, so carpooling. The next most popular option

12:35was just to walk to their destination, and that was the second highest for all trip purposes,

12:42including like social events, going to school or work, groceries. Transit was third and cycling

12:48was fourth with rideshare or carpooling. They kind of differentiated that from going as a passenger,

12:56I think, because there's an intimacy connection there. Like as a passenger, it's like perceived to

13:01be someone that you know where's rideshare. It's more of an externally organized random person

13:07that you're sharing a ride with or like an Uber situation. Also of interest, the social work,

13:14the social-based trips, so that's going to events or going to a restaurant or visiting friends,

13:21had for all modes the highest likelihood amongst respondents. So that's going to translate into

13:30some of the strategies that we're looking into, where it's like what kinds of campaigns can we

13:35develop to focus on those social trips and encouraging people to carpool or walk or take

13:41transit to those social trips, and then different strategies for work-based and school-based trips

13:48and groceries. I just want to check if there's anything else I wanted to say about this.

13:57Maybe just some of the demographics are of interest, and I didn't include that in the slide, but

14:03I mean we can provide the executive summary of the survey results if you're interested. It's,

14:08if you like statistics, it's fun to kind of look at those numbers. The use of a car for shopping

14:15intensifies with age, the older they are, the more likely they are to want to use a car for

14:20driving, for groceries. For work or school trips, car use increases with age and income,

14:27and it's more prevalent amongst men and those who work outside of wealth. The outside of

14:33wealth part makes sense because you're commuting and there's not that great of intercity transit.

14:39And then for taking someone to work or school, car use increases with age, work outside of wealth,

14:45gender, and income. Next slide. So moving forward while we were working on analyzing the results

14:56of the survey, the consultants went away and also worked on our TDM tool for development.

15:02The purpose of this is to standardize transportation demand management for all development applications

15:07who are looking to find opportunities to reduce their parking requirements. This is part of the

15:14Housing Accelerator Fund recommendations or initiatives that they wanted us to include.

15:20And so what we did was looking at, again, looking at best practices, other municipalities,

15:27and some of the data metrics we developed a framework of different measures that would get

15:33you points towards an ultimate parking reduction on your application. And so that looks like most

15:40of them are physical measures. So, you know, in increasing your number of bicycle, long-term

15:44bicycle parking, having enhanced protected walkways to the main entrances, featuring transit

15:52supportive features, carpool parking, preferred parking, those types of things. And so those will,

16:00you put it into a worksheet and it spits out a score for you and it gives you a standardized

16:05approach to helping our planning staff determine whether or not that's an amount of parking reduction

16:12they can support. And so this is, I'm going to go to the next slide. This is an example of what that

16:22table, that toolkit looks like. So, for example, you can get up to four points if you have carpool

16:28parking spaces that are designated next to the accessible parking spaces. Those are usually

16:32the closest to the entranceway. You can do parking levies. So, for example, charging for

16:39parking or unbundling the parking from what you are required to provide. Those get you points.

16:44And then at the end, it would add up all your points and tell you up to what percentage you can

16:50reduce your requirement for parking. This is an example of one of those times where the provincial

16:58policy framework and legislative framework doesn't let us do much. So there's a lot of

17:09legal requirements for how developments are, they go through their approval processes and

17:16go through council approval. So we were really restricted to physical measures that we can

17:22see on an inspection and make sure that they built it. And we have to make it voluntary because

17:30if it's part of the zoning bylaw, there's certain paths they have to go through to

17:35get a variance from that zoning bylaw for the parking. So this tool works within those constraints

17:42and just helps encourage people to ask for those parking reductions. So maybe you're asking,

17:48why are we talking so much about parking reductions? And the reason is that if you build it,

17:53they will come, applies both to the sustainable transportation side as much as it does to the

17:57driving side. So if you're providing less parking, then you're attracting a certain demographic of

18:04people who come with fewer cars and are more willing to take other modes of transportation. So

18:09it's kind of supportive of the TDM Action Plan that we're doing here. Okay, next slide.

18:19So this was presented to the Grand Highlands Builders Association in February. We went through

18:26the tool, we showed them a demonstration of how that works, and we invited their feedback

18:31as well as an invitation to participate in some interviews if they wanted to ask more questions

18:36or had feedback about the zoning bylaw. We didn't get very much engagement on that. We had a few

18:43clarification questions, not with it. So in this case, silence is golden. That means they love it.

18:48And after you know that. But that part went over well. And so we are finalizing that now with

18:54our planning stuff, just making sure that they're comfortable with how the tool will work in practice.

18:59Next slide. So another component of the project is the focus groups. So the purpose of that is to

19:07validate and refine some of the sample ideas around programs and branding that consultants have

19:13developed. We've got two focus groups. One was on Tuesday and the other one is happening right now.

