HomeMy WebLinkAbout2025-05-14 Planning & Transportation Commission Verbatim Minutes_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Planning & Transportation Commission 1
Verbatim Minutes: May 14, 2025 2
Council Chambers & Virtual 3
6:00 PM 4
5
Call to Order / Roll Call 6
6:00 pm 7
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Chair Akin: I believe we’re on the air. Good evening, everyone. Welcome to this May 14, 2025, 9
regular meeting of the Planning and Transportation Commission. Shall I repeat? Good evening, 10
everyone. Welcome to this May 14, 2025, regular meeting of the Planning and Transportation 11
Commission. 12
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ROLL CALL 14
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Chair Akin: Ms. Dao, would you call the roll? 16
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Administrative Associate Veronica Dao: Yes. Chair Akin? 18
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Chair Akin: Here. 20
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Veronica Dao: Vice-Chair Chang? 22
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
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Vice-Chair Chang: Here. 2
3
Veronica Dao: Commissioner Hechtman? 4
5
Commissioner Hechtman: Go Warriors. 6
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Veronica Dao: Commissioner James? 8
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Commissioner James: Here. 10
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Veronica Dao: Commissioner Ji? 12
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Commissioner Ji: Here. 14
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Veronica Dao: Commissioner Peterson? 16
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Commissioner Peterson: Here. 18
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Veronica Dao: Commissioner Templeton? 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Commissioner Templeton: Here. 2
3
Veronica Dao: We have a quorum. 4
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Chair Akin: Thank you. Assistant Director Armer, we had discussion at our previous meeting 6
whether we should cover agenda changes and deletions before entertaining public comment. Do 7
you have a preference? 8
9
Assistant Director Jennifer Armer: No, go ahead and follow the order listed on the agenda. That’s 10
fine. 11
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Chair Akin: Very good. 13
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Oral Communications 15
The public may speak to any item not on the agenda. Three (3) minutes per speaker.1,2 16
17
Chair Akin: All right, then let’s begin with public comment tonight for items not on the agenda. 18
Ms. Dao, do we have any speaker cards or raised hands? 19
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Veronica Dao: Yes, one in person from Jim Robinson. 21
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Chair Akin: Thank you. 2
3
Jim Robinson: Yeah, that’s me. I’m Jim Robinson. It’s regarding the bulb-out on East Crescent, 4
Southwood Drive, near Center and Edgewood. I’ve lived there since I was a little kid, since 1966, 5
and I’m back. I’m taking care of my mom. That street, I – if you guys decide against the bulb-out, 6
that’s fine. I just want it to be safe and I want you to consider the safety. I feel very safe now and 7
without that traffic bulb-out, I’d just like you guys to consider something as good or better. 8
Because it’s a scary intersection without the traffic controls and the way it is now, you cannot 9
possibly go past 20 miles an hour around that turn, which is really good. I have to back out and I 10
have to – sometimes I back into my driveway backwards. I’m right across the street from the 11
thing. And that’s really all I wanted to say. Thanks for considering our safety. All right. Thank you 12
[inaudible 9:29]. 13
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Chair Akin: Thank you, Mr. Robinson. Do we have anyone else? 15
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Veronica Dao: No, just the one. 17
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Agenda Changes, Additions and Deletions 19
The Chair or Commission majority may modify the agenda order to improve meeting management. 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Chair Akin: All right, let’s proceed to agenda changes, additions, and deletions. Begin with Ms. 1
Armer. 2
3
Jennifer Armer: No changes to the agenda though there were a few items – revisions that were 4
sent to you via email and provided in printed form at desks. 5
6
City Official Reports 7
1. Directors Report, Meeting Schedule and Assignments 8
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Chair Akin: All right, let’s move on to city official reports. Ms. Armer, would you begin? 10
11
Jennifer Armer: Yes, thank you. Jennifer Armer, Assistant Director. Next slide. Our next meeting 12
of the Planning and Transportation Commission will be on May 28. We are planning to bring to 13
you the parking program update as well as returning to you with revised maps for the El Camino 14
Real retail nodes. And at this time, we actually don’t have much scheduled for your meetings in 15
June. I will have more information at that May 28 meeting as to whether either or both of those 16
meetings will be canceled. Next slide? I’ve got a lot to touch on in regards to Council items. On 17
May 5, the Council took public comments and a staff presentation for the project at 4075 El 18
Camino Way but because of the late hour, they continued it. That will be returning to Council for 19
consideration on May 27. On May 12, the City Council approved the accessory dwelling unit 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
ordinance update and then starting next week, upcoming meetings, on May 19 we’ve got 2 1
prescreenings for planned community zoning – potential planned community zoning applications 2
at the locations of 788 San Antonio Road and 800 San Antonio Road. These are both projects that 3
were actually recently approved for development and the applicants are now considering 4
additional dwelling units and so are coming in for a prescreening with Council on those. And that 5
would be something if they do submit a formal application that would eventually come to PTC 6
for review. 7
8
And then on May 27, in addition to the continuation of the project at 4075 El Camino Way, they 9
will also be discussing the El Camino Real focus area that was recommended by PTC on March 10
26. The PTC liaison for that is Cari Templeton and as with previously, I think it would be helpful 11
to have you attend if you are available. If not, we can discuss alternatives. That concludes my 12
presentation. Thank you. 13
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Chair Akin: Thank you. Ms. Star-Lack, are you filling in for Mr. Rius tonight? 15
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Transportation Planning Manager Sylvia Star-Lack: I am. I have 2 items. One is that the Safe 17
Streets for All Safety Action Plan was reviewed by Policy and Services last night. The final draft of 18
it. That final draft is posted online on the project website and we are tentatively scheduling it for 19
adoption at Council on June 2. The other item is that you may have noticed the El Camino Real 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
bike lanes, bicycle lanes, have been striped. Caltrans is working to clarify the no-parking 1
restrictions for the bike lanes. They will – they hope to finish those no-parking restriction signage 2
installations next week. That’s it. 3
4
Chair Akin: Thank you. Commissioners, do we have any questions for Ms. Armer or Ms. Star-Lack? 5
No? Very well then. 6
7
Action Items 8
Public Comment is Permitted. Applicants/Appellant Teams: Fifteen (15) minutes, plus three (3) minutes rebuttal. All 9
others: Three (3) minutes per speaker. 10
11
2. PUBLIC HEARING / QUASI-JUDICIAL. 3150 El Camino Real [24PLN-00231]: 12
Recommendation on Applicant’s Request for Approval of a Vesting Tentative Map to 13
Merge Five Parcels Together to Create One 111,030-Square-Foot Parcel. The 14
Subdivision Map Would Facilitate Construction of 368 New Residential Units in One 15
Building (24PLN-00230). CEQA Status: The Project is Being Processed as a Streamlined 16
CEQA Review Under Section 15183. Zoning District: CS (Service Commercial). 17
18
Chair Akin: Let’s proceed to the first action item. Action Item #2, the public hearing, quasi-judicial, 19
for recommendation of an applicant’s request for approval of a vesting tentative map to merge 20
5 parcels together. Do we have a presentation? 21
22
Principal Planner Garrett Sauls: Good ev-. 23
24
Chair Akin: Oh. Yes. Do we have any disclosures before we begin? All right. Mr. Sauls, please go 25
ahead. 26
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Garrett Sauls: Good evening, Commissioners. My name is Garrett Sauls. I’m a principal planner 2
working on this application for a vesting tentative map at 3150 El Camino Real. Just to go over 3
briefly what a vesting tentative map sort of serves or does is it’s a subdivision application that 4
can be useful to merge, divide, or create condominium parcels on a property. And what’s really 5
important is that a vesting tentative map can vest the development rights for a project once that 6
project has been deemed complete. It doesn’t have to be determined to be approved but it can 7
– that will allow for a period of time once the project has been deemed complete that that 8
project’s entitlement rights and the development standards – even if they changed afterwards, 9
after that time it’s been deemed complete, the standards that are in effect at that time, that 10
project gets to hold onto those for a period of time afterwards. This specific project is looking to 11
merge 5 lots together to create one 111,000 square foot parcel in order to facilitate a 368-unit 12
development on the property. Which you can see a rough image of that on the screen here on 13
the left side. In terms of the analysis that we do with this vesting tentative map, we are trying to 14
compare whether or not the proposed lot merger in this case conforms or doesn’t conform with 15
the City zoning code. 16
17
And what is convenient in this specific district is that the commercial service district doesn’t have 18
a minimum lot size or a maximum lot size or minimum or maximum dimensions for each of these 19
parcels and so however large or small they were whenever they were merged together or 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
divided, that effectively can occur in many different ways. And in this case, they’ll be merging 1
them together. There are no private streets that are proposed where you might see those for the 2
4075 El Camino Way project that was discussed earlier where you might be making townhomes 3
that’ll typically have a private street within them. And those in those scenarios, a private street 4
would actually end up reducing the lot size for the parcel. But they just have access to the 5
property. We’re proposing to have access to the property on the southbound – directionally 6
southbound off of El Camino Real. When the City or staff are trying to make a decision on a 7
vesting tentative map, the findings that are needed to be made are actually needed to be made 8
in the negative in comparison to other findings and so it’s more a matter of asking the question 9
of can we not make this finding to determine that it would be able to be approved? Which is – in 10
comparison to a lot of other projects usually feels kind of odd at times. But what is appropriate 11
in this case is that we are able to make those negative findings for us to make that 12
recommendation. And so you see those on the screen here. Which are also included in the 13
attached findings for the record of land use action for this project attached to the staff report. 14
15
There was an issue that we had noted during the premeeting which were just to add some 16
additional notes on the parcel map, which we’ll be working with the applicant to do, just to call 17
out the additional parcels that are to be merged together. There are, I think, currently 3 or 4 18
parcels indicated on the parcel map. And there’s actually a – these small parcels that you see in 19
the center are actually 2 individual parcels so we’ll just have a – work with the applicant to make 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
that correction before we put that before the City Council as a consent item. But other than that, 1
there were no other corrections that we needed to make. And staff’s recommendation would be 2
to recommend to the Planning Commission to approve the proposed tentative map to City 3
Council based on the findings and conditions of approval attached in the record of land use action 4
– the draft record of land use action. And that concludes my presentation. 5
6
Chair Akin: Thank you, Mr. Sauls. Do we have any clarifying questions from the Commission? Vice-7
Chair Chang. 8
9
Vice-Chair Chang: I have a quick question about the assessor parcel line that’s on the map. Does 10
that also get removed or does that stay? This is the one separating parcels 1422035 – or no, sorry, 11
1422054 and 1422055, the 2 on the right. 12
13
Garrett Sauls: To my understanding, that’s going to stay. But it doesn’t have the same effect as a 14
underlying lot line where it might otherwise cause an issue maybe down the line where someone 15
could argue that that’s actually a legal parcel line once these are merged together. 16
17
Vice-Chair Chang: Thank you. So that’s something that’s only used for the purposes of assessing 18
and not for anything else. 19
20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Jennifer Armer: That is my understanding of it. I don’t know if the city attorney who’s here with 1
us has anything further, but usually when – if it is in – as it is with this case described as an 2
assessor’s parcel line and isn’t recorded as a subdivision line [went 20:02] through the process, 3
then that’s not something that would need to be removed. 4
5
Assistant City Attorney Albert Yang: That’s right. I guess I would just add the assessor’s parcels 6
are for tax assessment purposes and they don’t have to line up with legal lots. And it’s most likely 7
that this property owner after the lots are merged will go and work with the Assessor’s Office to 8
also change the boundaries of the tax parcels. But that’s not part of a subdivision process. 9
10
Vice-Chair Chang: Thank you. 11
12
Chair Akin: Commissioner Hechtman. 13
14
Commissioner Hechtman: I was just going to add based on experience, once this map is recorded, 15
it does get run through the Assessor’s Office and the Assessor’s Office will often on its own 16
basically replace these APN numbers that are there with one new APN. There can be dialogue 17
with the property owner if the property owner has tax reasons to keep multiple APNs. But 18
frequently in this situation – and it takes a while, six months after the map is recorded you get a 19
notice saying hey, you have a new APN replacing the old ones and here it is. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Chair Akin: Any other clarifying questions? No? Do we have any public commenters for this item, 2
Ms. Dao? 3
4
Veronica Dao: Yes, there is one online from Terry Holzemer. 5
6
Terry Holzemer: Can you hear me? Hello? 7
8
Jennifer Armer: Just before we do start with that... 9
10
Chair Akin: We [have an 21:50] applicant. 11
12
Jennifer Armer: ...we should invite the applicant to speak if they wish. 13
14
Gary Johnson: Hi, my name’s Gary Johnson. I’m with the Acclaim Companies. We worked closely 15
with Planning staff to move ahead with this vesting tentative map and our design team is here 16
today to answer any questions we have. Easton McAllister from Talus Engineers and Chris Lee 17
from Studio T-Square here. We also want to just specifically thank the skilled Planning staff of the 18
city of Palo Alto; Garrett Sauls, Karl Schneider from Fire, Jonathan Lait, Planning Director; 19
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
[inaudible 22:28] work closely with our team to make this project a reality. And so we’re just here 1
to field any questions related to the vesting tentative map. 2
3
Chair Akin: Thank you. 4
5
PUBLIC COMMENTS 6
7
Chair Akin: All right. Shall we move on to public comment then? 8
9
Veronica Dao: Okay. Yes, so I have one on Zoom and one in person. So we can start with Terry. 10
11
Terry Holzemer: Can you hear me? 12
13
Chair Akin: Yes, we can. 14
15
Terry Holzemer: Okay. I am a resident that lives within a half mile of this proposed project site at 16
3150 El Camino Real. Although I do agree that this is a good location for housing, I think it lacks 17
several things. And I’ll try to go as fast as I can on them. Number one, the traffic study, which I 18
looked at and I hope you guys have a chance to look at it if you haven’t, although it’s a very useful 19
paper, the study, I think, is deficient in several limited ways. It is bounded by Page Mill Road to 20
the north and on Hansen Way to the south. I believe this is insufficient due to the significant 21
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
amount of traffic that also comes from the University Avenue area and from Stanford. And it does 1
not include the traffic that comes from the south along Arastradero to north to Palo Alto on a 2
regular basis. Now that El Camino is now turning into a bike boulevard, I also believe there should 3
be a more extensive study of traffic done for this bike lane. Number two, I think there is a lack of 4
meaningful park and outdoor living space for this development. Remember, the nearest park 5
spaces are dangerously across major roadways and intersections. Are you expecting children to 6
cross them? For many years, Palo Alto has had a major deficiency in park space. According to the 7
National Recreation and Park Association, park space in Palo Alto is also deficient in many ways. 8
It needs to have a standard of 4 acres per 1,000 residents. That is not happening now and it needs 9
to. We need more park space, not less, and this development should have added that. 10
11
Finally, I’d like to mention [under parked 25:16]. I think that this proposal under this proposed 12
garage has only one entrance and exit. That should be a major concern and a red flag for all of 13
you. This forces residents to drive in and out of one entrance as well as a dangerous [part 25:35] 14
for people to cross when they’re walking or going back and forth to their work environments. I 15
think that this needs more study, it needs a better traffic study, it needs a more meaningful 16
attempt to add park space. All of these things need to be done and I would encourage you to 17
reject the proposal without major modifications. Thank you very much. 18
19
Chair Akin: Thank you, Mr. Holzemer. Next? 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Veronica Dao: The next in-person speaker is from Jaime Vasquez. 2
3
Jaime Vasquez: Good evening, Commissioners, Chair. My name is Jaime Vasquez and I’m 4
[inaudible 26:28] representative for the Nor Cal Carpenters Union, Local 405, which covers the 5
city of Palo Alto. And I understand the purpose of this project is to merge 5 parcels into 111,000 6
square foot site to develop 360 units of building. The major undertaking, the one that has the 7
potential to create a lot of work for our local skilled carpenters including many of our union 8
members. It’s not – I’m not here to speak against the project but [inaudible 27:03] to highlight 9
the opportunity it represents if the right choices are made [with a 27:10] project of this size 10
partners with the responsible contractor, one that hires locally and uses a state-certified 11
apprenticeship program. And it doesn’t just build housing. It creates [high-road 27:24] careers 12
with healthcare and family-supporting wages. It keeps tax dollars and economic benefits 13
circulating in our community. We’ve seen firsthand how projects like this can uplift not just 14
buildings but entire neighborhoods when done right. I urge the Commission to consider labor 15
standards and local hire to be part of this project’s framework moving forward. Let’s make sure 16
3150 El Camino Real lives up to its full potential, not just in what it builds but who it builds it for. 17
Thank you. 18
19
Chair Akin: Thank you. Do we have any further comments? 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Veronica Dao: Yes, one more on Zoom from Rene Baez. 2
3
Rene Baez: Good evening. Can you hear me? 4
5
Veronica Dao: Yes. 6
7
Chair Akin: Yes, we can. 8
9
Rene Baez: Awesome. Thank you. Hey, good evening, Council members. I want to first thank you 10
for giving me the opportunity to speak tonight. My name is Rene Baez and I am a field 11
representative for the Carpenters Union. I’m speaking today as a concerned worker just to urge 12
you to ensure that any public or publically supported development project in our community 13
include strong labor standards. These projects should benefit everyone, not just in terms of 14
infrastructure but also by creating good-paying and safe and dignified jobs for local workers. Fair 15
wages protections for workers and the use of skilled local labor can make a lasting difference in 16
the lives of families while strengthening our local economy. As you consider upcoming 17
developments such as this one on El Camino, please stand with the workers and prioritize labor 18
standards that reflect our community’s values. I have attempted to reach out multiple times to 19
Gary with Acclaim Companies but have not been given the proper time of day. We’d love to – 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
we’re not against building housing, commercial projects. We want to build. We love to build. We 1
want this community to grow but just to be fair for everyone including the local workers in the 2
area. Just want you to consider that. I want to thank you, Council members, for your service and 3
for standing up for fairness and opportunity. Thank you. 4
5
Chair Akin: Thank you, Mr. Baez. Do we have any other speakers? 6
7
Veronica Dao: That’s all our speakers. 8
9
Chair Akin: Okay. Applicant is entitled to a rebuttal if you wish? Very good. Commissioner 10
Hechtman, I have a light here from you. Is that a holdover? 11
12
Commissioner Hechtman: No. When you get to discussion, I’m ready. 13
14
Chair Akin: Okay. Very good. All right. I think it’s time for that, so I would like to open this item to 15
discussion from the Commission. 16
17
Jennifer Armer: And through the Chair, if there are any questions for the applicant, I would 18
encourage we do that before closing the public comment. 19
20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Chair Akin: Very good. Commissioner Hechtman. 1
2
Commissioner Hechtman: Thank you. As the staff report makes clear and even the applicant 3
noted, our purview tonight is really quite constrained. We’re talking about the design of a map 4
on paper. We’re not talking about the design of what will be built on that. That is the subject of 5
a separate process that our planning director is handling. The question I’m going to ask, I’m going 6
