The "Manhattan Optimist Club Bulletin": Vol. 2024 #49: 9-4-24
VOLUME 2024 SEPTEMBER 4 NUMBER 49
This morning, Greg McCune welcomed everyone and gave us a morning Labor Day Reflection, followed by the Pledge of Allegiance.
ACHES & PAINS: Be kind to one another, you never know what others may be going through.
Prior to joining the Flint Hills MPO, Jared worked for the City of Manhattan, beginning as a GIS (Geographic Information Systems) Technician and later as the Infrastructure Analyst. With GIS, he began working on a wide range of projects, including pipeline mapping, LIDAR classification and imagery analysis. He also served as the Staff Liaison to the Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee where he worked towards increasing safety and facilities for cyclists and pedestrians.
After living in Kansas City for several years, Jared and his wife moved back to the Manhattan area to raise their family. He is a repeat Optimist Club presenter as he’s talked to us about Electric Car Preparedness twice and will be coming back again soon to give us an update. Today the topic is “Transportation Planning 2025: Population, Financials and 2nd Blue River Crossing”.
Flint Hills MPO
The Flint Hills Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) is the designated entity to provide regional transportation planning and programming services across portions of Geary, Pottawatomie, and Riley Counties.
At both the local and regional scale, the MPO places special emphasis on providing equal access to a variety of transportation modes; including, transit, bicycling, walking, vehicles, and freight.
The Flint Hills MPO (designated February 2013 by the Designation Agreement) was the first MPO designated by the State of Kansas in over three decades. Federal law requires any Urbanized Area population exceeding 50,000 persons to create a Metropolitan Planning Organization to carry out the multi-modal transportation planning for the metropolitan area. The Manhattan Urbanized Area exceeded this population threshold in the 2010 Census.
In 2017, the Policy Board voted to expand the MPO boundary to include the City of Wamego and more of Pottawatomie County along the US-24 corridor. The boundary expansion took effect January 1, 2018.
The MPO is governed by a Policy Board made up of local elected officials from the jurisdictions in the metropolitan area and a representative from the Kansas Department of Transportation (KDOT). The Policy Board is supported by a Technical Advisory Committee (TAC), consisting of staff level representatives from various local, state, and federal agencies.
What is connect 2050?
Connect 2050, an update to the existing Connect 2040 plan, is the guiding document for the future of our region’s multi-modal transportation system over the next twenty-plus years. It’s the blueprint for how we can achieve our vision to Enhance Mobility, Strengthen Communities, and Generate Prosperity.
Long-range transportation plans are federally-required documents, standard throughout the United States. These plans walk through regional transportation needs of today while also examining future challenges. Over the next two years, the FHMPO will be working with local and state partners, and community members and organizations, to gain a complete understanding of our region's transportation needs today as well as in the future.
There was so much information with mapping and graphs, I would encourage you to go to www.flinthillsmop.org for all this information and more. Thank you, Jared.
CLUB STUFF/ANNOUNCEMENTS and UPCOMING EVENTS
Fall Social Date is set for Sunday, September 8th! Hope to see you all there!
Tom Hintz-after the social dinner, there will be some “slide” bingo fun for gift cards!
Doug Jardine is once again riding his bike 500 miles in support of Childhood Cancer. If you are interested, you can donate in person or on-line.
OPTIMIST FIELD WEEDS DEFEATED!!!!!!!! A great big thank you to those helping Friday, August 30 to remove the weeds that had taken over Optimist Field. Thank you, Jerry Banaka, Dan O’Neill, Mike Fincham, Bob Seymour, Jim Franke, Bill Wisdom and Mel Hunt. Steve Boeckman and Brad Horchem helped after the mowing was done. At the same time the weeding was being done, the push mowing crew was doing their weekly mowing of Brummett Field banks and surrounding areas. This crew included: Steve Boeckman, Brad Horchem and Steve Springer. Thank you all very much for your hard work!
SAVE THE DATE: September 28th-KSU Football Parking for the OSU game, October 19th – Aggieville Chili Crawl
GUESTS: No other guests were present this morning.
Meeting adjourned with the OPTIMIST CREED.
SEPTEMBER PROGRAMS: Program chairs: Mike Fincham, Heather Peterson and Ed Klimek
Program Chair: Heather Peterson