19:19And the outcomes of these are going to be to help refine and just finalize the recommendations in

19:26the TMP, sorry, in the TDM Action Plan. And next slide. Some of the key takeaways. So these are

19:34some of the examples of the campaigns that they're looking at. For example, this is the cycling-related

19:42campaigns. So there's a lot around an event around bike months, so doing bike to work week or bike to

19:49school week. Some training and skill building campaigns to overcome that perception of not

19:57feeling safe. Community rides, again, where you're inviting people to go on a ride in a group setting.

20:02So you're not feeling quite as like overwhelmed by the prospect of riding for the first time in

20:06wealth and getting to know some of the facilities in the community. And then some youth groups as

20:13well to target that younger population, that younger demographic. And so what we've heard from

20:19the first week's focus group session is that there's lots of support for the cycling programs,

20:24which I found interesting because cycling was like not the most, not the one that came out on top in

20:30terms of people's next preferred option or what they would be willing to consider as an alternative.

20:37But I think everyone likes cycling in principle, but when it comes to doing it, they're a little bit

20:41more intimidated. There was not very much support for the carpooling campaigns in the first

20:49focus group, but I think some of that is just, that presents its own barriers. You have to

20:55create a platform, people won't know who they're getting partnered with. There's lots of sort out

20:59with that. And then we heard some feedback that people want to see further removal of barriers

21:07to entry for using transit. So do we even need to have a pass for those like early adopters in the

21:13high school range? Or can we make it easier for them by not even requiring a pass, for example?

21:19That was just, again, I don't know if that's something we are already doing, but that was just

21:23feedback from the members. And then they got some feedback about the branding and

21:30some suggestions on how we can improve some of the branding. So it's been going well. Next slide.

21:38So now just to summarize some of the high level draft actions and the action plan.

21:45We just got this submitted at the beginning of April. So again, this is based on a very high

21:50level review of a pretty long document. And I wish it was in a state that was a little bit

21:57more advanced so we could share a draft of it with you, but timing isn't on our side in this case.

22:03But so far what we have is that the recommendation to continue implementing our TMP policies and

22:10program recommendations, as well as the wealth transit future ready action plan, our cycling

22:16master plan and our vision zero action plan. There's a lot of really good stuff in there

22:20that directs us the city to investing in measures that support TDM. So they said,

22:26good job, keep going. Great. The other recommendation is to introduce the score card for developers.

22:34So that's all ready to go. And that will be finalized throughout this year and introduced

22:40through our planning review process. Another big one was to identify some of those priority

22:46campaigns to implement that will help shift some of those trips to other modes. So that's

22:52what the focus groups are doing right now. And we're going to refine that over the coming weeks

22:56before we finalize the TDM action report. And then another recommendation was to continue to offer

23:05the ride free programs through transit and particularly marketing it to some of the target

23:11groups that we identified through the survey and integrating some of the findings from the survey

23:15focus groups to tweak some of the marketing tactics on a regular basis. So they also recommend

23:22that the household survey is done like every few years. Now we can kind of keep a pulse on how

23:29people's perceptions and tendencies are changing over time. The hope is that we start to see that

23:37willingness to try needle moving higher and that some of the mode choice information at the

23:44outset where it's like how are people currently traveling for these different trip purposes.

23:48We want to see that moving more towards the sustainable modes of transportation as well.

23:57I think that's it for that slide. You can go to the next slide.

24:01That is kind of the summary of the project to date. I wanted to pause in case you were

24:06any questions about materials or any of the steps that have covered in this study.

24:13Chelsea, I have two questions for you. The first one is around the scorecard. I know that

24:21it's mostly focused on parking but you do have a signage portion but in the other section. Is

24:29there any way to give points for developers who request a bus stop on their like near the

24:36location because we've seen some developers request bus stops close by to if they're building multi-unit

24:44that would be helpful for people. I think that's a good suggestion. I'll have to go back and check.

24:49We do have some transit network related elements in the scorecard. I just showed you

24:56one of the four modes. The table's broken down into each of the modes. But I think what we were

25:03really trying to do is limit it to things that the developer does on their property line because

25:11the request for bus stops is a good one but they don't necessarily have direct influence on whether

25:17or not we can deliver that. It might be too close to an existing stop or there might not be enough

25:23demand for it yet or there might not be room in the Boulevard location. We had talked about that

25:29but I feel like that was one that we ended up adjusting so that it was within their control

25:34and power to do. And then the second question I had was around the encouragement for folks from

25:42different backgrounds to use different modalities. Some folks don't have financial access to things

25:48like fights or even the kind of shoes you need to do long-distance. Is there I'm not sure if there

25:56are any programs in place to assist folks with either getting access to a bike or partnering

26:03with programs to get the safety training or even just if they have a bike and they don't know that

26:09they need a helmet in order to ride on the road and things like that. Yeah I'm so glad you asked

26:13that. So we did have a really great program that unfortunately the budget was eliminated during

26:20this council's the 2026 capital budget but this report recommends bringing it back and some of

26:27the programs in the final report cover the bike reuse program where we take bikes from that were

26:34donated to waste facilities. We work with a community group called Guelph Tool Library to renovate the

26:40bikes and get them in working order and we redistribute them in equity-deserving communities. So we

26:46have targeted marketing to specific areas of the city where we know there's a need and then we

26:53are recommending in the report that we pair that with some of the can bike courses that we're offering

26:58through recreation services maybe with the subsidy or some kind of a financial aid support.