to ask the applicant to indulge me because I think it’s very useful for us Commissioners to 7
understand as applications come through us how the applicants arrive at the densities that they 8
want to propose. In this situation, the density is just slightly below what the housing opportunity 9
site inventory was anticipating and I’m wondering if the developer – the applicant could just say 10
a few words about what considerations went into the decision that you’d be – even though you 11
could have more units if you wanted, you ended up with a design that had slightly fewer. 12
13
Gary Johnson: Yeah. Thanks, Commissioner. Happy to talk about that. One of the considerations 14
that we at Acclaim Companies really look at hard is parking. And so making sure that our 15
properties and the multifamily projects that we develop are properly parked and have the proper 16
amenities for the – for each – all the tenants that are going to be living here in Palo Alto along 17
the El Camino corridor is one of the highest priorities that we have here. A lot of thought and 18
consideration went into that and that informed partly our decision to slightly reduce the number 19
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
of units for the project. We feel that this, although it is a transit-oriented development, that it’s 1
far enough away that we wanted to make sure that we were handling that in a good way. 2
3
Commissioner Hechtman: Thank you. 4
5
Chair Akin: Vice-Chair Chang. 6
7
Vice-Chair Chang: Yeah, I wanted to reiterate some of the same things that Commissioner 8
Hechtman had said, which is we are purely looking at the vesting tentative map tonight. And I for 9
one am really glad to see some lot consolidation so that we can get – make the most out of the 10
land that we have in Palo Alto. That’s it. 11
12
Chair Akin: Commissioner Peterson. 13
14
Commissioner Peterson: Thank you, Chair. I’d like to ask the applicant if you’ve worked with the 15
Carpenters Union in the past on other projects? They’re probably one of the major workforce 16
suppliers in Northern California. Particularly in this region. They have a training center in Morgan 17
Hill. 18
19
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Gary Johnson: Yes. I apologize. I spoke – there’s 2 representatives of the Carpenters Union here 1
today. I have spoken with Jaime who is here in person and we are going to set up a time to 2
connect. As I mentioned to Jaime today, we have not even selected our general contractor for 3
the project at all so we’re happy to speak to the Carpenters Union when it’s appropriate. 4
5
Commissioner Peterson: Understood. And then another question is wage theft has been an 6
ongoing issue in the region because the cost of living is so high here that the – everyone’s heard 7
of – I think they call it Silvery Towers – they’ve had some nicknames for it – where the workforce 8
was locked in a container, was unpaid, they weren’t free to leave, they were threatened with 9
harm to their family if they complained. Because of that, there’s a heightened issue on large 10
projects that the contractor that comes in is using high-road practices. I just wanted to ask if 11
you’ve had problems with general contractors in the past. I mean, obviously everybody knows 12
the experience of – managing contractors can be like managing invisible cats in some way so it’s 13
difficult to be responsible for everything. But then in this region because of the special 14
circumstances, we – it is important to be responsible all the way down to the workforce that you 15
don’t have somebody locked in a container in Oakland every night. 16
17
Gary Johnson: Yeah, so at Acclaim, Mark Johnson, the partner, and I grew up in the area. We’re 18
from here. We’re not an out-of-town developer that’s going to be absent. Our office is right over 19
here off of Willow Road and Middlefield in Menlo Park and so it’s just a hop, skip, and a jump 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
over to the site. We’re also general contractors ourselves and hold an active license and so we 1
plan on managing this project and being boots on the ground every day. 2
3
Commissioner Peterson: And as a general contractor, are you signatory with the carpenters or 4
any other building trades? 5
6
Gary Johnson: No, because we’re too small. We’re just really too small to – we don’t really 7
exercise our contractor’s license for projects like this. This is way beyond the scope of our – of 8
what we can do as contractors. We act more in the realm of a developer on projects of this size. 9
10
Commissioner Peterson: Okay. Thank you. Appreciate it. 11
12
Chair Akin: Commissioner Templeton. 13
14
Commissioner Templeton: Thank you. We’re asking questions of you. You don’t have to sit back 15
down because they’re all for you. Anyway, thank you for coming out here and answering our 16
questions. I was wondering. I’ve lived on both sides of El Camino in this part of town and there 17
are some really good bike paths that are back there and I’m just looking to see if that would 18
connect to your neighborhood down Hansen Way. And it’s a little awkward and probably outside 19
the scope of tonight’s conversation. I just wanted to ask if you have thought about the bike paths. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
What high school would kids be going to from your development and are we going to be able – 1
would you be willing to prioritize working on making sure that there’s safe bike paths through 2
the neighborhood, in addition to El Camino, when you’re working with the Planning and 3
Transportation Departments for your project? 4
5
Gary Johnson: Yeah, sure. We would certainly be willing to look at that. However, we are – if you 6
look at the site, we’re constrained a bit [inaudible 36:53] Parmani Hotel and Palo Alto Square, so 7
we’re midblock. There’s only really so much we can do in terms of bike paths but we look forward 8
to El Camino Real being a bike corridor and we made many accommodations for that with the 9
project in term – when we were designing it with our civil engineer. 10
11
Commissioner Templeton: Well, I appreciate you saying that. I would encourage you to think for 12
children to possibly not be – only have that one choice of how to get to school down El Camino 13
because there is such a very adjacent rich network of bike paths off of Hansen Way and Hanover 14
that connect to Barron Park which has a bike path to Gunn High School. Hope you’ll think about 15
that because it sounds like a really exciting project and we want to make sure that the families 16
that live there can connect with the whole neighborhoods that they’re adjacent to. Thank you. 17
18
Gary Johnson: Mm-hm. 19
20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Chair Akin: Any additional questions for the applicant? No? Thank you very much. I guess that 1
closes public comment. We’ll move on to additional comments from the Commissioners, if any. 2
Commissioner Hechtman. 3
4
Commissioner Hechtman: Thank you. I am supportive of the staff recommendation. I do think 5
that all the findings can be made for this lot merger. I want to echo what Vice-Chair Chang said 6
that it’s an example of a concept that we were promoting during our El Camino Real discussion 7
that assemblage of properties can yield better projects that can be built at scale. For example, in 8
this one, they’re over-parking, actually, per our standard, I think, and so we want to encourage 9
that kind of behavior and we’re seeing it in this instance. Let’s see. I did have a couple of notes 10
on the record of land use approval for staff to look at possibly changing. On Packet Page 18, these 11
are the findings approved in the negative on this one. The first and second finding both reference 12
our general and specific plans. The first sentence of our second finding is there is no adopted 13
specific plan for the project site, which is true. I think that sentence needs to be also included in 14
Finding #1 because that’s about specific plans too so that that finding can be complete. That’s 15
one suggestion. Just copy the first sentence of 2 up into 1. And then the second suggestion I have 16
is on Packet Page 24 in Section 7. The second half of this paragraph is about an extension. And 17
the way you get an extension is you have – the applicant, at that point the approval holder, needs 18
to make an application before the map expires. And then it’ll come through Planning Commission 19
to Council. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
I think a clarification needs to be made here that the only thing that has to happen before the 2
map expires is the request for the extension. You don’t have to apply early enough that you 3
actually get through this whole process and get an approved extension by Council before the 4
original deadline. And I think that’s what’s meant here but the language could be clearer. And I 5
think at the fourth line from the bottom, recommendation of the Planning Commission upon the 6
written application of the subdivider, if you add the word submitted after subdivider, that 7
clarifies what I think is the intent of this provision. And so with those two changes, I’m ready to 8
support staff recommendation. Thanks. 9
10
Chair Akin: Thank you, Commissioner Hechtman. Any other comments? Commissioner Peterson. 11
12
Commissioner Peterson: Thank you. This is a question to staff. The packet says that there is a 13
CEQA waiver on this project? Is that correct? 14
15
Garrett Sauls: It’s that the project is reviewed in conjunction with this CEQA document that we 16
provided or prepared for the [ARB 41:47] application. And that is a streamlined review process 17
that is a newer provision in state law in the last couple of years for evaluating projects. 18
19
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Commissioner Peterson: We have maybe less than a paragraph to review on environmental 1
concerns? It’s got the stormwater pollution plan. What’s the criteria for the accelerated review? 2
3
Garrett Sauls: At a high level, it’s looking at how the project complies with the City’s adopted – 4
in this case, our adopted Comprehensive Plan mitigation measures. And so what we’re really 5
trying to establish is whether or not this project requires new mitigation beyond what the City 6
has already adopted for its general growth pattern to 2030. At a high level, it sort of captures a 7
lot of different things but it just asks the question broadly of is this project creating new impacts 8
or new mitigation measures than what we’ve already adopted and can apply through sort of 9
standard language to this application? 10
11
Commissioner Peterson: The site’s near one of the creeks, isn’t it? 12
13
Garrett Sauls: The Matadero Creek is further down south from this but it’s not right next to it, no. 14
15
Commissioner Peterson: And so the question is then is there any existing – preexisting 16
contamination on that site? I’m not familiar if there’s been a gas station there, agricultural. I’m 17
sure there was agriculture at one point. 18
19
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Jennifer Armer: I’m going to jump in. We may provide some specific answer to that but jumping 1
in, rephrase what Mr. Sauls was saying, is what you’re really looking at here is the vesting 2
tentative map. And so the question is... 3
4
Commissioner Peterson: Hm. 5
6
Jennifer Armer: ...is the lot merger proposed by the vesting tentative map creating any 7
environmental issues that wouldn’t have been already reviewed and mitigated through the 8
review for the development project? 9
10
Commissioner Peterson: We get the soil sampling on what the actual issues are when the project 11
starts? 12
13
Jennifer Armer: Correct. 14
15
Commissioner Peterson: Okay. Thank you. 16
17
Albert Yang: Sorry. I also just want to clarify. Commissioner, I think you referenced that there’s 18
one paragraph on environmental review. And in the staff report, there is a summary paragraph 19
explaining what the environmental review was. But we also link to the full environmental review 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
document so that’s not – yeah, it’s not just that one paragraph. There is an analysis of how this 1
project qualifies for the exemption and why the Comprehensive Plan mitigation measures are 2
adequate. 3
4
Commissioner Peterson: Can we get that link? 5
6
Albert Yang: It is on Packet Page... 7
8
Garrett Sauls: Packet Page 26. It’s the link which is Attachment C to the staff report. 9
10
Jennifer Armer: The same page that has the link to the project plans. 11
12
Commissioner Peterson: Perfect. Thank you. 13
14
Chair Akin: Vice-Chair Chang. 15
16
Vice-Chair Chang: I just wanted to thank Commissioner Templeton for her comments about the 17
bike pa-, or a potential bike path. Because when I was reading this and saw the 368 units, while I 18
am in support of this vesting tentative map, I’m very concerned about the future bicyclists on El 19
Camino and a driveway that is now going to be probably one of the most heavily used driveways 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
along the entire El Camino corridor during, say, morning commute hours. And so as this project 1
moves through the process, encourage, I think, Transportation to do whatever we can to make 2
sure that there’s good mirrors and signage and whatnot there because we’re not reviewing the 3
full plans right now. But other than that, I’m happy to make a motion if there’s no other 4
comments. 5
6
Chair Akin: I have one. Just to check. Staff, are you comfortable with the modifications that 7
Commissioner Hechtman has suggested? 8
9
Jennifer Armer: Yes. 10
11
Chair Akin: All right. I think we’re ready for a motion then. 12
13
Vice-Chair Chang: I’d like to move the staff recommendation with Commissioner Hechtman’s 14
suggested changes. 15
16
Commissioner Ji: Second. 17
18
Chair Akin: Very good. Ms. Dao, would you call the roll? 19
20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Veronica Dao: Commissioner Templeton? 1
2
Commissioner Templeton: Yes. 3
4
Veronica Dao: Commissioner Peterson? 5
6
Commissioner Peterson: Yes. 7
8
Veronica Dao: Vice-Chair Chang? 9
10
Vice-Chair Chang: Yes. 11
12
Veronica Dao: Chair Akin? 13
14
Chair Akin: Yes. 15
16
Veronica Dao: Commissioner Ji? 17
18
Commissioner Ji: Yes. 19
20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Veronica Dao: Commissioner James? 1
2
Commissioner James: Yes. 3
4
Veronica Dao: Commissioner Hechtman? 5
6
Commissioner Hechtman: Yes. 7
8
Veronica Dao: Motion carries 7-0. 9
10
Chair Akin: Thank you, everyone. 11
12
3. Review and Recommendation to Finance Committee and the City Council on Proposed 13
2026-2030 Capital Improvement Plan and Comprehensive Plan Compliance. 14
15
Chair Akin: Let’s move on to Agenda Item #3. 16
17
Jennifer Armer: Give us just a moment. And Julia Knight will be presenting this item. 18
19
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Senior Program Manager Julia Knight: Good evening. My name is Julia Knight. I am a senior 1
program manager in the Planning and Development Services Department and I have a 2
presentation for you tonight on the CIP Comprehensive Plan consistency. 3
4
Female: [Inaudible 47:50]. 5
6
Julia Knight: Oh, sorry. Veronica, if you wouldn’t mind helping with the slides, that’d be excellent. 7
Thank you. Good evening, Chair, Vice-Chair, and Commissioners. Our purpose tonight is to review 8
each new capital improvement project, a CIP, for consistency with the Comprehensive Plan. This 9
is an annual effort that we do so you should’ve been familiar with it from previous years if you’ve 10
been on the Commission. I myself am new to it this year so thank you for bearing with me. And 11
we’ll go through just high level a few of those key project for this year for your review. And we 12
do have my colleagues from various departments online and in the room to answer questions on 13
the specific projects themselves. I am sort of just the corraler of information. Really quickly, we 14
have about 200 active CIPs and of those about 21 are new this year, 180 are carrying over from 15
previous years. Those 180 have already been reviewed by yourselves or previous commissioners 16
in other years for their consistency with the Comprehensive Plan and do not require additional 17
review at this time. The 21 new CIPs for this Fiscal Year 2026 include 10 placeholder projects 18
which serve administrative purposes only and which ASD, Administrative Services Department, 19
advises does not need review on an individual basis for consistency with the Comprehensive Plan 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
and then 11 additional projects which do require review by yourselves for consistency with the 1
Comprehensive Plan. 2
3
And of those 11 projects that we’ll be focusing on tonight, 5 fall into the – or align, I should say, 4
most closely with the Comprehensive Plan element for natural environment, 4 community 5
services and facilities, 1 for transportation, and 1 for land use and community design. And that 6
chart is just slightly updated from what was in your packet. Next slide, please. We can come back 7
to these individual slides which organize each of the CIPs by their associated element at any time 8
if you have questions. But we have a number of natural environment ones that are aligned with 9
parks and open space. The CIPs in the community services section are with the libraries and the 10
Palo Alto Art Center, upgrades to the Lucie Stern Community Center, the golf course, things like 11
that. Our one transportation project is related to charging stations and maintenance citywide 12
aligning with sustainable transportation goals. And then we have one last category for land use 13
and community design and that is the Ramona Street update right out front City Hall here which 14
aligns with a lot of our retail and vibrancy goals. I also just want to mention that sort of collectively 15
– if we go to the slide if you don’t mind, Veronica – these placeholder projects that I mentioned, 16
they are just for benefits and salaries and things for the staff that are administrating these CIPs. 17
But as a whole, we have found those to be consistent with a number of goals and policies in the 18
community services section of our Comp Plan which strives to provide excellent service to our 19
community and to have a really highly trained and motivated staff. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
And with that, I will just proceed onto our recommended motion for your consideration which is 2
to recommend to the Finance Committee and City Council that the proposed 2026-2030 Capital 3
Improvement Projects listed in Attachment A are consistent with the Comprehensive Plan 2030 4
policies, goals, and programs. Thank you. 5
6
Chair Akin: Thank you, Ms. Knight. Do we have any clarifying questions from the Commission? I 7
see none. Do we have any public comment on this item? 8
9
Veronica Dao: I have no requests to speak. 10
11
Chair Akin: Very good. Commissioners’ comments? Commissioner Hechtman. 12
13
Commissioner Hechtman: Thank you. I suppose I do have one question but it wasn’t worth asking 14
before the potential of public comment and that is so really we’re focused tonight on 11 new 15
programs. And I’m looking at VR 30000 which is the scheduled vehicle and equipment 16
replacement for Fiscal Year 2030. And it seems to me the nature of this is funding for the City’s 17
vehicle fleet. I was just trying to understand why this is a new program rather than a continuing 18
program because I suspect that we have to fund the vehicle fleet every year. I was just kind of 19
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
trying to understand how you build this list, the distinction between what’s new and what’s 1
continuing. 2
3
Julia Knight: Absolutely. I believe some of my colleagues from ASD are online. Naomi or Paul, 4
would you be able to speak to that? 5
6
Paul Harper: Sure. Hi. Good evening. Paul Harper, the Office of Management and Budget. The 7
way that we structure the capital budget every year for the vehicle fund is that we essentially 8
add a new project for the fifth year of the Capital Improvement Plan, or the 5-year Capital 9
Improvement Plan, and so it is new in the sense that it’s a new project that wasn’t in the budget 10
last year. This is pretty common to have a new vehicle project show up every year as a new 11
project. But to your point, it is a continuing fleet replacement and we fund specific vehicles based 12
on requirements to replace them due to mileage and usage and things like that. 13
14
Commissioner Hechtman: Okay. Thank you. That’s very helpful and now I understand. I did read 15
through the descriptions and I appreciate the various departments putting some effort into those 16
project descriptions. All 11 of these projects look terrific and meaningful and will improve Palo 17
Alto. And of course the 10 that we’re not really looking at but those are designed to ensure that 18
we’re treating our city staff right, those are very important too. I am in support of the staff 19
recommendation on this item. Thanks. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Chair Akin: Any additional questions or comments? I believe we’re ready for a motion then. 2
3
Vice-Chair Chang: I’ll move the staff recommendation. 4
5
Commissioner Ji: Second. 6
7
Chair Akin: Ms. Dao, would you call the roll? 8
9
Veronica Dao: Chair Akin? 10
11
Chair Akin: Yes. 12
13
Veronica Dao: Vice-Chair Chang? 14
15
Vice-Chair Chang: Yes. 16
17
Veronica Dao: Commissioner Hechtman? 18
19
Commissioner Hechtman: Yes. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Veronica Dao: Commissioner James? 2
3
Commissioner James: Yes. 4
5
Veronica Dao: Commissioner Ji? 6
7
Commissioner Ji: Yes. 8
9
Veronica Dao: Commissioner Peterson? 10
11
Commissioner Peterson: Yes. 12
13
Veronica Dao: Commissioner Templeton? 14
15
Commissioner Templeton: Yes. 16
17
Veronica Dao: Motion carries 7-0. 18
19
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Chair Akin: Thank you all. Since we are making good time here, shall we just proceed to our study 1
session? 2
3
Jennifer Armer: Yes, I think we can. I’m going to give our Transportation staff a minute or two to 4
come down and join us. And they will – maybe we take a 5-minute break just to give them a 5
chance to join us? 6
7
Chair Akin: Sure. Five minutes. 8
9
Jennifer Armer: Thank you. 10
11
Chair Akin: We will return at 6:55. 12
13
Study Session 14
Public Comment is Permitted. Three (3) minutes per speaker. 15 16
4. South Palo Alto Bike/Ped Connectivity: Provide Feedback on Initial Crossing 17
Opportunity Locations and Draft Design Priorities and Evaluation Criteria. 18
19
Chair Akin: All right, I believe we are ready to resume. 20
21
Jennifer Armer: Thank you. I will introduce Charlie Coles who will be making the presentation this 22
evening. 23
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Senior Transportation Planner Charlie Coles: Good evening, Commissioners. Charlie Coles, Senior 2
Transportation Planner with Office of Transportation. I’m here to speak with you all about the 3
South Palo Alto Bike/Ped Connectivity Project. I’ll just refer to it as the Project for the remainder 4
of the presentation. Joining me is Sylvia Star-Lack, Transportation Planning Manager. We also 5
have Amanda Leahy from Kittelson & Associates on the line as well so if you have any questions, 6
we can bring her in to help answer those. Next slide, please. Just a quick overview. The staff 7
report provides an overview of the project and work completed to date. We’ve recommended 8
that PTC review the Existing Conditions Report and Draft Goals and Design Priorities 9
Memorandum. And the feedback we’re looking from PTC tonight is on the initial crossing 10
opportunity locations presented in the Existing Conditions Report and the draft design and 11
evaluation criteria presented in the Goals and Design Priorities Memorandum. Here’s the agenda 12
for this evening. I’ll provide an overview of the project. We’ll talk a bit about the overarching 13
goals and objectives for the project. We’ll review work completed to date and next steps. I’ll also 14
spend a little bit of time talking about a couple of sections that are in the Existing Conditions 15
Report because I believe that’s important for the Commission and the general public to 16
understand. Then we’ll go over the potential crossing opportunity locations and draft design 17
priorities and evaluation criteria. 18
19
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
First with project objectives, the purpose of this project is to improve bicycle and pedestrian 1
accessibility across the rail corridor in the southern portion of the City. To accomplish this, the 2
goal of this project is to identify locally preferred crossing design locations and design concepts 3
for 2 new grade-separated crossing. Each of the 2 preferred concepts will be developed into what 4
we call 15 percent designs and packaged into a final plan. The final plan will include an 5
implementation plan and funding strategy for next steps which includes final design, 6
environmental, and construction. I just want to emphasize that last bit here that for this project, 7
the goal is to get to the 15 percent designs. And we consider this to be the conceptual planning 8
phase of the overall project. Next slide, please. This is your project study area shown on your 9
screen. It’s outlined with the blue dash line and bounded by Oregon Expressway, Page Mill Road, 10
Middlefield, San Antonio, and El Camino Real. The study area figure also shows current crossing 11
locations – the gray dot that you see there – within and immediately adjacent to the study area. 12
It also shows the suggested walking and cycling routes just for some additional context. Next 13
slide. Just to touch briefly on the significance of this project, several citywide plans and studies, 14
including the ones that are shown on your screen, have identified a need for additional grade-15
separated bicycle and pedestrian crossings. Particularly in the southern portion of the City. 16
17
I just want to highlight that this project is really implementing the recommendations of previous 18
work from the City and this is all in a need to address the mobility gaps and barriers to walking 19
and biking in support of the City’s mobility and sustainability goals. Next slide. Here’s our project 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
timeline. It’s a step-by-step approach and as shown, we’ve reviewed existing conditions and are 1
currently in Phase 1 of community engagement where we’re working with the community to 2
establish the design priorities for crossing alternatives. Next, the project team will develop 3
crossing alternatives, share those with the community for feedback during Phase 2. Following 4
Phase 2, there’ll be some refinement of those alternatives and we’ll package everything up into 5
a public draft report that’s released for review and comment in Phase 3. And then the goal for 6
Phase 4 will be to obtain Council adoption of a final report. Next slide, please. Here’s an overview 7
of Phase 1 and community engagement, what’s happening right now. On your screen this 8
includes a list of all of the different events and meetings showing how we’re engaging with the 9
community through a variety of different mediums. I won’t go through all this in great detail but 10
if you have any questions when I talk through this, I’m happy to do that later. Next slide. Now 11
we’ll talk a little bit about the Existing Conditions Report that we shared with you in the addenda 12
packet for this evening. 13
14
On your slide it lists all of the sections that are in the Existing Conditions Report just recognizing 15
that there’s no data source that perfectly represents the real world. We looked at a variety of 16
different data sources to hopefully capture what we believe to be a representation of the existing 17
condition. The plan is to combine the data that’s included in this report with the data that we 18
received through Phase 1 of community engagement. This is the feedback that we receive tonight 19
from you all, from the other committees that we’ll be meeting with, as well as the results that 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
we get out of the online survey and through the other means that we’re communicating and 1
engaging with the community. Key findings from the Existing Conditions Report are in the staff 2
report. And the Existing Condition Report does towards the end conclude with a list of the 3
potential crossing opportunities that we’ll be talking about this evening as well. Those were 4
developed based on the existing conditions data as well as other feasibility considerations. Now, 5
the next 2 slides hinted that I’m going to spend a little bit of time just talking about the bike/ped 6
accessibility analysis as well as the big data analysis sections in the Existing Conditions Report. 7
Just recognizing that some of this information is technical but I think it’s important for the 8
Commissioners to understand it as well as the general public. 9
10
First with the bike/ped accessibility analysis. Starting on Packet Page 109, this is the section 11
where we’re focusing on the network accessibility analysis. And this was calculated using GIS, or 12
Geographic Information System, to estimate travel times from the existing rail crossings. And so 13
this is along the existing street network. Just to clarify, this is not as the crow flies or a straight 14
line. This is actually along the existing travel network. Travel times are shown in 5, 10, and 15-15
minute increments and those are shown using a variety of different colors. And this analysis tells 16
a story of how long it takes to walk or bike to or from the existing crossings and illustrates areas 17
where there’s limited east-west connectivity in the study area. With any calculation, there are 18
inputs. What were the key inputs for these? I think there are – what’d I write down? I wrote down 19
4. Four key inputs. I think that it’s important to understand in these calculations. The first is that 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
we only included the crossings at Cal. Ave., Meadow, Charleston, and the San Antonio Caltrain 1
station bike/ped underpass. Those are the main crossings where bikes and peds can cross [a 2
railroad 1:11:40] corridor within the study area or immediately adjacent. The second key input is 3
that we used a walk speed of 3 miles an hour. This is considered on the lower end of walking 4
speeds. It’s typically used for calculating walk times at signalized intersections. 5
6
The third key input is that we used a bike speed of 10 miles an hour. Again, this is also considered 7
on the lower end of biking speeds to account for things like stopping at intersections along the 8
way. And then 4, we assumed bicyclists would not travel along high-stress streets or cross any 9
high-stress intersections. And this builds off of an analysis that was done earlier in the report. 10
That’s on Packet Page 91 and 92. That includes the bicycle level of traffic stress analysis. We’re 11
building off of the work that was done earlier in that report. Next slide, please. Okay, next I’ll talk 12
a little bit about the big data analysis. This is starting on Page 112 of your packet. And so this 13
presents an analysis of travel patterns using big data. And it includes trip origins and destinations. 14
On your screen you see the figure shown there. This is the origins and destinations results from 15
that analysis. But we’re also able to get information about trip lengths, trip purpose, and travel 16
mode, all from a big data provider called Replica. For those who aren’t familiar with that data 17
provider, Replica uses a blend of GPS location, land use census, economic activity, and other data 18
sources to calculate those travel patterns. A few clarifications in this analysis that I think are 19
important to understand. First is that we use data from spring of 2024 representing average 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
weekday and weekend conditions for all trip purposes. It’s not just commute trips. It’s all trip 1
purposes. 2
3
The big data analysis presents the results in terms of person trips and this is different from other 4
trip terms that are defined and used early in the report. For example, vehicle trips is another term 5
that’s used. A person trip – just to give you a quick example, 2 people in a car taking a trip, that’s 6
considered 2 person trips but it’s also considered 1 vehicle trip. Just want to emphasize that. 7
Another thing to clarify too, when we say trips, that’s considered a one-way trip. You travel from 8
home to work, that’s one trip. You travel from work back to home, that’s another trip. Much like 9
I did on the previous slide, I’m talking about our inputs. And how did we filter this analysis? I think 10
there’s 2 key things to mention here. First is that the big data analysis shows information on one-11
way trips that are – and we only included trips that are less than 5 miles in length. And we only 12
included trips that crossed the railroad at Cal. Ave., Oregon, Page Mill, Meadow, Charleston, and 13
the San Antonio Road bike/ped underpass. I think that’s just kind of important to understand that 14
the data presented in this section only includes those trips less than 5 miles and cross the Caltrain 15
corridor within or near our study area. Okay. All right, so we’ll talk quickly here. Just a couple 16
more slides. Just to emphasize again or just repeat what’s already in the Existing Conditions 17
Report, the potential crossing locations. This is the locations that we’ve identified for further 18
exploration as part of this project. We’re looking for your feedback on where you think the City 19
should be prioritizing new bicycle and pedestrian crossings. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Next slide. Next we have the draft design priorities. These were identified based on project needs, 2
goals, benefits, and themes that are documented in several plans and studies that I’ve previously 3
brought up. These were shared with you in the agenda packet and we’re looking for your 4
feedback on the draft design priorities as well. And then building on the draft design priorities – 5
next slide, please – we have the draft evaluation criteria. And so the proposed criteria builds on 6
the draft design priorities. On your left you see your design priorities that were carried forward 7
from the previous slide. The next column lists the evaluation criteria. And then the column on 8
your far right provides an additional explanation on how we plan to measure or calculate each 9
one. And then we just have one final slide. A few questions just to help guide the conversation if 10
you so choose. And I look forward to discussion and hearing your feedback. Thanks. 11
12
Chair Akin: Thank you, Mr. Coles. Before we ask for public comment, do we have any clarifying 13
questions from the Commission? Let’s see. Commissioner James. 14
15
Commissioner James: Thank you. Appreciate the explanation and all the literature review. It was 16
quite helpful. At times a little daunting. Do I understand that each of these crossings is – we’re 17
looking at an underpass and that overpasses are not possible or not being considered? And I 18
suppose there’s some high-line wires there that make that kind of complicated but I just want to 19
clarify that. 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Charlie Coles: Yeah. Thanks for the question. At this point, we’re going to be exploring all options. 2
But as you noted, the electrical wires for Caltrain would require any overpass to go fairly high. I 3
think at least 30 feet or so if I’m remembering... 4
5
Commissioner James: Above them? 6
7
Charlie Coles: Above them. Yeah. Maybe even more for certain clearances. We haven’t gotten to 8
that level of detail at this point but it’s something that we will be exploring as we move into Phase 9
2. 10
11
Commissioner James: Mm-hm. And do any of these datasets and assumptions or observations, 12
do they take into account the imagined 6,000 more housing units that we’re trying to get by 2030 13
or 2031? 14
15
Charlie Coles: Absolutely. Let’s see. In the staff report and in the existing conditions report, we 16
do have information that talks about future land use growth for the City and where that growth 17
will be occurring. Part of our design evaluation framework and what we’ve proposed includes 18
looking at what we believe to be the anticipated demand for future crossings and that will 19
account for future populations and what’s planned for the City currently. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Commissioner James: And that was the map that showed, for instance, like the [Matadero 2
1:19:20] Creek corridor had particular high, I think, sort of projection? 3
4
Charlie Coles: Depends which map you’re speaking of. 5
6
Commissioner James: Well, I’m sorry [inaudible 19:31]. 7
8
Charlie Coles: If you can clarify? 9
10
Commissioner James: Okay. 11
12
Charlie Coles: There [inaudible 1:19:33] a lot of maps there. 13
14
Commissioner James: Anyway, so – yeah, and my other questions were about how long this is 15
going to take because I’m – got a 4-year term and I see things from 2013 here and I’d just love to 16
see us make a decision and break ground and build something before I have to leave. But you did 17
have a nice graphic on what the projection – the timeline was so thank you for that. 18
19
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Chair Akin: Thank you, Commissioner James. We have a lot of requests here. I hope I have them 1
in order but I apologize in advance if I don’t. Commissioner Ji. 2
3
Commissioner Ji: Thank you, Chair. I have a couple questions. Do you mind pulling up the slide 4
deck again? Can we got to slide 10, please? Yes. Thank you. I believe this is also referred to as 5
Packet Page 109 for those looking on the packet. Although there’s a little discrepancy. Anyway, I 6
was curious about the definition of the area size. Can we talk about why this area was chosen for 7
the study area as opposed to maybe extending further beyond El Camino? 8
9
Charlie Coles: Yeah, so this was a staff-level decision to really focus in on the rail corridor itself 10
recognizing that the City is also going through the process of updating its bicycle and pedestrian 11
transportation plan which takes the citywide look at the bicycle and pedestrian future proposed 12
infrastructure. The reason for the extents to Middlefield and, as you’ve pointed out, to El Camino, 13
is recognizing that no matter where the future crossings are located, we’ll need to connect to the 14
main bike and ped network. And so we believed that extending to El Camino and Middlefield and 15
south of Oregon Expressway would give us plenty of space to be able to do that. 16
17
Commissioner Ji: I guess the follow-up question there is it looks like – if we assume that the rail 18
crossing should be at the center, wouldn’t we expect that the area extend equidistant on both 19
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
sides of the train? It extends all the way to Middlefield on one side and it extends only to El 1
Camino on the other side? 2
3
Transportation Planning Manager Sylvia Star-Lack: Sylvia Star-Lack, Transportation Planning 4
Manager. I think that for the purposes of this analysis, extending to the next major parallel street 5
makes sense east and west and so for the west side that would be El Camino and for the east side 6
that would be Middlefield. Those are the major arterials so it makes sense from a network 7
analysis perspective that you’d want to go all the way out to those. 8
9
Commissioner Ji: Totally get that. I think my comment there is just – actually I’ll save my comment 10
for the comment period. I’ll just continue asking questions. 11
12
Sylvia Star-Lack: Okay. 13
14
Commissioner Ji: Now I’m going to ask about Packet Page 108. It’s the graphs with the bicycle 15
crossing and the pedestrian crossing. Can you help me understand why these times were 16
particularly picked, between 7 a.m. and 6 p.m.? 17
18
Charlie Coles: I think you may have a different packet page than what we have. 19
20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Commissioner Ji: Oh. Yeah. I know Veronica said that there was a slight offset. 1
2
Female: [Inaudible 1:23:44]. 3
4
Commissioner Ji: Yeah, I guess any of the Kittelson pages between 49 and 51. I’m wondering 5
about the timing. 6
7
Charlie Coles: Right. Yeah. Yeah, so the data used for the majority, if not all, of the section, we 8
actually used traffic counts that were collected as part of the BPTP update. That was done back 9
in 2024, looks like May of 2024. And so, Sylvia, I don’t know if you have additional context as to 10
why the times were chosen? Typically you focus on the peak periods. For this data collection 11
effort, it was more comprehensive looking at the full daytime when you see most biking and 12
pedestrian activity so I imagine that was part of the discussion back then. 13
14
Commissioner Ji: Thank you. Again, I’ll reserve my comments for that in the comment section. 15
And then can we pull up the slide again, Veronica? Same slide 10. It’s the one with the – yes, this 16
one. I’m looking at the diagram on the right which is Kittelson Page 55/maybe Packet Page 113 17
or nearby which is the diagram on the right here on the slide. I’m looking in and zooming in kind 18
of in the area that is at the corner between Los Robles and El Camino Way. If you kind of see the 19
triangle that’s kind of in the middle of the diagram and then a little bit to the left side there? I’m 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
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3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
wondering why this area is included in the 15-minute walk but not included in any of the biking 1
areas? It seems a little bit confusing to be because I’d assume that the biking area is a superset 2
on top of all of the walking areas. 3
4
Charlie Coles: Yeah, thanks for the question. I can take a first pass at answering this but I’ll also 5
just queue up Amanda on the line to help kind of add or clarify what I say here. The walking access 6
and the biking access, those were done separately. The key difference here is that the biking 7
access only assumes cyclists would travel along a network that wasn’t characterized as a LTS4, or 8
high-stress network, as well as an intersection. A cyclist wouldn’t cross through an intersection 9
that’s considered to be high-stress or LTS4. 10
11
Commissioner Ji: Thank you. That’s the answer I expected. But actually my understanding based 12
on the BPTP update is actually that that intersection is considered a safe route to school for 13
children and so it’s a little bit confusing to me that we’re simultaneously saying that this is LTS4 14
but also saying that this is a safe route to school. 15
16
Sylvia Star-Lack: Did you want to respond to that? Okay. Can you specify which intersection you 17
mean? 18
19
Commissioner Ji: Yes. The corner of Los Robles and El Camino Real. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Sylvia Star-Lack: Yes. We do provide a crossing guard there recognizing that it is a difficult crossing 2
for students. That is why it’s on the route. But there’s no – there are limited places where 3
students can cross on El Camino. 4
5
Commissioner Templeton: Can I interject here? Just to clarify. You provide a crossing guard for 6
half of that street. Half. It doesn’t cover the entire street. And that is high stress for me when I 7
walked across it every day for 2 years taking my son back and forth to school and for the people 8
that I witnessed get hit in that intersection so I’m going to push back on that. And I’m going to 9
say also just to support Commissioner Ji all the way down Los Robles towards Gunn should have 10
been measured. That is actually – I saw another collision there this week with a bicyclist and a 11
car. A high schooler going to their AP test. This is something we need to study and take a lot more 12
seriously. Sorry to interject. Thank you. 13
14
Jennifer Armer: If I may through the Chair. Just requesting that comments be made and shared 15
as suggestions for additional study. 16
17
Commissioner Templeton: And that exactly how it was intended. Thank you for clarifying that. 18
19
Jennifer Armer: Thank you. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Chair Akin: Yes. Very valuable comment. Thank you. And we’ll... 2
3
Commissioner Ji: [Inaudible 1:28:33]. 4
5
Chair Akin: ...go back to clarifying questions. Commissioner Ji. 6
7
Commissioner Ji: Yes. Apologies. One more clarifying question. I don’t actually know which slide 8
it is. It’s the one with the trips back and forth. I think it’s after this slide somewhere. Yes, this one. 9
Slide 11, Packet Page 117ish/Kittelson Page 61. When you’re talking about trips here, is this the 10
sum of the trips? Or how are we calculating this here? 11
12
Charlie Coles: Yeah, again, I’ll start and then queue up Amanda Leahy from Kittelson & Associates 13
to expand. The data presented for the most part in the entire big data section presents the data 14
as rates. You can see in the lower left-hand corner in the legends on these figures it’s presented 15
as trips per square mile so they’re ratios rather than exact number of trips. Amanda, I don’t know 16
if there’s anything that you’d like – if you’re on the line and would like to chime in here and 17
expand on that? 18
19
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Amanda Leahy: Yeah. Hey. I think that is a great description. It is trip starts or ends per 10,000. 1
Right, it is not exactly a ratio. It is a number. 2
3
Commissioner Ji: Sorry, can we clarify that a little bit more? Ten thousand whats? Ten thousand 4
people? Ten thousand square feet? Ten thousand – I guess [inaudible 1:30:21]. 5
6
Amanda Leahy: Oh, sorry. No, so the shading refers to the number of trips per square mile. 7
8
Commissioner Ji: Okay, [inaudible 1:3:30]... 9
10
Amanda Leahy: The lighter shading is fewer than 10,000 trips. 11
12
Commissioner Ji: Okay. 13
14
Amanda Leahy: And the darkest is over 40,000 trips. And by trips, that’s trip starts or ends. 15
16
Commissioner Ji: Yeah, so then that begs the next question which is over, I guess, what kind of – 17