27:05So that was looking at more of that financial need perspective and then there was some

27:12recommendations around like group rides in those neighborhoods as well just to get people familiar

27:18with not just where the infrastructure is but also the culture of the road culture at Guelph

27:25because it's not the same here as it is in other parts of the world. It can be scary particularly

27:31if you're new to Canada, drive is can be aggressive so it's intended to help socialize people to

27:40what to expect good and bad where to go how to be safe how to be kind of a proactive road user.

27:50Yeah John. I've got another question about the TDM Development Scorecard. I know that was a

27:54section on that sample checklist about carpool spots in accessible positions. I was wondering if

28:01that would or could extend to like car share programs in the like. Well just to have a car

28:06share co-op there's no private option available that partners with like developers in the like

28:11that like a designating designated parking spot to host a vehicle open to members of

28:17these car share programs. Yes we originally had that on the list as well. I would have to double

28:24check and see where the final one landed because I think that one of the challenges we faced with

28:29the car share like virtue car community car share is that we rely on we have to we expect the developer

28:39to act in good faith in like signing up an agreement and having the car available at time of occupancy

28:46and that's the part that we lose a little bit of control. Sometimes there'll be a letter of intent

28:53but then whether they actually follow through on that that's the part where it's like we don't want

28:58to set ourselves up for a situation where they just say yeah yeah yeah we're going to do all these

29:02things and then they don't actually do it and they got the parking reduction. So now you're like

29:07getting the parking reduction and not offering accessible options for people at the same time.

29:14What about in the case of the carpool spots the same situation there where they could

29:21fall through or? Usually there's signage so it would be part of a signage marking plan that

29:26they have to submit as part of their site plan and then the inspectors when they go to do their

29:30inspection they can they can check it off and say yeah okay I see that there's a carpool designated

29:35parking spot here. Maybe like you could put it at a later date to a car share spot or yeah the opposite

29:40since something okay yeah it can go either way so it is a bit slippery working with the development

29:46community like there's developers that are amazing and they really want to do great things and there's

29:50developers who are like yeah let's just see what we can get. Yeah I'm trying to conceptualize it for

29:55like my housing co-op where I guess some of our members don't have personal vehicles. Yeah I would

29:59love to see much more car share uptake for sure. Thank you. I just have a question then around

30:06enforcement for the carpools like for the carpool parking spaces is it done on the developer

30:12or the property manager to enforce that is an actual grocery area kind of set up using those spaces?

30:19Yeah yeah the enforcement it's kind of like parking for electric vehicles too. Oftentimes you see

30:26non-EDs parking in an EV charging spot and yeah there's only so much enforcement that the city can do

30:33but yeah the enforcement would be on a property on that point. Do you want the condo or a ratio?

30:41I think all through enforcement by the city if they submit a formal complaint

30:50but it's not automatic like it's a complaint based system. It wouldn't be by-law going on. Yeah yeah it's

30:55not by-law yeah. All right if we don't have any further questions just looking on the screen if

31:03there was anybody online who had any questions the next slide is just the recommendation. So this was

31:15high level suggested recommendation to receive the presentation. I don't know if the committee

31:23wants to pass any type of additional recommendation of anything you'd like to see in the final report

31:28but happy to have the conversation about that as well. That's what I came with for today.

31:47I am going to motion not the... Sorry Trin. Oh I have to ask them. Sorry sorry I'm going to ask

31:54someone to motion for the transportation advisory committee to receive the staff presentation for

31:59the project entitled moving you forward transportation demand action sorry transportation

32:06demand management action plan. Can I get a motion? Thank you. Can I get a second? You can just ask

32:19any opposed. Oh any opposed? Fantastic motion carries. Thank you so much for the presentation

32:26it's very informative. Thank you. I'll just finish by saying we this is our last point of

32:32engagement. That's the same time as that one and this will be presented as an information report

32:38so it's not a presentation to council there's nothing that they're going to vote on they'll

32:43receive it on July 3rd of this year so that'll be it for this and then the intent is to hopefully

32:52reference this plan with making requests for funding to actually implement it.

32:57Thanks so much for your time everyone. Appreciate it.

33:05Any staff announcements? Chair we do not have any staff announcements. Fantastic. Can I get

33:13someone to move for the adjournment and aren't we... Can I get a second? Thank you John. Thank you.

33:22Fantastic. Any opposed? Wonderful. The adjourned. Thank you all for coming.

33:37Every board is so different.