I guess it doesn’t really matter the period of time because they’re all the same but just to clarify 18
my original question, it is the sum of the trip starts and ends. 19
20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Amanda Leahy: Over the average weekday or weekend, so over a 1-day period. 1
2
Commissioner Ji: Okay. Thank you. That ends my clarifying question. I’m done, Chair. 3
4
Chair Akin: Thank you. Commissioner Hechtman. 5
6
Commissioner Hechtman: Thank you. Our task tonight is you’re hoping to get sort of a 7
recommendation from us on a couple of new crossings of the railroad out of options A through 8
F. And so to do that, we have to start with a baseline of what crossings are we considering already 9
in existence? And so I have a question. On Packet Pages 42 and 43, at the very bottom there’s a 10
reference to ongoing projects. I hope your numbers are the same as mine. It’s the very end of 42. 11
Ongoing and upcoming transportation projects in study area include the rail grade separation 12
projects for vehicle, bicycles, and pedestrians at Meadow Drive and Charleston Road. Do you see 13
that? 14
15
Vice-Chair Chang: It’s... 16
17
Commissioner Hechtman: That’s in... 18
19
Vice-Chair Chang: ...page 3 of 10. 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Charlie Coles: I’m familiar with it. 2
3
Vice-Chair Chang: Page 3 of 10 of your report. 4
5
Commissioner Hechtman: Yeah. 6
7
Charlie Coles: Thank you. 8
9
Commissioner Hechtman: Okay. When I look at the diagram of A through F, I think those projects 10
are shown with circles. But they don’t exist today, I don’t think. But what we’re talking about 11
here has a long time horizon so in our analysis and recommendation to you, should we – first of 12
all, can you just tell me a little bit more about those 2 projects? And should we consider that by 13
the time whichever of A through F might go forward these are going to be going forward too or 14
be done? That’s the first question. 15
16
Charlie Coles: Yeah. Thank you for that. If you wouldn’t mind, Veronica, can you pull up slide 12, 17
please? You’re absolutely right. The rail grade separation projects that the City is also working 18
on, this project, what we’re calling the South Palo Alto Bike/Ped Connectivity Project, is in 19
addition to, right? The rail grade separation projects are grade separation projects focusing at 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Churchill, Meadow, and Charleston. Meadow and Charleston is in our study area and those are 1
identified here with the smaller gray dots. You see the crossing opportunity location D is located 2
somewhere in-between those. 3
4
Commissioner Hechtman: Yeah. 5
6
Charlie Coles: We consider that to be a separate grade-separated – a future potential location for 7
a grade-separated crossing for bikes and peds only. 8
9
Commissioner Hechtman: Okay. 10
11
Charlie Coles: Hopefully that clarifies. 12
13
Commissioner Hechtman: It does. Yeah. Thank you. That helps, I think, frame the 14
recommendationswe might offer. And then the other question I had is on Packet Page – well, 15
Kittelson Page 21. Which is a figure for population growth. I don’t know if you have a color version 16
of it because the black and white isn’t possible to use here. In fact, you probably need it. What 17
caught my eye is in the color version there’s a really large area that appears to have the shading 18
of somewhere between population growth – 2 shades, 751 to 2,500 and more than 2,500. Are 19
you able to see that? 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
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3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Vice-Chair Chang: Could we pull it up on the screen so that the public can see? 2
3
Commissioner Hechtman: That’d be great. Again, Kittelson Page 21 in color. 4
5
Charlie Coles: We also have slide 19, Veronica. Or that works as well. 6
7
Commissioner Hechtman: [Inaudible 1:35:04]. 8
9
Charlie Coles: Thank you. 10
11
Commissioner Hechtman: Yeah. It looks to me like the area that includes the words Louis Road – 12
I’m talking about this big orangish area up along Bayshore Road. And it looks like the northerly 13
part in which Louis Road is written, that’s actually the darker color which has, according to this 14
table, more than 2,500 – I’m guessing that’s people – population growth anticipated by 2031. 15
And then the area to the south of that, which is larger but a little lighter, that would be population 16
growth in the 751 to 2,500. I know that in our housing element the portion of that orange area 17
that’s kind of tucked up against Bayshore and wrapping San Antonio, that a lot of our housing 18
opportunity sites. But this orange area seems larger than that. The area at Loma Verde and Louis, 19
for example, that’s single-family neighborhoods that I didn’t think were part of the housing 20
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opportunity sites. I thought those were avoided in our looking for housing sites. I think all of these 1
tables are very challenging to put together and so I just wanted to flag that as this moves forward. 2
It’s a long project. Take a look at that population growth, whatever assumptions are built into 3
that generated this, because I think that might be larger than you intended to capture. Now I 4
think I understand it. All right. Those are my questions. And I’m sorry, I guess the second one was 5
more of a comment than a question. 6
7
Chair Akin: Thank you. And next is Vice-Chair Chang. 8
9
Commissioner Templeton: [Inaudible 1:37:06]. 10
11
Vice-Chair Chang: My overall contextual question for this is I know that we’re expected to have 12
Council look at the final recommendations from this in 2026 but bigger picture, has this been – 13
are these 2 crossings kind of budgeted for or are there – as we look at feasibility, is there some – 14
or as you go on in the next stages of this and look at feasibility, is there a number or something 15
where we know that if a design exceeds this number that it would then therefore become 16
infeasible? Or is this going to go the route of the 2013 plan and just like poof, disappear? I’m just 17
wondering if you help provide the background on what the will is for Council to actually do this? 18
19
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
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Charlie Coles: With regards to the will, I’m sure Sylvia can maybe speak to this better than I can. 1
But just to provide a little bit of context with how the project team is thinking about it, a big part 2
of this project, especially as we get towards the end when we’re starting to have design concepts 3
and getting close to having Council approval for the 2 designs to move forward, we hope to be 4
applying for variety of funding sources to be able to fund the next steps which would be 5
developing 35 percent designs, getting to final designs, going through environmental review, and 6
then ultimately construction. And as you move down the line, things get more expensive and so 7
we anticipate there being multiple grant applications to support this. At least that’s how we’re 8
thinking about it. Sylvia, I don’t know if there’s any additional context from the Council 9
perspective that you wanted to add? 10
11
Sylvia Star-Lack: Yeah. I think this – well, this project actually maybe even predates the rail grade 12
separation project. People have been looking at our bike network for years and have said we 13
need more crossings of the rails so I’ll say that first. Then rail grade. Though I might have the 14
order wrong. But rail grade conversation definitely pointed this [up 1:39:41] particularly when 15
thinking about construction impacts. I think it is our intention to always maintain bicycle and 16
pedestrian access across the rail even during construction but in the case that this is not feasible, 17
I think Council actually directed us to hire somebody like Charlie to lead a project to identify these 18
locations so that we could be ready, perhaps even ahead of rail grade construction, with crossings 19
so that – for example, school access to Gunn and – I don’t know if Fletcher comes [from across 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
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3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1:40:24] but I guess with their new sustainability program, they probably do come across – 1
anyway, so that students accessing those schools could actually get across if Charleston and 2
Meadow were not open. 3
4
Vice-Chair Chang: That’s heartening to hear so let’s hope that this happens. The follow-on to that 5
is what’s our sense of what the timing of this would look like? Is this 10 years away then or is it...? 6
7
Commissioner Hechtman: We like to measure things in terms of Planning Commissioner terms. 8
9
Charlie Coles: Yeah. It’s difficult to answer at this point. This project we’re hoping to complete 10
summer of 2026. And again, the end goal is 15 percent design. So even getting to that stage is 11
going to take year and a half from now or so. 12
13
Vice-Chair Chang: Okay, so that’s a good segue for me for my next question. On Packet Page 46, 14
and I might need to translate that into – it’s report page 7. In the next steps section there’s a 15
sentence that says that the final evaluation criteria will be selected based on how well they 16
facilitate evaluation against the overarching set of established priorities, which makes sense, and 17
then the second part of the sentence says and how effectively they differentiate alternatives. My 18
question is is the thought that we are going to be – the final selection of criteria is going to happen 19
after the alternatives are already chosen? Because that seems like a – well, yeah. 20
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time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
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1
Charlie Coles: Yeah, thanks for the question. 2
3
Vice-Chair Chang: Uh-huh. 4
5
Charlie Coles: The outcome of Phase 1, the community engagement phase we’re in right now, is 6
to establish the design criteria. That will be the design criteria for how we evaluate alternatives 7
during Phase 2. The evaluation of alternatives will be in Phase 2. We won’t be adjusting the design 8
evaluation criteria. 9
10
Vice-Chair Chang: Great. Thank you. That’s great to hear. Otherwise, it’s like a moral hazard 11
problem. Okay. But in the selection of the criteria, we’re hoping to, without knowing what the 12
alternatives are, chose ones that will help us differentiate the future alternatives. Got it. Okay. 13
So then if we look at Packet Page 118 and 119 – I’m going to have to translate that again – I think 14
these are the same maps that we’ve been looking – oh, no. We have 2 different sets of packets. 15
These are the same origin, destination maps that Commissioner Ji was asking about so it's 16
Kittelson Page 60 and 61. I understand now what the shading is about but if you look at the 17
shaded areas, they’re particularly strangely shaped. For example, if you look at page 60, there’s 18
like a big panhandle, right? And, well, you see it on both of them. How were those areas chosen? 19
Because I understand that we’re doing counts per square mile but what – we’re not seeing a 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
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bunch of pixels here so how, yeah, how are we looking at this and is it causing – this is a overall 1
data question because I think it might also address the question that Commissioner Hechtman 2
had asked. I’m just wondering about how the data comes in. Is that what’s driving the shapes of 3
these areas? 4
5
Charlie Coles: Thanks for the question. We define the shapes and the shapes are the same – 6
they’re called transportation analysis zones – that are in the VTA, Valley Transportation 7
Authority, model. We are using the same – they’re called TAZs, or transportation analysis zones 8
– that are in the VTA model. And we did this for the big data analysis to be able to compare to 9
other data sources that we are using from the VTA model. Much like Commissioner Hechtman 10
was pointing out. Those are the same shapes. 11
12
Vice-Chair Chang: That’s why when we’re looking at the population growth map, the population 13
growth’s actually going to occur in a much more narrow area but these areas were chosen to 14
match VTA data. 15
16
Male: [Inaudible 1:45:25]. 17
18
Vice-Chair Chang: Okay. 19
20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
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Female: Yeah. 1
2
Vice-Chair Chang: That’s really helpful. All right. I think that’s it for my questions for now. Thanks. 3
4
Chair Akin: All right. Commissioner Peterson followed by Commissioner Templeton. 5
6
Commissioner Peterson: All right. Can we put the map back up with the walk analysis? Think it 7
was the 5 minute. And while we’re getting there, I just want to say how much I appreciate this 8
being that I use the Caltrain and I walk that this looks very familiar because if you’re a walker in 9
Palo Alto, this is essentially what Palo Alto does look like. You’re locked into the Caltrain stations. 10
And my kids use the Caltrain stations and they go to the San Antonio to go to the movies and 11
come back on their own. Two questions on this. One of them is are we covering – I know we’re 12
not the Art Commission but if anyone’s noticed, the Caltrain stations don’t necessarily have a lot 13
of – [no one 1:46:31] really put any money into the budget for the [art] [inaudible 1:46:33]. I 14
don’t think there’s a single art installation at either Cal. Ave. or San Antonio. Palo Alto station’s 15
basically like a art deco on its own so it doesn’t need anything. 16
17
Chair Akin: Does this constitute a clarifying question? 18
19
Commissioner Peterson: It is. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
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1
Chair Akin: Okay. 2
3
Sylvia Star-Lack: Those stations are operated by Caltrain. 4
5
Commissioner Peterson: That’s what I thought the answer would be. We don’t get – is there a 6
way we’d put art and point it towards the station from [inaudible 1:47:03]? 7
8
Sylvia Star-Lack: We have at Cal. Ave., right? [With the 1:47:07] fountain... 9
10
Commissioner Peterson: Right, right. 11
12
Sylvia Star-Lack: ...and – yeah, so we... 13
14
Female: [Inaudible 1:47:08]. 15
16
Sylvia Star-Lack: ...do what we – that’s right. There’s the mural in the Cal. Ave. underpass. 17
18
Commissioner Peterson: Yeah. Okay. That answers the question on the art. I was almost certain 19
that was going to be the answer on that. The other one is I can give you some bonus points here 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
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3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
on the transportation here. Let’s see. Can we zoom in and can I draw on the screen? Think I’m 1
able to draw on here, aren’t I? 2
3
Male: [Yep]. [Inaudible 1:47:32]. 4
5
Commissioner Peterson: Let’s see. Bottom. There it is. I saw it. All right. And can we zoom in? 6
Make a – the walking map. I’m a walker so zoom into the walking map as far as we can. A little 7
bit more. Is there any way to go towards Cal. Ave. a little bit? We’re on the bike – that’s the bike 8
path. Yeah, the other map. There we go. All right. I’ll see how well I can draw here. I think there’s 9
a flaw in the dataset, which there always is, of course, right? Especially if it’s VTA and it’s covering 10
the whole region. What’s the odds they got this one little street right? I brought this up a while 11
back that there’s a walking path that’s just not recognized as a walking path, which is what I 12
happen to use because to get to Cal. Ave., there is a huge – what do you call – apartment complex 13
there with locked gates. Even though it looks like the train station’s right there, well, you actually 14
have to walk around. But there’s a shortcut here and I’m going to – let’s see. Right – oops. Let’s 15
use red. Can I change the size of the – here we go. Just right there. 16
17
Female: It’s not showing for us. Oh, there it is. [Yeah] [inaudible 1:49:05]. 18
19
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
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3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Commissioner Peterson: Oh, okay. Oop. We’re there. Okay, let’s try it one more time. Now I know 1
this is like leading theory too. We have to do this in class at Stanford to make sure we have the 2
students all draw on the screen. Supposed to be the difference between understanding and not 3
understanding. There is an old bridge at the back of the parking lot for the Caltrain station and I 4
don’t think this analysis took that into account because that would mean if you – Oregon 5
Expressway is essentially like – it’s like a medieval-level fortress of something to cross. It really 6
bisects the City. But that old bridge you can walk across. You’re basically in no-man’s-land. It’s an 7
[RV 1:49:49] zone essentially because nobody’s back there. But it’s a shortcut to get to Ventura 8
from the Caltrain station and everybody uses it. As soon as anybody gets off that Caltrain, half 9
the people head for Cal. Ave., the other half cross that little bridge for Ventura, try not to get run 10
over by somebody [inaudible 1:50:05] across the bridge. So the walkability here is clearly – that 11
whole Ventura there. See? You’ve done a great job. You have solved the walkability... 12
13
Sylvia Star-Lack: So... 14
15
Commissioner Peterson: ...of North Ventura. 16
17
Sylvia Star-Lack: I wish we had. That bridge is a vehicle bridge. 18
19
Commissioner Peterson: Yes. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
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3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Sylvia Star-Lack: There is no formal sidewalk... 2
3
Commissioner Peterson: Right. 4
5
Sylvia Star-Lack: ...on there. 6
7
Commissioner Peterson: You have to walk in the middle of it so you don’t get hit. 8
9
Sylvia Star-Lack: Right, which this analysis would not have allowed, I believe. 10
11
Commissioner Peterson: Interesting. Okay. 12
13
Sylvia Star-Lack: Because we’re only – I think they only used places where there were sidewalks. 14
15
Commissioner Peterson: Right. 16
17
Sylvia Star-Lack: So someone in a wheelchair would not – would have to be in the road. 18
19
Commissioner Peterson: Right. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
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3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Sylvia Star-Lack: Right, so yeah. 2
3
Commissioner Peterson: I assumed that was probably the answer to it as well. I just want to 4
reinforce that that it is a great walking path. It’s used as a walking path. If it could be solved – the 5
bridge would probably have to be a one-way bridge or turned into a walking bridge only. But I 6
think there is a de facto walking path basically from Peers Park down across Cal. Avenue, through 7
the parking lot of the Caltrain station, and on through Ventura that is unsafe but I think with some 8
attention, it could be made safe. Thank you. 9
10
Chair Akin: Commissioner Templeton? 11
12
Commissioner Templeton: Thank you so much, Chair, and thank you for the heads-up of giving 13
the next speaker when we’re backlogged like that. That’s very helpful for me so I don’t get excited 14
and then disappointed 5 times in a row. I’m going to acknowledge again that I know why we’re 15
here and that is to give you feedback. And I will acknowledge again that I’m excited about all this 16
stuff and sometimes that’s going to come across as pretty intense and I don’t mean it in any way 17
against any individual here. But I’ve also got history of trying to work on these issues and it’s 18
pretty frustrating to be confronted with the lack of change over the years with some of these 19
issues. That’s not you personally. I don’t know how long you’ve been working on this. Doesn’t 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
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3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
mean it’s the same amount of time I have. That all caveated, I just want to circle back to what 1
Commissioner Ji said. These are also my comments. Let’s please bring up that map again. As 2
someone who lives in this part of Palo Alto, I am surprised – let’s zoom back out. And we want to 3
look at the – yeah. I really don’t know how you can – one, can talk about these things without 4
sufficiently covering Barron Park. It’s really unimaginable. There is so much foot and bike traffic 5
happening in Barron Park and I would say it’s equivalent, if not in excess of, what’s happening in 6
other parts of the City. 7
8
We have a major high school and a major middle school there, not to mention 2 elementary 9
schools in this neighborhood. And it’s just really unimaginable that those are considered low risk, 10
or whatever it’s called, intersections. I’m telling you this because we’re on the record, because 11
we’re talking about Barron Park, and because we need to make sure that the team – not 12
necessarily an individual here – and I know you are passionate about all the stuff that’s happening 13
on bikes and pedestrians and you know this but what we’re seeing reflected here does not reflect 14
my experience in the 20 years living in Palo Alto. I would encourage you to figure out what the 15
root cause is of why that’s not being studied or included and address it before the next phase of 16
the project. Because if this comes back and it is as incomplete, we’re not going to forget. We’ll 17
remind you again. It’s not personal but it is personal to those of us that are living in this area. 18
Okay. Can we also go to the one that has the shades of blue and orange, please? The slide? And 19
I’m just going to echo what Commissioner Hechtman said about the color. My printout is entirely 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
in black and white, which is fine, I understand, for economic reasons but I would encourage 1
anyone creating a map that they’re going to print 50 pages of in black and white to use something 2
discernable. I’m sure you have a copy of it now and you can see that. There are tricks to doing 3
that that we have seen in other presentation elements from staff. 4
5
Jennifer Armer: And they were requested to be printed in color, so that was intended to be 6
provided in color. 7
8
Commissioner Templeton: Aw. That’s very thoughtful. I wish that had happened. Anyway, okay, 9
so looking at this, are these dark shades that are happening in the bottom right area Target and 10
Walmart? Is that... 11
12
Charlie Coles: Yeah, thanks for the question. Yeah, so the data doesn’t provide us with the 13
granularity to tell you specifically what stores people are going to and from. 14
15
Commissioner Templeton: I’m not asking the data, my friend. 16
17
Charlie Coles: Okay. 18
19
Commissioner Templeton: I think that’s the area. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Charlie Coles: Right. 2
3
Commissioner Templeton: [Okay 1:55:49]. 4
5
Charlie Coles: But just to clarify, yeah, this is the – those are called the San Antonio... 6
7
Sylvia Star-Lack: Center. 8
9
Charlie Coles: ...Center. This is... 10
11
Commissioner Templeton: Yeah. 12
13
Charlie Coles: When we see the data as it comes out and we compare that with our understanding 14
of the local... 15
16
Commissioner Templeton: Hold on. I’m going to interrupt. You don’t need to explain. I get all 17
that. I just wanted to make sure I was oriented because that’s not in Palo Alto. Right? Just trying 18
to figure out oh, we have – what’s shown here are shopping hubs, right? The shopping center 19
nearest us in Mountain View and California Avenue. Okay. Where is Gunn on this? I’m going to 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
just conjecture that Gunn has a very large number of trips given the size of the school? Is there a 1
reason that it’s – would it be a darker color or was it simply not studied? 2
3
Charlie Coles: It was studied and it’s shown there. 4
5
Commissioner Templeton: Where? 6
7
Charlie Coles: The shape of Gunn High School you can see... 8
9
Commissioner Templeton: I see the green part. 10
11
Charlie Coles: ...overlaps with... 12
13
Commissioner Templeton: Oh, is that blue over it? 14
15
Charlie Coles: Yeah, so there’s a what looks like on my screen a light kind of yellow shading 16
representing the shape of the property that represents Gunn High School. That’s where Gunn 17
High School is located. The Gunn High School – I’m calling it property... 18
19
Commissioner Templeton: Mm-hm. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Charlie Coles: ...does cover a couple of the transportation analysis zones that I was mentioning, 2
the polygons that you see. To answer your question, it was included in the analysis. 3
4
Commissioner Templeton: Thank you. Yeah, it was not visible on the version I had but I see it 5
zoomed in that there is blue overlaying the other color that’s there. Okay. What strikes me here 6
is possibly an improvement to your map because Gunn High School has fluctuating demand on 7
our transportation systems that’s very connected to the schedule but that destroys the 8
movement on Arastradero twice a day. And so it’s not – this diagram as it’s designed is not 9
reflective of the traffic situation. I would say I’d rather go to Target than to Gunn at 8 in the 10
morning or 3 in the afternoon. Right? Given that I have to drive this path to get to and from school 11
for my kids, I’m experiencing it and it’s pretty painful. The reason I’m telling you that is are we 12
designing for the average or the maximum use? And what would be the most useful to show to 13
the Council when they’re making decisions? Okay, so that’s – priorities on page 167. Okay. Do 14
you want feedback on this list of priorities? Yes? 15
16
Chair Akin: We’re on clarifying questions now. I hope to organize the rest of the discussion so 17
that we get a focused discussion of the priorities. 18
19
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
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Commissioner Templeton: Oh. This was my first – I waited 30 minutes to ask this question. I would 1
love to ask it now, Chair. Would you be willing to indulge me? 2
3
Chair Akin: If it’s a clarifying question, sure. 4
5
Commissioner Templeton: Yeah, it is. Thank you. That’s why I said I was going to go ahead and 6
ask it. On that note, I was very patient and waited my turn. I’m going to ask my question. The 7
question is why are we not talking about the other reasons for crossing like connecting 8
neighborhoods? And I bring this up because people that need to connect with their friends, I 9
don’t see anything like that. Do you think that there’s something in here that’s including personal 10
relationships? There’s a story that I’m not going to get into – it was very sad – about people trying 11
to connect with their friends at Gunn High School that lived in East Palo Alto and had a difficult 12
time reaching them. And I think the same is true about people that live across the train tracks. 13
And I don’t know where that is in here. Did you intend to include it? Is that the kind of feedback 14
you’d be looking for? 15
16
Charlie Coles: I’m happy to respond to that. Yeah, thanks for that perspective. This is the exact 17
kind of feedback we’re looking for. 18
19
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
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Commissioner Templeton: Okay. Well, I will get into that. And personal security, I assume, is 1
separate from safety? In other words, not dying when you are on the railroad tracks. 2
3
Charlie Coles: I’m sorry. Could you repeat your question? You’re asking... 4
5
Commissioner Templeton: I’m trying to distinguish if personal security includes safety? 6
7
Charlie Coles: It does. 8
9
Commissioner Templeton: Okay. 10
11
Charlie Coles: Safety can be somewhat of a broad term. I think the... 12
13
Commissioner Templeton: It looks like it’s crime focused and I was wondering – I’m thinking 14
about particularly the suicides on the train tracks and that is not shown as a consideration so I’m 15
asking specifically if you’re including that in crime or if that’s something we could potentially add 16
in the future? 17
18
Charlie Coles: Yeah, so just to clarify. Crime prevention through environmental design. This is a 19
standard of practice where you’re designing a facility to discourage unwanted behavior, so to 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
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speak, is maybe the simplest way to explain that. You could think of this like including ample 1
lighting, making sure that there are direct lines of paths so that more people can see into this 2
area. More eyes on the street, so to speak, in theory prevents people from doing unwanted types 3
of behaviors. Hopefully that clarifies what this definition has been... 4
5
Commissioner Templeton: No, but I... 6
7
Charlie Coles: ...as it’s been written. But again, we’re open to feedback and we appreciate your 8
perspectives. 9
10
Commissioner Templeton: Yeah, we’ll get into it more later. I was thinking more along the lines 11
of preventing sexual assaults at underpassings, which is something we’ve had to deal with at the 12
California Avenue. And we definitely want to do that. And we also want to have safer crossings 13
that don’t provide opportunities for impulsive undesirable actions affected by other mechanisms. 14
Okay. That’s all for now. Oh, the rail grading. The other thing I wanted to clarify, because it didn’t 15
get brought up, is I was on the XCAP and we talked a lot about how important these crossing are 16
at that time. I think that was 2018 – oh, no, must have been 2019 that we talked about it. And 17
I’m sure it preexisted that conversation as well. But the primary learning there was that around 18
the Loma Verde – it’s such a long stretch either way to bike – that we really would like to see an 19
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underpass at that place. That was the major feedback from the group of 20 or so people working 1
on how to best provide an underpass. Thank you. 2
3
Chair Akin: Thank you all. Fortunately, most of my clarifying questions have already been covered, 4
which is exactly as I expected. But I do have a couple left. You’ve heard a good bit of feedback – 5
I made notes about Figure 4, Figure 23, Figure 19 – about how well the Existing Conditions Report 6
is communicating its conclusions and its data. The clarifying question, I guess, is how much 7
feedback do you want on the Existing Conditions Report or is that already cast in concrete? 8
9
Charlie Coles: Appreciate the question. We’re open to all feedback. I think this is helpful for us as 10
professionals as we’re moving through this project to be taking this feedback into consideration 11
as it comes. We do have a published Existing Conditions Report. We will be using that report 12
throughout the project and we want to make sure we have it right. There will be opportunities 13
to summarize, present the data as we move through the project again and again. We will have a 14
final plan which will likely have an existing conditions chapter so there are opportunities for 15
refinement. Thank you. 16
17
Chair Akin: Yeah, given the mechanisms that you’re using, I understand why it’s difficult to create 18
graphics that might be the most informative because there are limits on the resolution and 19
character of the data but perhaps additional explanation might be worthwhile. And the last 20
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question I have for clarifying concerns a little bit about our process for the rest of the discussion. 1
And this dovetails with one of Vice-Chair Chang’s questions. I was surprised to see in the staff 2
report the order in which you were seeking feedback, first to prioritize crossing locations and 3
then second to provide feedback on the evaluation framework. I know that one of the criteria 4
that I would use to prioritize locations is not in the existing evaluation framework so my 5
inclination would be to try and get feedback on that first and then to move to locations. Was 6
there was a reason you wanted to do it the other way or is it unimportant from your point of 7
view? 8
9
Charlie Coles: Yeah. I appreciate that perspective. I’m happy for the conversation to proceed 10
however you feel appropriate though I would just clarify that we’re really not looking for any kind 11
of final decision on where the future crossing locations would be. This is merely an exercise to 12
get early input and bring the community along through the process. And it also gives the project 13
team some important information about where the community thinks we should be prioritizing 14
our efforts. Because we are limited in scope and schedule, we do need to prioritize. 15
16
Chair Akin: Sure. All right. I see we have another clarifying question from Commissioner Peterson. 17
18
Commissioner Peterson: The Churchill Viaduct. What are you looking for regarding that? Or is 19
that outside the discussion? 20
_______________________
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1
Charlie Coles: That would be outside of this discussion. 2
3
Commissioner Peterson: Okay. Thank you. 4
5
Chair Akin: And Commissioner James. 6
7
Commissioner James: Just one last question. A number of the locations to be considered, the A 8
through F, align with creeks. And it may be obvious to others why that is but it’s not obvious to 9
me and I wonder if you could just explain that a little bit. 10
11
Charlie Coles: Yeah, happy to. Many of the locations presented in the staff report and the Existing 12
Conditions Report builds off of previously identified locations. That also includes locations that 13
us as professionals have identified through our review of the existing conditions data as well as 14
through field visits and things of that sort. The creek crossings have come up multiple times and 15
they’re seen as areas where there’s available right-of-way of work with potentially. That’s my 16
understanding of why they’ve been brought up in previous studies and are presented again here. 17
18
Commissioner James: I’m just – so there is a right-of-way advantage that’s adjacent to those 19
creeks? Or there may be? 20
_______________________
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1
Charlie Coles: There may be. It’s just recognizing space, that there’s potentially space to work 2
with. 3
4
Commissioner James: On either side. 5
6
Charlie Coles: On either... 7
8
Commissioner James: Or directly adjacent to. 9
10
Charlie Coles: Right. And on either side of the Caltrain corridor. 11
12
Commissioner James: Okay. So it in no way sort of makes construction easier or – there’s 13
obviously existing infrastructure but I’m just curious what the – it seemed very attractive in a 14
certain way. It’s the only open space along the whole corridor pretty much, but... 15
16
Charlie Coles: Yeah. 17
18
Commissioner James: ...I just wanted to make sure I fully understood why we align so many times 19
with creeks. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
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3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Charlie Coles: Yeah, I really appreciate that question. Based on our understanding with engineers 2
on the team, when you actually start doing work around the creeks, things can become more 3
complicated. The Midtown Connector Feasibility Study, it’s a document that’s mentioned in the 4
Existing Conditions Report that looked at alignments through Midtown along Matadero Creek 5
and some of those similar complications came up through that process is my understanding. Even 6
though that project’s – the final plan was dated 2016. 7
8
Chair Akin: All right. I see no other clarifying question requests so we have an opportunity here 9
for public comment. Ms. Dao, do we have any commenter? 10
11
Veronica Dao: I have no speakers. 12
13
Chair Akin: Very good. If my fellow Commissioners are amenable, we can proceed to the next 14
part of the discussion. If anyone needs a break, we can also arrange that. All right. I have one 15
request for a break so 8:00. Let’s do that. Can we do this in 5 minutes or do we need 10? All right, 16
5-minute break then, please. Welcome back, everyone. I would like to set a frame to continue 17
the rest of the discussion. If we have further questions about the Existing Conditions Report, let’s 18
try and get those out of the way first so that the rest of the discussion we’re all fully informed. I 19
suspect after the clarifying questions, we may not have any but I’d like to cover them, like to 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
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reserve a space for that just in case. And then I think the best approach is to review the draft 1
design priorities and evaluation criteria next. That’s partly because as I suggested to Mr. Coles, 2
we may have some suggestions there that affect how we prioritize the crossing options. Let’s try 3
and tackle those second. And then to wrap up, let’s offer our advice about prioritizing the 4
crossings. If that’s acceptable to everyone, then let’s start off by seeing if anyone has any further 5
comments or questions about the Existing Conditions Report. Commissioner Ji. 6
7
Commissioner Ji: Thank you, Chair. I think we’ll know where we we’re going back to. Slide 10. All 8
right. I guess my commentary shouldn’t come as a surprise but I’m a little bit disappointed about 9
the current size of the study area. I do think that the definition of the study area is particularly 10
important for this project. In fact, in the Existing Conditions Report the study area is named by 11
name 153 times meaning it’s very used for the calculations that we might use the defining criteria 12
for. So I think it’s very important to consider how we define the study area. Personally, I think 13
that the study area should extend pretty significantly further – I guess we’ll just say bottom left. 14
I get my geography a little bit confused given the angle – but into the Barron Park neighborhood. 15
Especially because in the Existing Conditions Report, there’s a lot of discussion of major 16
destinations that are in that area. The one I think about particularly is Gunn High School and other 17
nearby schools. I think that it’s a little bit misleading to not include a significant portion of 18
Arastradero Road when defining the study area. That’s my comment there. And then I want to 19
go back to another point that I made during my clarifying questions about the 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
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time slot which is that living pretty smack-dab in the middle of this section, I’ll you right now that 1
the busy times can extend significantly past 7. 2
3
If I were leave my house at 7, I would still be very congested and so I think that we should be 4
extending the time period. In fact, the graph actually included in the Existing Conditions Report 5
only goes until 6 even though the study time period is defined as 7. I think that there is an 6
opportunity to collect more data there. And then I’ll reiterate my concern for the LTS4 usage. I 7
totally understand where we’re coming from here with the LTS metric but I do think maybe if it’s 8
just for the purposes of this discussion or this diagram or this report that we do include the 9
intersection at Los Robles and El Camino Real, which I’ve previously stated, into this diagram so 10
as to better help the public and those deciding make a decision here. And then can we go to the 11
next slide? Yes, the one we’ve also been talking about a lot. A lot of the way I think about it is we 12
– I think it’s important to think about not just trips to and from collectively but I think it’s 13
important to think about the exact route in which people are going, right? If, for example, the 14
route is, I don’t know, from Ventura to Cal. Ave., there’s not very much the crossing is going to 15
impact. But I think if we have the data, which it seems like we do have this available, to be able 16
to kind of draw some kind of diagram that shows the heavy routes of where people are going 17
instead of having the to and from layered and stacked on top of each other, I think, would be 18
pretty useful for that. 19
20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
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3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
And then I think I have a couple other small nit comments which is on Packet Page 141 on the 1
bottom, Figure 3, Palo Alto 2012 BPTP Bike Boulevard Network, that diagram’s just not readable. 2
Just a small comment. It’s neither readable on the digital version or on the paper version. And 3
then those are all of my comments for now on the Existing Conditions Report. Thank you. 4
5
Chair Akin: Thank you. And next I have Vice-Chair Chang and then Commissioner Peterson. 6
7
Vice-Chair Chang: Once we move on to discussion about criteria, I think this comment will 8
become much more obvious but I think it would be really valuable. On the narrative, there is 9
quite a lot of information about big destinations that folks are headed to. I think it would be 10
helpful to have a map that actually just showed those destinations because as we looked at the 11
2 maps that were blue and orange in the presentation, I understand why the blocks, the polygons, 12
were crafted as is but as a result and also as a result of the measurement, which I think is like per 13
square mile, what we don’t see are these real hot spots. So if something like Gunn is a hot spot 14
where if it – Gunn’s area, I think, is much less than a square mile and Gunn on the map also spans 15
like 2 different polygons. I think it would be really valuable to see that. Okay, then another 16
question I had was around – this is just more broadly a clarifying question that I should’ve asked. 17
In the staff report, when you’re looking at the draft design priorities – so this is Staff Report Page 18
5 and it’s also in the appendices again – there’s a priority that’s called enhanced user experience 19
and it talks about vulnerable populations. What does vulnerable populations mean? This is just a 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
clarifying question so that later on when we move on to the discussion of the actual priorities we 1
have a common understanding. 2
3
Charlie Coles: I’m happy to answer that now. Thank you for the question. Typically when we think 4
of vulnerable populations, we think of people who have difficulty moving, so people who may be 5
handicapped, have visual impairments, things of those sorts. 6
7
Vice-Chair Chang: Okay, so students, for example, then wouldn’t be – I mean, so in general, when 8
I think about vulnerable populations in the context of traffic safety, I think of all peds and bikes 9
in addition. I think there’s many different ways of looking at it. I just wanted to understand what 10
was meant by vulnerable populations in the report. 11
12
Charlie Coles: Yeah. Children, seniors. This is intended to be a bicycle and pedestrian facility so it 13
will be for all bikes and peds. 14
15
Vice-Chair Chang: Okay, so not – because I know that there was information about – in addition 16
to physical challenges or age or mobility challenges, there’s also something in the report also 17
about socioeconomic challenges. Is that also included in the vulnerable populations? 18
19
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Charlie Coles: Yeah. That’s a great comment. I think this is the type of feedback we’re looking for 1
through this. 2
3
Vice-Chair Chang: Okay. I don’t know that I have a perspective on that. I just wanted clarification, 4
so thanks. 5
6
Chair Akin: Next I have Commissioner Peterson and then Commissioner Templeton. 7
8
Commissioner Peterson: All right. Thank you, Chair. Can we go to slide number 10? All right. Let’s 9
zoom in on the walk path again and I’m going to do some drawing here. All right. I’m going to 10
push back a little bit on the idea of redefining the boundaries. And also I want to say that the – 11
I’ll call it the GIS, or the [gees 2:27:11], guess depends whether in Europe or the US. But I really 12
appreciate the data analysis that came in with this. I know that it came from a consultant and I 13
just want to say that I do appreciate this. I think it’s informative having somebody have done the 14
walking analysis here, a simulation or whatever it is, that came up with these times. One of the 15
things that stands out to me having this type of multidimensional data with color and dimension 16
is that – I heard you say that El Camino can be a barrier to crossing. And one of the things that 17
stands out to me in that is when we talk about the El Camino corridor for affordable housing, we 18
consider the housing on both sides of El Camino. But this is indicating that maybe affordable 19
housing is more applicable to one side of El Camino than the other simply because it has access 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
to, one, crossing the railroad tracks but also for me more importantly I think accessing the 1
Caltrain stations for the transportation. 2
3
I was a daily commuter for 2 years to San Francisco. It was great. We had a start-up office there. 4
And I’ve commuted to San Jose more times than I think I can remember. And the Caltrain is a 5
great transportation mode. There’s no traffic on the Caltrain. Other than the fact a lot of the 6
stations all look the same, it’s the hazard of getting off at the wrong station, but sometimes that’s 7
fun because you get to walk around and check the place out. Can you just elaborate a little bit on 8
is one side of El Camino, would you agree, probably better for affordable housing than the other 9
side of El Camino? Even though when we think about it, we just think about it as a corridor. But 10
if you take it in relation the Caltrain corridor, now they become symbiotic corridors. 11
12
Charlie Coles: Yeah. Thank you for the question. I appreciate the question and I don’t want to 13
opine on something that’s maybe not directly related to the feedback that we’re looking for today 14
but I do hear multiple questions from Commissioners around the shape of the study area. And I 15
maybe do want to, if I may, take a moment, Chair, just to maybe provide a bit of clarification? 16
17
Commissioner Peterson: That’s my question. Clarification. 18
19
Chair Akin: Yeah, certainly. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Charlie Coles: Thank you. As you see in the Existing Conditions Report, we have a variety of 2
different data that we’ve pulled together. Some of that data is focused within what we’re calling 3
our study area. There’s a section in there that actually shows all the locations for where you have 4
stop signs, signals, the pedestrian hybrid beacons, a lot of the existing pedestrian infrastructure. 5
Because we needed to do a detailed look into what we’re calling the study area, which is the area 6
most adjacent to where these future rail crossings will be. Having said that, there are many other 7
data sources that go well beyond the study area. The big data analysis, the bike and ped 8
accessibility analysis, this recognizes that a future bicycle and pedestrian tunnel, overpass will 9
have a wide-ranging effect, a citywide effect on travel. It has a potential to do that. The study 10
area, the way we’re thinking about it, is merely to focus in closest to the rail but recognizing that 11
we are thinking of this as a potential to affect travel citywide, recognizing south of Oregon 12
Expressway, what we’re calling south Palo Alto, as most likely to benefit from a future crossing 13
like this. I hope that just clarifies a little bit about how we’re thinking about what we’re calling 14
the study area. And I appreciate the graphics that you’re putting up there. Thank you. 15
16
Commissioner Peterson: No problem. 17
18
Chair Akin: Is that it, Commissioner Peterson? 19
20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
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Commissioner Peterson: That’s it. Thank you, Chair. 1
2
Chair Akin: Okay. I have Commissioner Templeton, then Commissioner Hechtman. 3
4
Commissioner Templeton: Thank you. I agree that there is housing in the areas that are red. I 5
think there is also additional housing on the other side of El Camino that deserves bike and 6
pedestrian access and services as well. I’m sure that’s not what you were implying but 7
nonetheless, I wanted to opine on that. I wanted to add to Vice-Chair Chang’s comments about 8
additional things to consider vulnerabilities and I would say mental illness should be included as 9
a vulnerability especially for people crossing the railroad tracks as we have again and again and 10
again had to experience as a community. I wanted to talk again about the orange and blue 11
because that’s what the Chair has asked us to talk about. The orange and blue graphs. I wonder 12
if in a future version of this graph you can identify these high-traffic destinations by their 13
likelihood to be adopted by more bike and pedestrian users. For example, California Avenue. It’s 14
an area we really want to encourage bike and pedestrian users. Gunn High School. We want as 15
many as possible. Get those cars off the road, right? However, when I go to Target, I have to take 16
the car, right? Well, not you. I didn’t say you don’t. I said I do because I try not to go very often 17
so when I go, I bring a haul home. But the point that Ms. Star-Lack is making is of course there 18
are people who want to use that too, right? 19
20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
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3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
But what I’m trying to get at, and possibly I mentioned this earlier and I’m just trying another 1
angle, is the way that it’s depicted on the map gives an outsized priority to servicing that area 2
versus the other 2 areas because of the way the shading is done, because it’s not taking into 3
account a smaller area, a targeted area, or times of day. If there’s a way that we can say given 4
these high-traffic areas, these are the ones that we have a higher priority on for everyone versus 5
for people with the facilities to have long-haul biking and pedestrian trolleys. One time I did have 6
that but after the kids were old enough to bike on their own and I still had the trailer, I could go 7
to Target but I can’t do that anymore. Okay. That’s all I wanted to say on that. Thank you. 8
9
Chair Akin: Thank you. I have Commissioner Hechtman, then Commissioner Ji. 10
11
Commissioner Hechtman: I guess my question is – I’ll ask the question and then I’ll explain. What 12
are we doing here tonight is my question. I thought the focus of this study session is for us to 13
identify hopefully some kind of consensus on 2 of the potential crossing locations, places to do a 14
most likely underground crossing of the railroad track that doesn’t exist today. That’s what I 15
thought we were here to do. And these diagrams and the data and the criteria will help inform 16
that choice but I don’t know how much they change that choice. Because one of the things we 17
have to recognize is – first of all, I think staff did a good job of explaining that we’re not limited 18
to what’s happening in the study area in making this decision. And in fact, I will preview for you 19
that one of the alternatives I like is E. And the reason I like E, which is not the most southerly but 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
the second-most southerly, is I think that will best serve all of this new development near 101 1
and San Antonio which is outside of the study area but it’s still addressed in a number of the 2
diagrams that are included in the Existing Conditions Report. I understand that we are looking at 3
the City as a whole and really only focusing on sort of south of Page Mill-Oregon because that’s 4
where the need is that at least we’re discussing today. 5
6
And so I want to confirm that what you’d like this evening to end with is to see if there’s 7
consensus on a couple of rail crossing because that’s how I read the staff report. And I think it 8
was number one on your list ahead of the criteria. Not necessarily that it was a higher priority 9
but I thought it was one of the ones. It was identify the crossing, identify the criteria, and I can’t 10
remember what the third one was. That’s what I’m asking, is are you hoping that we’ll give you 11
our impressions of A through F and you can see if there’s some uniform direction among the 12
Commission toward pursuing those? 13
14
Charlie Coles: Yeah. Thanks for the question. To clarify, tonight we are really looking for your 15
perspectives on the locations A through F. We’re not expecting a decision. 16
17
Commissioner Hechtman: Yeah. 18
19
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
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3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Charlie Coles: We also would be open to hearing from your perspectives and your understanding 1
of the local context are there certain things that we should be considering within the locations 2
we’ve identified? Are there other locations that we’ve completely missed that we need to take a 3
look at? That’s one level of input that we’re looking to gather this evening and that we’re hoping 4
to gather throughout all of the Phase 1 community engagement. Because that will help us to 5
think through where we want to prioritize our efforts for coming up with design concepts. As I 6
mentioned before, we have a scope of work with our project consultant team and so we do have 7
a limited number of crossing design concepts that we plan to come forward [inaudible 2:38:58] 8
community with and share them during Phase 2. And so there’s a set number and we want to 9
make sure that whatever we come forward with, at least the community has had an opportunity 10
to weigh in early and will have opportunities to weigh in again later throughout the project. The 11
second point regarding the evaluation criteria, understand there is a bit of a chicken-and-egg 12
thing happening here. I totally appreciate that. And again, just to emphasize, another outcome 13
of Phase 1 is to establish the evaluation framework for how we evaluate all alternatives, whatever 14
they may be – we don’t know what they’re going to be – during Phase 2. I think the way that the 15
Chair has characterized it makes a lot of sense from our perspective. Focusing on the evaluation 16
criteria, that’s most important, I would say, for this evening. Any input you can provide on the 17
locations, that’s also important. 18
19
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
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Commissioner Hechtman: Okay. And then in the long run, and maybe this is in Phase 2, a lot of 1
the information you’ve provided in the various mapping is the existing condition. This is how 2
traffic flows. This is how the bicyclists move and forth. This is where the walkers walk. Right? 3
Once you have identified alternatives and you’re studying them, at some point will there be 4
modeling about okay, if we put those 2 undercrossings in those locations, this is where the people 5
will bike and this is where the people will walk? Will we see that years from now? I’m just being 6
realistic about that. 7
8
Charlie Coles: Absolutely. Yeah. I appreciate that question. Yes, so the – at least at this point what 9
we’ve included in the draft evaluation criteria, you see the second item down, demand. That is 10
defined as the projected number of users during the weekday peak hour. That’s going to estimate 11
the number of people during the peaks would use this future crossing. Yeah. 12
13
Chair Akin: All right. I hope we can wrap up the comments on the Existing Conditions Report 14
quickly and then move on to the evaluation criteria. I have next Commissioner Ji and then 15
Commissioner Templeton. 16
17
Commissioner Ji: Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Mr. Coles, for your explanation of the study area. 18
Can you then clarify for me what exactly is the purpose of the study area as defined? I know that 19
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there’s lots of different datasets but what are you particularly hoping to use the study area 1
definition for? 2
3
Charlie Coles: Yeah. Again, as I stated, the definition of the study area was to focus in on collecting 4
specific data that we know is going to be relevant for the project in its immediate vicinity. That 5
was why we have a defined study area. 6
7
Commissioner Ji: Sure. But can you be more specific? My comment is I feel like there are areas 8
that are outside the study area that are also pretty important. And I am trying to just understand 9
whether – what kinds of criteria are pertinent only to the study area that aren’t pertinent to the 10
other areas? Drawing the study area as such, if you were to draw it in a different way, what actual 11
impact would you see across the decision-making? Does that make sense? 12
13
Charlie Coles: It does. I think I see what you’re getting at. My understanding is that it wouldn’t 14
have an impact on the decision-making. It’s really – again, I hate to be repeating myself but 15
there’s a certain level of granularity that we need and most of that granularity needs to be closest 16
to the rail corridor. Because eventually we’re going to need to come up with design concepts and 17
we need to know what intersection modifications are needed, what bike, walk treatments are 18
needed to be able to connect to and from the future rail crossings. As you start to expand and if 19
there are potential impacts to that future – future impacts to the overall network, those will also 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
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be explored. But I think I understand what you’re asking and hopefully that helps to clarify our 1
understanding and perspective of how we’ll be approaching this project going forward. 2
3
Commissioner Ji: Fundamentally it’s moderately arbitrary is kind of what you’re saying? For 4
example, if I were to draw it at like, I don’t know, Bryant instead of Middlefield or – I don’t actually 5
know where – yeah, so let’s say I use Bryant, right? It’s equidistant between the rail crossing and 6
El Camino. You’re making a pretty fair area on both sides. Would this change the way in which 7
we’re doing any of the thinking about the study area? 8
9
Charlie Coles: Yeah, so I don’t think that it would. I will also cue in Amanda with Kittelson & 10
Associates to see if she has something that she would like to add. 11
12
Amanda Leahy: Yes. Sure. I will also say we have had multiple back-and-forths about where we 13
draw the boundaries for this. When the project was described, it was simply the Caltrain corridor 14
between Oregon Expressway and San Antonio. And talking with the project team, we knew we’d 15
need to gather data beyond this area. We wanted to define a study area that made sense. And I 16
think Sylvia described it well talking about the major parallel corridors that carry vehicle traffic. 17
That is how we chose to define it. We are still – in the maps that we’ve talked about, we’re 18
showing transportation analysis zones outside of our study area. We also have data outside of 19
our study area. I suppose you did describe it well. It is somewhat moderately arbitrary but we do 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
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need to have a cutoff somewhere. And we do still have data beyond this area. We are still 1
analyzing it and summarizing it beyond this area. But we did want to put some boundary on 2
where the project team would be identifying recommendations for network access and 3
connections beyond the corridor crossing itself. Part of this project is looking at the on-street 4
connections and we will do that within the study area between Middlefield and El Camino Real 5
and Oregon Expressway and San Antonio. I think that’s the best way we could describe it. 6
7
Commissioner Ji: Thank you. I think you get where my feedback is going so I won’t continue to 8
reiterate but I just think that given that you refer to the study area over 150 times in the report, 9
I think it deserves some thought about how we’re defining this in a hopefully not so arbitrary 10
way. Thank you. 11
12
Chair Akin: All right. I have Commissioner Templeton and then Commissioner Peterson. 13
14
Commissioner Templeton: Thank you, Chair. Thank you again, Commissioner Ji, for those 15
comments. I am going to paraphrase, and feel free to interject if I get it wrong, but I think what 16
I’m hearing is – and what I identify with – is this could be a good question for your next public 17
meeting is where do you think people who are affected by these crossings live? And I wonder 18
just listening to the commentary from staff is perhaps that was not a consideration when you 19
were deciding the boundaries that you have to have. If I were, as somebody who lives there, to 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
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create those boundaries, I would have included my neighborhood because there’s no more 1
important intersections than those crossings for me in my life. That is constant. I have to wait 2
and wait. And if I’m going to send my kid to bike to the library, which I like to do and he likes to 3
do in the summer, I am afraid for him when I send him down Meadow because he has to cross 4
that crossing and El Camino. And so I don’t think of El Camino as the boundary of where I start to 5
care. It’s part of our life. Our life has to cross both of these major hazards regularly. What you’re 6
hearing from the 2 people on this Commission who live in the zone that you have constructed is 7
one was included but doesn’t feel that that was a large enough zone, one was excluded and 8
doesn’t feel like that was a large enough zone. 9
10
That is something you could potentially get more input on when you go to the next community 11
meeting. And I think it matters a lot. I think what you’re going to do is going to change the lives 12
of so many young people especially but the younger generation who are still actively biking and 13
those zippy older folks who are still biking are really going to benefit from this. The reason you’re 14
hearing this passionate feedback again and again because it doesn’t seem to have landed because 15
what we’re hearing back from you in response is well, we had to choose something. And so that’s 16
not good enough. You can choose better. And I hope you do. Thank you. 17
18
Commissioner Ji: Do you mind if I just jump on there? I want to echo Commissioner Templeton’s 19
comments and also provide a little bit more color as to why I’m very passionate about this. I 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
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crossed this intersection starting from like age 6 by myself basically going to Fairmeadow 1
Elementary School from this side so I’m very intimately familiar. Starting in middle school, we 2
were required to take classes at both JLS and Terman and so I frequently crossed this intersection 3
4, 5, 10 times per day. And then when I went to Gunn, I crossed this intersection even more than 4
that. And I’m also very invested in I think what folks have talked about for vulnerable populations. 5
My 84-year-old grandmother will bike across this intersection to come visit me and so I’m very 6
personally attached to the safety and the selection for some of these choices. Thank you. 7
8
Chair Akin: All right. Commissioner Peterson and then I will try and wrap up the round with a few 9
final comments. 10
11
Commissioner Peterson: Thank you, Chair. Do we have a slide with the proposed crossings? 12
13
Commissioner Ji: Think it’s early in the slide deck maybe, Veronica? 14
15
Commissioner Peterson: There we go. The question I have is these crossings essentially cross into 16
a small – I don’t want to call it a interstate but Redwood City and Mountain View are almost like 17
different countries. How do you get across Alma? 18
19
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
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Charlie Coles: Yeah, so the intention is to look at that as part of this project. One of the earlier 1
slides in the presentation mentions a program in the comprehensive plan and it states – if I were 2
to pull it up – it mentions not only crossing the Caltrain corridor but also Alma so we’ll be looking 3
at that as part of this. 4
5
Commissioner Peterson: And then let me just make a comment that there was an unhoused 6
person on California Avenue. Really nice guy. I used to talk with him. And he told me he couldn’t 7
get his cart under California Avenue because the way the gates were. Unfortunately he passed 8
away on a really cold night. I don’t know why he passed away but he did. It was really cold. But 9
just put in that consideration. I think it’s probably one population we don’t always think about 10
but can I push a cart through this underpass and get it up the other side and all the rest? Because 11
that was part of his life. And he was pretty cool because he actually kept the crime down in the 12
street. He used to tell me I chase everybody else away. He used to always tell me. I just want to 13
make that comment. Probably a design consideration we don’t always think of. 14
15
Chair Akin: Commissioner Hechtman, do you have a follow-up on the Existing Conditions Report 16
issues? 17
18
Commissioner Hechtman: No, I’ll pass. 19
20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
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Chair Akin: Okay. We’ll come back for the design criteria. All right. As staff knows, my main 1
concern about the existing conditions analysis is that we get [point 2:53:02] samples particularly 2
about trip counts near the tracks but we don’t have much information about connectivity. And I 3
just want to explain why I think that’s important to think about more carefully in the next steps. 4
Take a look at Packet Page 107. That’s the vehicle crossings for Meadow and Charleston. That is 5
Kittelson Page 51. All right. Notice that there – just look at the weekday chart. That’s all you need. 6
Notice that there are a lot more cars going westbound than eastbound. And that’s true for both 7
Charleston and Meadow. What that suggests to me is that people are not making round trips 8
back and forth on the same route. They’re making loops. And that means they’re crossing the 9
tracks at least twice at different points. So an analysis that assumes that each crossing is 10
independent of all the others won’t capture the actual behavior, which is serially dependent. 11
Where that comes into play is if you choose a crossing that meets the need for one part of a loop 12
but fail to choose a crossing that meets the need for the other part of the loop, then you don’t 13
get people taking the first part because they can’t complete the whole loop. That’s the serial 14
dependence issue. I understand why we’re not analyzing that this time around but I want to make 15
sure that it’s kept in mind. 16
17
And I bring that up because not only is it just an issue with the analysis in the Existing Conditions 18
Report but it affects the evaluation criteria too. And that is something that we need to talk about 19
tonight. That’s because you can’t really project demand if you don’t take into account the 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
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3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
dependencies between the demand at one place affecting the demand at the other. That’s the 1
fundamental concern I have about that analysis. I have pondered some ways you might be able 2
to do some work with the data you already have and there may be something you can do with 3
separating the origin and destination counts to estimate some paths without having to gather 4
more data. But if that comes up in the future, then I wanted to make sure you were aware. All 5
right. If there are no more comments for the moment about the Existing Conditions Report, I 6
would very much like to move on to the draft design priorities and evaluation criteria. All right. 7
Everyone ready to move on? I see Commissioner Templeton followed by Vice-Chair Chang. 8
9
Commissioner Templeton: Thank you. And I realize I forgot to mention a response to 10
Commissioner Hechtman’s what are we doing here tonight because I’m really – I appreciate that 11
question because we were not all on the same page. But I read the staff recommendation here 12
and it did ask for feedback for these things and we are spending a lot of time on it so I hear your 13
point but I think it has been a good discussion. All right, so for the comments I have on the 14
evaluation criteria, I think the maintenance item does not explicitly call out flooding risk or 15
dealing with flooding risk. And that was a major concern in our XCAP discussions around the 16
underpass. And what we found was that there was a lot of concern about flooding and needing 17
pumps and whatnot to deal with that so some of the options were excluded for those reasons. I 18
wonder if that would affect our underpass. And when I first moved to Palo Alto and I was biking 19
over to work at Google over there in the Mountain View, we had to underpass that was only open 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
under 101. The bike underpass is only open half the year because of flooding. So I’m not entirely 1
sure how this is going to work and I would like to see that flooding risk called out explicitly either 2
in terms of feasibility but also environmental impact. We have these underground aquifers in the 3
City and we’ve undergrounded a lot of our creeks. There’s a lot of reasons to call out our 4
recommended treatment of those underpasses in terms of flooding risk. That’s one area I’d add. 5
6
The other, for personal security, I really appreciate that you’ve talked about the crime along our 7
bike paths along the railroad because this is the number one feedback I get from my teenage 8
daughter when she and her friends want to bike out from Barron Park to Town & Country. It’s 9
dangerous for them. There’s often – I would say 50 percent of the time they encounter somebody 10
who is unpleasant towards young women on the bike path and it deters them, and we need to 11
think about that for these underpasses. I’m glad you have it in there but I also want to say I think 12
that is completely distinct from self-harm. That is something that this community needs and 13
wants to prioritize and I think it would be excellent for us to acknowledge that that is one of our 14
goals. If we’re prioritizing evaluation criteria and design priorities, we have to think about that. 15
And I know it’s unpleasant to talk about but I’m going to try to respectfully discuss but we have 16
seen some of the incidents regarding pedestrians that are crossing have a momentary dangerous 17
thought and act on it. So by providing these safer crossings, we’re going to reduce that and that’s 18
worth its weight in gold. That’s really important for our community. And if we’re calling things 19
out, we need to call that out explicitly so I’m going to urge one more time to add that to the list 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
of criteria. If you can’t, if it ends up being to many things and you need to consolidate, please at 1
least include that in the description. 2
3
And then I’m not sure how to phrase this, and maybe other people will have some suggestions, 4
but the interpersonal – like connecting people to other people, it sound obvious and I’m sure 5
that’s why it’s not here but we have – we discuss the ways of connecting people with their school 6
and with their shopping area and with their place of work and with their – taking Caltrain up to 7
the city, whatever it is. We need to also make sure that we’re connecting people with other 8
people. And why this is important is not just – I’ve given an example about friends at school trying 9
to connect across neighborhoods. We have socioeconomic things that you mentioned from 10
neighborhood to neighborhood. But also think about our seniors, our seniors who are going to 11
be connecting with other people. Yeah, they go shopping too but they also want to be with each 12
other and they want to be more easily connecting with each other. I just would like to see that 13
as a priority. But I would also like to hear what other people think about that. Those are my 3 14
suggestions for how to improve our design priority criteria. Thank you. 15
16
Chair Akin: Thank you, Commissioner Templeton. I have Vice-Chair Chang next and then 17
Commissioner Ji. 18
19
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Vice-Chair Chang: Great. I love being on this Commission because I wholeheartedly agree with all 1
the things that Commissioner Templeton said and they are different from the 3 things that I had 2
thought about. You had said maybe somebody can word it differently. I do think that when we 3
talk about overall priorities, we always talk about Palo Alto as being divided by the tracks and 4
divided by Alma so I think it’s an obvious priority that the reason why we’re doing this is to 5
connect – to make us feel like one community, one city. I’m saying all these things because I’m 6
interested in making sure that this happens instead of going into some purgatory of, I don’t know, 7
like the last one from 13 or 16 years ago. Okay, so then the other design priorities that I was 8
thinking about is partially included already in what’s stated in terms of mobility but I don’t think 9
it’s explicitly called out enough. So this might be the wording change type of thing. And again, 10
this is to hopefully light a fire under the powers that be that are funding. This is to keep our city 11
moving in the face of what’s a growing population. Particularly given the increase in housing. If 12
we’re really going to have 6,000 more units, that is a 20 percent plus increase in the existing units 13
in our city which is going to have somewhat proportional population increase. But our roads are 14
not widening and public transit is such that – when you hear business people, developers, as well 15
as – well, we just heard it tonight in fact – that they really think about parking because that makes 16
their housing development marketable. 17
18
In other words, people are all coming with cars and so this is going to keep us moving. And so 19
essentially it’s to – I know that we talked about future needs but really the future need is to 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
address a growing population and I think we should be explicit about that. Like a significantly 1
growing one. And then in terms of the evaluation criteria, I know that we talked about the 2
alignment of the facilities themselves, the crossings themselves, to be consistent with the CPTED 3
best practices but I think there’s crime and then there’s traffic safety. And so again, this is like an 4
overall priority. Divided city. We know that the kids have to cross these horrible – or everybody, 5
every vulnerable population, every nonvulnerable population, so I just think that it’s important 6
to – we don’t mention traffic safety explicitly and that is obviously one of the reasons that we’re 7
doing this. And then regarding the mobility criteria or the mobility design priority, what I think is 8
missing from this – and I already spoke about this when I was giving feedback on the existing 9
conditions – is I know that we tried to include the origin-destination analysis but somehow we 10
need to have – and I don’t quite know how we’re going to measure it but I really think – and I 11
think Commissioner Head Akin had emailed staff about this before which is we ought to look at 12
these hot spots across either side of the tracks and see – as I think about the locations to site the 13
crossings, really it should connect as many hot spots as possible in a direct line. 14
15
And I don’t think that our origin-destination maps are granular enough to give us a sense of that. 16
And I think obviously staff has highlighted what those hot spots are. And so that’s kind of what I 17
think should be encapsulated in the criteria which might not be quite there right now. And then 18
finally with respect to – you had said – oh, I’m sorry. Finally, you had said feedback on what those 19
– I’m going to call – local destinations might be. A couple that were not explicitly called out on 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Report Page 3, Packet Page 42, there’s the El Camino Real retail area that was highlighted in the 1
Bike Ped Plan. Again, if we were to make a map of sort of these destinations, that might be one 2
to add to it as well as the Midtown shopping area, which I think was alluded to somewhere else, 3
maybe in the existing conditions. And then obviously Gunn High School as we’ve mentioned many 4
times. But I, as a person who lives in that part of Palo Alto that’s in the 1.3 mile – like the largest 5
distance that doesn’t have – I don’t go to some of our local businesses just on the other side of 6
El Camino because it’s hard. Especially during rush hour. It’s easier for me to get all the way to 7
Mountain View and shop at Trader Joe’s and San Antonio than it is to go to Happy Donuts which 8
is, as the crow flies, like way closer. And so I think that that is one of those – it has everything to 9
do with everything that I talked about. Connecting our community, making us one city. All of that. 10
And so if we are able to show that on a map, it might actually change the face of our retail 11
vibrancy on El Camino and all sorts of other things. That’s it for my comments. Thank you. 12
13
Chair Akin: Commissioner Ji. 14
15
Commissioner Ji: Thank you, Chair. Well, again, wholeheartedly agree with my previous 16
commissioners and I have more additional topics that also I’d like to add. I really like Vice-Chair 17
Chang’s comments about the connectivity and the deltas between the start and the destination. 18
And I look at the replicate dataset and it does look like we are considering start and ends. And so 19
I wonder if there’s some metric we can say which is like if we were to add this connection, I don’t 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
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know, at spot B, let’s say, then it would reduce the amount of distance that people are traveling 1
by X percent. I think that there are ways to calculate that using the replicate dataset as is because 2
we have the start and end destination points. Or another way to look at that is how close can we 3
get to as the crow flies for these points? When adding that, I also want to echo Chair Akin’s 4
comments about taking the 2 crossings together in that the moment you add one crossing, it will 5
change the model in which you look at the second crossing. For example, the criteria might 6
suddenly say that [inaudible 3:09:53] crossings A and B are the best 2 crossings but it probably 7
doesn’t make sense to put them next to each other given that they’re only 2 or 3 blocks away. I 8
think that that’s something interesting to think about when looking at the criteria. Also just 9
having the modeling apply not just for one solo site but for a connected series of sites. 10
11
And here’s a small nit about the demand row in the improving mobility column. It says here that 12
the – the description is that projected number of users during weekday peak hour. I wonder it 13
just would be helpful to cross out weekday. I don’t know if it’s partic-, I think just peak congestion 14
in general. I assume that it’s probably a weekday but I just don’t know if that’s necessary at that 15
point. I’m not super sold on that specific point. And then I also want to heavily emphasize Vice-16
Chair Chang’s comments about future population. I think that the word projected in this subitem 17
really captures it pretty well but given the previous [heat 3:10:54] maps that we’ve seen, we do 18
see – anticipate significant population growth in some of our areas in kind of the top right 19
quadrant of the maps that we’ve described. And in addition, I think it’s important to think about 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
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the schooling impacts in particular. Based on the way the map’s drawn today, the area in the top 1
right would probably go to Gunn and so it would significantly even more congest what is already 2
now, if anyone tries to go in the morning, a very congested biking corridor. I hate to admit it but 3
when I was biking there, I’d see like 8 bikes trying to go all at the same time and I’m just trying to 4
imagine what it would be like to add potentially 2,000 more people going through that corridor. 5
6
And then I have kind of a clarifying question which is about the weighting. Suppose we have all 7
these design priorities. Are they all going to be consider equally weighted or what is that going 8
to be looking like when we get closer to that phase? 9
10
Charlie Coles: Yeah. I’m happy to answer that question. At this point, we’re not considering any 11
weighting of the different [inaudible 3:12:04] evaluation criteria. It would simply be – the way 12
we’re thinking about it is [inaudible 3:12:11] be presenting the results of the evaluation as 13
information and there won’t be a specific number result or anything like that that we come up 14
with. 15
16
Commissioner Ji: All right. Thank you. Those were all my comments. 17
18
Chair Akin: Commissioner Hechtman. 19
20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
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Commissioner Hechtman: Thank you. I’m looking at Packet Page 167, the list of draft evaluation 1
criteria. And so one thing I’m observing is there are 14 criteria listed here plus there may be more 2
added. Are we all literally on the same page? Good. Okay. What I’m noticing, I believe that 11 of 3
these criteria are specific to the immediate area of the crossing. Right where the crossing is. For 4
example, crossing length. Area A, that length to make it work might be 140 feet. Area B, 210 feet. 5
Whatever. That’s a criteria but it’s all about the location of the crossing. And I think 11 of these 6
are all except for accessibility, demand, and pedestrian and bicycle comfort. Those 3 criteria look 7
outside of the area of the crossing itself at really how it’s going to get used and where its users 8
are going to come from. And so one thing I think you might want to think about is breaking this 9
list of 14 into those 2 categories. And then within those – and I don’t really have any issues on all 10
of your criteria about the location of the crossing itself and its attributes. I really want to talk 11
briefly about the 3 that look outward from the crossing location because most of the 12
conversation I’ve heard tonight is – almost all of it is about that other than a few excellent points 13
about – a wheelchair has to be able to navigate this, whatever it is, and a person with a shopping 14
cart has to be able to navigate this, whatever it is. 15
16
But most what you’re hearing is about the people that are going to come from near and far and 17
so that’s these 3. And I think some of the suggestions that we’re hearing maybe would add to 18
those 3 with some other categories. But in terms of accessibility, I just want to point out that 19
what you’ve written here I really like. It’s citywide. This is clearly not limited to the study area 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
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even though you’ve defined a study area. The criteria isn’t walk and bike access within the study 1
area. It’s 15 minutes gets you far outside of the study area in both directions, on the El Camino 2
side and on the Middlefield side. I really like that. And I think why that’s important is I think the 3
theory that we’ll want to test through some of this criteria is if we build it, will they come? And 4
you want to believe that people will act in the interest of efficiency for themselves and take a 5
shorter distance as long as the safety factors are equivalent. And so I think that’s a really 6
important metric. And then demand is projected number of users. And I agree with 7
Commissioner Ji that we should think about the weekday peak hours. One of the things I’m 8
thinking is while weekday peak hours is really important to measure vehicle traffic and its 9
relationship with pedestrians and bicyclists, there’s a lot of biking and walking that happens 10
outside of vehicle peak hours, I think. 11
12
Like schools get let out 2:30 to 3, which I think is a little earlier than peak traffic hours but that 13
mass of 2,000 bicyclists create their own problems even when they’re not running into cars. And 14
so I think maybe think about whether demand should be looked at a little more broadly. And 15
then the third criteria that is really citywide, not crossing specific, is the pedestrian and bicyclists’ 16
comfort. And I just want to point out the way this has been written, extent to which existing 17
network would provide low-stress alternative access. Well, I think that – I’ll preview again, I like 18
Crossing B because it’s geographically logical. It’s the midpoint between the existing California 19
and the coming Meadow. But it doesn’t exist today and so we don’t have a network of safe biking 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
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and walking routes radiating out from it. And so if you keep existing here, what you’re going to 1
do is you’re going skew the results in favor of things that are proximate to the existing crossings 2
because that’s where more of the existing safety features radiate out from. I think on this one 3
you should think about extent to which – maybe something like existing or modified bike and 4
pedestrian network would provide low-stress access. Because I think what’s going to happen in 5
the long run with this is when you identify a new crossing location, wherever it is, and you get to 6
the point where you’re going to start to radiate out and design the connectivity that doesn’t exist 7
today to the network that does. That’s my suggestion on that one. And those are my suggestions 8
on the draft criteria. Thanks. 9
10
Chair Akin: Thank you. All right. I have a few minor, fairly concrete. Under improved mobility, I’d 11
suggest adding a qualitative description – a qualitative criterion: potential to encourage mode 12
shift. As the population increases and as we expect the trips in this area to increase, it might be 13
a useful criterion to select those that will encourage a little more move to active transportation 14
modes. Under enhance user experience, I have a comment about the crossing design itself. Some 15
crossing designs have ramps that run parallel to the tracks and then make a sharp turn to 16
implement the crossing. I see that that might be a safety issue for shared-use paths because a 17
pedestrian coming out of the tunnel and a cyclist coming fast down a ramp won’t be able to see 18
each other until close to the turn. It’s also, I think, a personal security issue because an assailant 19
waiting in the end of the tunnel will be invisible to somebody, pedestrian or cyclist, coming down 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
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the ramp. I’d suggest having the number of turns as a quantitative evaluation criterion there. And 1
finally, under minimize community impacts, what about traffic congesting impacts? For example, 2
if an approach crosses Alma or maybe Park at grade, then we’re going to need to signalize one 3
way or another. I suspect that’s quantifiable in terms that you prefer to use but I don’t know 4
what your preference would be. My suggestion is to add that under the minimize community 5
impacts category. Let’s see. That’s all I have and I believe I have a light from Commissioner 6
Templeton. 7
8
Commissioner Templeton: Thank you. And I don’t know if everybody had to go yet but this’ll be 9
quick. I just wanted to list the accessibility refinements that we’ve suggested so far. That these 10
underpasses be able to accommodate wheelchairs, shopping carts, strollers, wagons, bike 11
trailers. And what about tandem bikes? Do we have to be able to allow tandem people to bike 12
under? I would say so because a lot of people like to go to Foothill and bike on Sunday together. 13
Any other thoughts on what other large apparati need to be accommodated? All right, well, that’s 14
what we’ve all [inaudible 3:21:52] across all of us. And all the suggestions, I think, were fantastic. 15
Thank you. 16
17
Chair Akin: Commissioner Peterson? 18
19
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
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Commissioner Peterson: Just real quick. I didn’t want to bring it up earlier but so let’s say if there’s 1
a rail trench in the future, do we dig out the underpass and remove it or the rail trench won’t 2
reach this location? 3
4
Sylvia Star-Lack: I think our intention is to find out where the train will be and then we will design 5
these things. 6
7
Commissioner Peterson: All right. Thank you. 8
9
Chair Akin: All right, if we have no more questions or comments about the evaluation criteria, 10
shall we move on to advice about locations? Commissioner Hechtman. 11
12
Commissioner Hechtman: All right, I’ll go first since I’ve already previewed mine. This has been a 13
great discussion but it’s real interesting because – I guess my approach in getting ready for this 14
meeting tonight, I took kind of the opposite approach, I think. I didn’t start with the criteria and 15
then try to see where that led me. Instead I would say the approach I took was if all things were 16
equal, what are the geographically most logical locations? And then once I identified those, then 17
I asked a question well, are all things really equal or are there some of these evaluation criteria 18
that make the geographic location not necessarily the best location? And so as I’ve mentioned 19
earlier, the 2 I came up – the 2 crossings that make the most sense to me as being geographically 20
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logical are first Crossing B, which is in the vicinity of Matadero Creek and it’s roughly halfway 1
between Cal. Ave., and Meadow Drive, which is a future crossing but by the time B is realized, 2
hopefully it will be there. I am noticing in looking at this diagram there’s another circle at 3
Colorado Avenue, which wasn’t really referenced so I’m not clear about that one, if that is an 4
existing crossing then B is a little closer to that than it is to Meadow. But otherwise, B is pretty 5
wide so it can be anywhere in there. But anyway, that was one of the ones I liked. 6
7
And again, because it’s covering an area of 1.3 miles with no crossings, no pedestrian 8
underground-type crossings, it has the potential to feed a wide swath that exists in the middle of 9
this part of the City south of California and north of Meadow, on both sides of Middlefield, on 10
both sides of El Camino. If you can imagine kind of a middle corridor there. It has that prospect. 11
And then the other one I liked, as I mentioned earlier, was E. And I like E more than F because 12
again, I’m looking to serve the most southerly part of our city. But E would come out both sides 13
in Palo Alto whereas F, you’re coming from the east, you’re in Palo Alto but once you cross the 14
tracks, you’re in Los Altos. I don’t know that Los Altos is willing to share the cost with us any more 15
than they were when we did Foothill Park in the ‘60s. And so I think we should be looking at E. 16
I’m a little facetious there but E’s a little more central although it’s closer to Charleston. But I will 17
say– and this really gets to that criteria about the network that gets us there – that I’m liking E – 18
what I’m imagining is there will be a number of high schoolers in the San Antonio-101 dense 19
development and they’re going to need to get to Gunn. 20
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1
And I think that the way they would do it without riding down San Antonio, which I don’t think 2
we’re going to want them to ride the length of San Antonio, is from the development to 3
Charleston, then to Montrose, and then through Cubberley, and then through the Green 4
Meadow neighborhood. I think that’s where you come out of E, I think it’s Green Meadow. I think 5
that’s that road. But that’s a challenge because that route doesn’t exist today. And so that’s a 6
potential shortcoming of E and that’s where some of the criteria you’ve identified, about the 7
connectivity, it might suggest E is not great, F works better. But if we can make that connection 8
work, it seems like it’s safer and it really – it takes the kids in a direction that’s closer to Gunn 9
rather than traveling a little bit more southerly down San Antonio. Now they’re too far south and 10
they have to come back north to get to Gunn. Those are my thoughts. 11
12
Chair Akin: Seeing no other lights, I’ll make – oh, I apologize. I did catch you. Proceed first. 13
14
Commissioner Templeton: Sorry. I mean, you’re welcome to go first if you wish. But I did do my 15
light. I will say that I might – this might be one of the only situations where I have slightly more 16
biking insight than you. There is a path through Los Altos neighborhood area there to get – that 17
the kids take to get to the candy shop. And so they could double back. I’m just saying. That’s the 18
only way I can get my kids to bike. I tell them on the weekends go to the candy shop and they 19
bike with their friends and they have a good time. They don’t cross though, of course, here for 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
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variety of reasons that you mentioned. Did you want 2? Is that what you were asking us? Did you 1
want 2 recommendations? 2
3
Charlie Coles: There’s no set number at this point. The overall goal for this project is to select 2 4
design concepts at 2 separate locations. 5
6
Commissioner Templeton: Okay, so yes. 7
8
Charlie Coles: You’re welcome to provide to provide... 9
10
Commissioner Templeton: Okay. 11
12
Charlie Coles: Well... 13
14
Commissioner Templeton: I’m just trying to figure out – yeah. All right, so A seems impractical, F 15
seems impractical. Thank you for providing us easy ones to eliminate. D seems impractical 16
because we have long-standing plans to provide crossings at those locations adjacent. I don’t 17
know – is the intention of D to just tell the railroad people never mind, we got this, you don’t 18
have to do bike and peds? Okay. Yeah, go ahead. 19
20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
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Sylvia Star-Lack: No. In fact, if you imag-, I think this location came up because if those 2 locations 1
adjacent are both shut down at the same time, D serves both of them well. 2
3
Commissioner Templeton: Okay, but they won’t be shut down for a long time, will they? [You 4
3:30:33] couldn’t possibly be planning that. We don’t... 5
6
Sylvia Star-Lack: I – grade sep is not my project and I am thankful for that but... 7
8
Commissioner Templeton: Well, let me relieve you of answering this question. It would be really 9
important, I think, for the Department of Transportation’s grade separation person to include the 10
precaution not to shut down both of those major corridors for the south at the same time. I 11
understand why Caltrain would like that to happen because that would annoy them less. But 12
honestly, kids need to be able to get to school. Just putting that on the record. I’m not saying you 13
said anything about it. You are off the hook. For me, A is not worth considering, F is not worth 14
considering, and D is hopefully not worth considering because the grade sep project would not 15
make that necessary. Also, it would be a waste if we did this permanent infrastructure 16
improvement and had 3 within this little area, undercrossings, in this part of town and left the 17
rest of it unserved. For me, then that leaves us B, C, and E. B is one that we have heard for many 18
years is a strong need for a crossing at Loma Verde area. To be determined what exact street. I 19
highly encourage us to prioritize that one. If we do have the planned railroad crossing grade 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
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separation down near D and E, we don’t need C either so if I were going to do a second project, 1
I would do it up closer to Churchill. 2
3
I know that is a planned grade separation; however, that one is not – a lot of people haven’t seen 4
that design yet and I suspect that there’ll be an interest in having some other way of crossing 5
Alma and the railroad tracks, so if I had a second project I would do something up there closer to 6
that area. But B would be the priority down here with the caveat that the ones on Meadow and 7
Charleston would exist. Thanks. 8
9
Chair Akin: Commissioner James. 10
11
Commissioner James: Well, lots of people like B, including me. I think I read there was a feasibility 12
study right there that made it look like – I’ll go further and say that Loma Verda from the 13
feasibility study that I read or thought I understood was really the only viable route in there 14
because of various factors. That looks good to me. And the BPTP map network, Figure 2 on page 15
141, looks like it envisions a bicycle boulevard across from where Loma Verda meets Alma and 16
what looks like, I think, [Matadero 3:33:57]. I couldn’t tell from the resolution of my map. And 17
another envisioned bike boulevard at Park Boulevard, which would intersect with that crossing 18
as well, which eventually goes to Gunn and appears to provide an alternative to Meadow and 19
Charleston, which I think we hear overwhelmingly is needed. And I think it also crosses into the 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
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3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Cornelis Bol bike path if I’m reading the maps correctly and kind of aligning them in my head. I 1
just feel like that looks like – I walked the route. I started from – I thought it made perfect sense 2
from a bird’s-eye view and then I walked the route and to me it seemed clear that that was, from 3
my perspective, the best option. So much so that I didn’t even select a second though I was very 4
mindful of what Commissioner Hechtman said about that – where we’re expecting new 5
development. I didn’t come up with a solution on my own though it actually looks like maybe 6
Loma Verde could also serve that projected future population. 7
8
All these criteria make perfect sense to me. I try and make things as simple as I possibly can. And 9
it just seems like there are really clear benefits for improving convenience and safety to that 10
adjacent population and to a future population on the other side of the tracks. 11
12
Chair Akin: Thank you. Vice-Chair Chang. 13
14
Vice-Chair Chang: I actually don’t think I have much to add given what everybody has said, so 15
leave it at that. 16
17
Chair Akin: All right. This time, seeing no other lights – oh, not so fast. Commissioner Ji. 18
19
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
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Commissioner Ji: Apologies, Chair. I will echo B. No further comments there. I think that going off 1
of Commissioner Templeton’s comment about Churchill, I believe that there is a planned crossing 2
at Seale. Staff, is that correct? I believe that there is something planned there. I would like to also 3
endorse spot E as proposed by Commissioner Hechtman. I think specifically I would love – I live 4
pretty close to there and I would – I think that there’s a lot of opportunity there to connect the 5
new developments, as Commissioner Hechtman said, but also there’s pretty good access – if we 6
were to envision what a future would look like connecting some of those points in the Green 7
Meadow neighborhood via this road to Wilkie, which is the Peninsula bike path, I think there’s 8
some opportunity there as well, which is – you can see the line that’s Wilkie and Miller below. 9
And I think that if I were to prioritize these, I would prioritize B and then E. But I do think that 10
having 2 in the south side is important. 11
12
Commissioner Templeton: I would love to hear your thoughts about E given that those 2 green 13
dots are already planned. 14
15
Commissioner Ji: Yeah, I think that for me it’s – I don’t know, I guess the way I think about it is 16
that there’s probably a lot of just people. As someone who’s just biked a lot, I think having – if 17
we continue to expand in the direction on the San Antonio side, I expect that – even today if I 18
were to bike – I very much used to avoid, as much as I could, biking during school hours around 19
Meadow. And so just having another spot there potentially to relieve congestion, I think, given 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
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the amount of development that we have in the new areas is important but again, I would 1
significantly prioritize B above E for that particular reason. 2
3
Chair Akin: Commissioner Hechtman. 4
5
Commissioner Hechtman: Yeah, if I can answer that too since I like E. One of the things I looked 6
at was that Meadow and Charleston, which is where those Caltrans projects are coming, those 7
are busier streets and E is not inviting kids to be on those streets but rather to ride on some of 8
our smaller, more neighborhoody streets and I liked that aspect of it. Although as I mentioned 9
before, we don’t know the exact route that would take. But the idea is to not put them on the 10
streets that are carrying the most cars. 11
12
Chair Akin: Commissioner Peterson. 13
14
Commissioner Peterson: I just want to comment I’m being pretty solidly swayed towards location 15
E. Just hearing the comments, it’s coming through. 16
17
Chair Akin: All right. I have a couple of observations. I spent a lot of time looking at the field study 18
notes and also at the short trip counts. Oregon really dominates the crossings for all the short 19
trips total but San Antonio is a really close second. San Antonio dominates for all the trips in the 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
range of 1 to 4 miles. I think that argues to me that we should be throwing a lot of weight in those 1
2 directions. Now, of the potential crossings close to Oregon, judging from the field study notes, 2
El Dorado really looks like the easiest to implement. It’s close enough to Oregon to capture a lot 3
of the traffic there and seems to have a reasonable connection into Midtown. Of the category B 4
sites, El Dorado looks the most appealing to me. Loma Verde has a good location in this crossings 5
desert but the implementation looks challenging. And I’m not sure that El Verano has much of a 6
payoff because it’s so close to Meadow. On the other end, I’m going to break with the trend here. 7
Both Lindero and Ely look difficult and I don’t think they add enough value over Meadow and 8
Charleston once the grade separations are done. So I’m going to argue for F, for the San Antonio 9
crossing. Sure, that’s not going to serve Palo Alto exclusively but this is an area where there is 10
going to be a lot of growth and there is already bike infrastructure in Mountain View on San 11
Antonio so I think we’re close to making a reasonable connection there and potentially serving 12
people who would be moving to Palo Alto further north on San Antonio. Those are the 2 that I 13
think weighed most heavily for me, so around El Dorado and the San Antonio overpass. 14
Commissioner Templeton. 15
16
Commissioner Templeton: I just wanted to weigh in some agreement there. I think F is superior 17
to C, D, and E because it would – there’s a – my understanding is that the crossings at Meadow 18
and Charleston are going to spend significant amounts of time, effort, and funding to create the 19
world’s most beautiful bike and pedestrian crossings. I know you have all been viewing those 20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
with intense interest, as I have. Unless that could be exchanged for a crossing at D, I’m not sure 1
it would be worth it. But F has potential and not – that would be one that we would not want to 2
exclusively fund as Palo Alto. That would happen with cooperation with the other jurisdictions, 3
perhaps with state or federal funding. But I like F better than C, D, or E. Thanks. 4
5
Chair Akin: Let’s see. I’m sorry I didn’t get the order correctly on these. Commissioner Hechtman, 6
then Commissioner Ji. 7
8
Commissioner Hechtman: Question. Is there a pedestrian/bike undercrossing currently at San 9
Antonio Caltrain? 10
11
Charlie Coles: Yes, there is. It’s a grade-separated under Caltrain at Mayfield Avenue in Mountain 12
View. 13
14
Commissioner Hechtman: Okay, F is somewhat proximate to that so maybe staff can give us a 15
little flavor of what attracted them to that location given that it’s close to an existing location? 16
17
Male: [Inaudible 3:43:50]. 18
19
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Commissioner Hechtman: I’m sorry. That’s what I meant. Staff identified F as a possibility and I’m 1
asking given that the San Antonio undercrossing’s right there, which you knew about, you still 2
liked it enough to put it on the table and I’d like to know why. 3
4
Charlie Coles: Yeah. Thank you. F is located in an area that is representative of San Antonio Road 5
and the interchange that is mostly in Palo Alto but as we’ve all heard, it’s partially in Mountain 6
View. There’s also the San Antonio Avenue which runs parallel to San Antonio Road and then 7
connects to Alma. That is in Palo Alto. The reason for including location F is just recognizing the 8
potential to do something either at the interchange or at San Antonio Avenue which has already 9
been pointed out to provide that connection into Mountain View along San Antonio Road given 10
that there’s already bicycle facilities on the Mountain View section on San Antonio Road, and 11
also recognizing that some of the work that’s being done in part of the Bicycle and Pedestrian 12
Transportation Plan, even though it is draft, does propose bike facilities along San Antonio Road 13
in Palo Alto as well as a connection along Alma from San Antonio Avenue to Charleston. 14
Recognizing the connection between the 2 plans, that’s sort of the thought process for including 15
this as a potential location. 16
17
Commissioner Hechtman: I’m still leaning toward E but I like F more now than I did before I came 18
tonight. Again, you’re just looking for feedback tonight, not votes, and so I wanted to include 19
that. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Chair Akin: Commissioner Ji. 2
3
Commissioner Ji: Thank you. I also took a good look at the field visit. The field visit looked like you 4
guys had a lot of fun. There’s a lot of photos of people on the bikes. I think that for me, looking – 5
I think generally I want to echo Commissioner Hechtman’s comment about as a biker and 6
especially as someone who biked to school as a child, I think prioritizing low-car-traffic streets is 7
really important to me and that’s why E sticks out specifically and I guess so does B in that context. 8
I wonder if F would encourage a lot of people to be using San Antonio Road, which I’ve previously 9
stated in the BPTP update that I’m generally opposed to having lots of bikes on major roads, 10
which I know is part of the current design. But I just want to echo my sentiment for E. Although I 11
do wonder what kinds of support we could provided for the existing [undercrossing 3:46:50] 12
given, in fact, they are actually 2 crossings at San Antonio, what additional work should be done 13
there. But just a pondering thought. But I’m still supportive of E. 14
15
Chair Akin: Commissioner Templeton, then Commissioner Peterson. 16
17
Commissioner Templeton: Thank you. Yeah, I’m going to suggest that perhaps the E and F 18
locations need to be rethought and perhaps converged for a future discussion. That is an option 19
that you may consider. Thanks. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Chair Akin: Commissioner Peterson. 2
3
Commissioner Peterson: Thank you, Chair. Can we open Google Maps [inaudible 3:47:39]? 4
Actually somebody walked the train station with the map so it’s a – you can actually walk the 5
path. 6
7
Commissioner Ji: While this is being pulled up, I know at the very beginning you actually talked 8
about potentially other options and maybe echoing Commissioner Templeton’s [inaudible 9
3:48:04], maybe there is some compromise somewhere between E and F that is an option as well. 10
11
Commissioner Peterson: It’s San Antonio Caltrain station. There we go. Click on the pin. Should 12
give you an option for street view. 13
14
Commissioner Templeton: Can also do – click on layers . It will give you that option as well. 15
16
Commissioner Peterson: That’s right. You’re from Google. Did you make this? There we go. We 17
actually want to be on the other side of the street. Right? I wonder if it’ll walk you under the 18
underpass. Oh, there we go. 19
20
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Commissioner Templeton: Where’s the underpass? 1
2
Commissioner Peterson: Yeah. 3
4
Commissioner Hechtman: If you’re watching at home, don’t cross the expressway this way. 5
6
Commissioner Ji: Yeah, I guess – wait, go back, Veronica. 7
8
Commissioner Peterson: There you go. Yeah, you can walk – the underpass is right there in front 9
of you. There we go. Oh, looks like it’s all the way through. Yeah. This is how we get to the movie 10
theaters with my kids. There we go. Looks a lot like the underpass that’s just out here. 11
12
Commissioner Templeton: Oh, so that’s part of the train station. 13
14
Commissioner Peterson: Uh-huh. 15
16
Commissioner Templeton: It’s not a separate facility. 17
18
Commissioner Peterson: Nope. Yeah. And then if you go back the other way you came, it’ll take 19
you across Alma. There’s the shopping cart. Now, I’ll be the first to say this probably could use 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
some money to be redone. Let’s see. Go back up the ramp to the left. Or – there you go. You 1
want to go back the other way. There you go. Yep. Yeah, go down the stairs. Sorry. 2
3
Commissioner Templeton: Thank you for doing this. 4
5
Commissioner Peterson: Yeah, you’re awesome. Okay, there you go. And then – yep. Yeah. Looks 6
just like me walking my kids around there. Me and my kids like literally ran up this as fast as we 7
could trying to get to the train and missed it. And then if you go all the way to the end of the 8
station, this is how you cross Alma as a pedestrian. You just keep going. It looks like a dead end 9
but there’s a pathway there. There you go. And it’s... 10
11
Commissioner Templeton: [Inaudible 3:51:01] personal safety could be improved here. 12
13
Commissioner Peterson: Yeah, it’s a little sketchy. I think there’s holes cut in the fence in spots 14
here. Maybe they fixed it. And then down here it’s got the bike lockers. There you go. And there’s 15
a stair somewhere. You can walk up to go to the overpass. I don’t know where – I think the stairs 16
are like right there in front of you somewhere. There we are. There’s the stairs. Yeah. Anyways, 17
so that’s the existing F that sounds like is being reimagined. Which I can see why. This is rocket 18
science pedestrian for the ’90s when this was built, I guess. Okay, I’ll stop there. Thank you. 19
20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Chair Akin: Commissioner Ji? Ghost light. Apologies. All right. I see no other lights. Do we have 1
any final comments before we close this item? Very good. Thank you all. This was more 2
complicated than I expected but informative and I hope it was useful. It certainly brought all of 3
us up to speed on a lot of these issues, so thank you. 4
5
APPROVAL OF MINUTES 6
Public Comment is Permitted. Three (3) minutes per speaker. 7
8
3. Approval of Planning & Transportation Commission Draft Summary & Verbatim 9
Minutes of April 9, 2025 10
11
Chair Akin: All right. It looks like the next item is approval of minutes. May I have a motion? 12
13
Commissioner Hechtman: I move approval as revised of the April 9 verbatim and summary 14
minutes. 15
16
Chair Akin: Second. Let’s see. Was everyone present? I don’t think so. We were all present? We 17
can do this by voice vote then. Ms. Dao? 18
19
Veronica Dao: Yes, you can do a voice vote. 20
21
Chair Akin: All right. All in favor? 22
23
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1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
Commissioners: Aye. 1
2
Chair Akin: All opposed? Any abstentions? All right. Passes unanimously. 3
4
Commissioner Questions, Comments or Announcements 5
6
Chair Akin: Commissioner questions, comments, and announcements. Commissioner Hechtman? 7
8
Commissioner Hechtman: Yeah, I’d just like to point out that it’s 9:46 and under our agenda, we 9
were going to finish Item 4 at 9:40 and I think that’s a credit to our fairly new Chair. I just want 10
to acknowledge when we actually hit the mark as we did tonight. Well done. 11
12
Chair Akin: Thank you. Thank you. I will take that although I suspect luck had a lot to do with it. 13
Commissioner Templeton. 14
15
Commissioner Templeton: Yes. Commissioner Hechtman mentioned upcoming absences and 16
staff also mentioned a dearth of things to do in June and I wondered if we should discuss that as 17
a group? Does anyone else anticipate being out in June? 18
19
Vice-Chair Chang: I too am going to miss the June 11 meeting. 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Commissioner Templeton: My son will be in need of his mother for medical reasons that day. He 2
has a surgery the day before so I may also miss it. That’s 3. Anyone else? 3
4
Jennifer Armer: If there’s general consensus, I think it’s fine given that we don’t have... 5
6
Chair Akin: Commissioner Hechtman, aren’t you out on the 11th? 7
8
Commissioner Hechtman: Yeah, I think Commissioner Templeton was including me as a third. 9
Right? Yeah. 10
11
Jennifer Armer: And so since we don’t at the moment have any urgent items for that date from 12
a staff perspective, I would be comfortable stating it as canceled and listing that as part of the 13
report that we put together for your meeting in 2 weeks. 14
15
Commissioner Templeton: Okay. Cool. Thanks. 16
17
Chair Akin: Very good. Thank you. Any other questions or comments tonight? 18
19
Commissioner Ji: Can we still come for dinner on June 11? 20
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at the
time of the spokesperson’s presentation will be allowed up to ten (10) minutes at the discretion of the Chair, provided
that the non-speaking members agree not to speak individually.
2. The Chair may limit Oral Communications to 30 minutes for all combined speakers.
3. The Chair may reduce the allowed time to speak to three minutes to accommodate a larger number of speakers.
1
Commissioner Templeton: You can meet me at the hospital. 2
3
Commissioner Ji: Or dessert? 4
5
Chair Akin: All right, then. We are adjourned. 6
7
Adjournment 8
9:49 pm 9
10
11