HomeMy WebLinkAboutStaff Report 8277City of Palo Alto (ID # 8277)
City Council Staff Report
Report Type: Action Items Meeting Date: 9/5/2017
City of Palo Alto Page 1
Summary Title: Rail Program CSS Alternatives Analysis Plan, Problem
Statement, Goals and Performance Measures
Title: Adoption of the Community Engagement Plan, Problem Statement,
Objectives and Evaluation Criteria to Support Development and Evaluation of
Railroad Grade Separation Alternatives
From: City Manager
Lead Department: Planning and Community Environment
Recommendation
Staff recommends that the City Council consider recommendations from the Planning and
Transportation Commission (PTC) and the City Council Rail Committee and:
1.Review the revised Community Engagement Plan (Attachment A), summary of
Community Workshop #1 on May 20, 2017 (Attachment B), and summary of Community
Questionnaire #1 responses (Attachment C), and
2.Adopt the revised Community Engagement Plan (Attachment A), and Problem
Statement, Objectives, and Evaluation Criteria (Attachment E) for discussion at
Community Workshop #2 and to inform the development and analysis of project
alternatives.
NOTE: Due to potential conflicts of interest for Councilmember(s) owning real property near rail
crossings, the Council will segregate the process issue (community engagement) from the policy
issue (problem statement, objectives, and criteria) and will discuss the process issue first.
Report Summary
The City Council directed staff to prioritize the definition of a preferred solution for grade
separations along the Caltrain corridor due to:
longstanding concerns regarding connectivity, safety, noise, aesthetics, and circulation
impacts along the corridor;
AGENDA ITEM # 11
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passage of Santa Clara County Measure B in November 2016, which includes $700
million for grade separations that will be split among three jurisdictions with a total of
eight crossings (four in Palo Alto);
scheduled implementation of Caltrain modernization by 2021, which will facilitate more
trains per hour through Palo Alto; and
ongoing environmental review of the California High-speed Rail Project alternatives
which may further increase train service through Palo Alto.
As a result, the City Council’s Rail Committee has been discussing how to best seek community
input at key junctures along the way. At present, Staff is seeking input on a Problem Statement
to succinctly define the purpose of the project, project Objectives that will be used to help
develop project Alternatives, and Evaluation Criteria that will be used to analyze project
Alternatives. This approach is typically used in the context sensitive solutions (CSS) planning
process and staff has proposed a community engagement plan using a suite of strategies to
maximize input from the community throughout the planning process. Direction from City
Council will be used to inform Community Workshop #2 on September 16, 2017 and the
development and analysis of project alternatives.
Background
The brief discussion below summarizes past planning processes related to grade separations in
Palo Alto as well as the principal characteristics of existing and planned grade crossings along
the Caltrain corridor. Where more detailed information is available, links to prior staff reports
are provided.
Prior Rail Corridor Studies
The City of Palo Alto has long discussed the need to improve circulation and connectivity along
the Caltrain rail corridor, and has undertaken a number of previous planning efforts as well as
offering multiple comments during the environmental review process associated with Caltrain
modernization and the California High-speed Rail Project.
If Council members are interested in a brief description of the Rail Corridor Study planning
effort from 2013 and the more recent analysis of a trenching solution for grade separating the
Charleston Road and Meadow Drive crossings, these can be found in the form of a report to the
Rail Committee which is available at the following link:
http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/civicax/filebank/documents/58463.
The 2013 Rail Corridor Study itself can be found at:
https://www.cityofpaloalto.org/civicax/filebank/documents/38025
The 2014 trenching study can be found at:
City of Palo Alto Page 3
https://www.cityofpaloalto.org/civicax/filebank/documents/44211.
Please note that the Discussion section below provides some additional detail on the vision and
goals of the 2013 Rail Corridor Study, as well as constraints identified during the 2014 trenching
study.
This report also contains a summary of the status of other grade separations that are being
planned by local jurisdictions along the corridor via an updated status diagram, included as
Attachment F.
Existing and Planned Grade Crossings in Palo Alto
There are currently two grade-separated crossings for all modes at University Avenue and
Embarcadero Road and two grade-separated crossings for pedestrians and bicycles at Homer
Avenue and California Avenue. Two existing grade-separated crossings at Oregon Expressway
and San Antonio Road accommodate motor vehicles and bicyclists, but not pedestrians.
There are four at-grade crossings that have been the focus of grade separation discussions:
Palo Alto Ave (AKA Alma Street), Churchill Avenue, East/West Meadow Drive, and East/West
Charleston Road. In addition, there have been at least two new grade-separated crossings for
pedestrians and bicycles discussed in the past several years, one near Matadero Creek or Loma
Verde Avenue in South Palo Alto and one at Emerson Avenue in Downtown North. Past studies
have also discussed relocating pedestrian and bicycle access from Churchill Avenue one block
north to Kellogg Avenue and adding a pedestrian and bicycle crossing at Seale Avenue (to Peers
Park). The Study Area map below provides the location of the existing and planned crossings
(with the exception of the Seale Avenue/Peers Park concept).
Figure 1. Map of the Rail Corridor Showing Existing and Planned Grade Crossings
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Note: The “Planned bike/ped crossings” shown have been identified as desirable in past planning efforts, but
require additional planning, design, and funding.
Source: Mott McDonald, August 2017
Staff has initiated a data collection effort to inform planning for changes along the rail corridor,
and the preliminary data on existing at-grade crossings was presented at Community Workshop
#1 on May 20, 2017. Some of this data is shown in Table 1 below.
Table 1.
Existing Conditions at Existing At-Grade Rail Crossings
Palo Alto Ave
(Alma St)
Churchill Ave Meadow Dr Charleston Rd
Traffic
(Average Daily)
14,700 11,400 9,300 16,000
Bicycle
(Average Daily)
550 1020 900 240
Pedestrian
(Average Daily)
300 270 180 140
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Palo Alto Ave
(Alma St)
Churchill Ave Meadow Dr Charleston Rd
Road Transit/Bus
(Average Daily)
33 7 11 45
School Bus
(Average Daily)
0 64 48 20
Heavy Truck
(Average Daily)
190 127 47 20
Daily Gate
Closures
43 39 39 40
Avg. Seconds Gates
are Closed
25-75 30-78 20-74 22-76
Collisions
(2011-13)
0 13 13 11
Source: Mott McDonald, May 2017
Future Challenges
As noted earlier, modernization of Caltrain (including electrification) will facilitate more train
service to and through Palo Alto starting in 2021. This expanded rail service will have impacts
as well as benefits, and the impacts will be exacerbated when combined with the potential
addition of High Speed Rail. The most notable impact will be an increase in the number of gate
closures at the existing at-grade crossings listed above. With more gate closures at greater
frequencies, motorists will experience more delay and congestion at the grade crossings and at
nearby intersections. Pedestrians and bicyclists will also experience more frequent delays, and
the presence of the Caltrain corridor as a barrier impeding east-west connectivity in Palo Alto
will be accentuated. The noise from train horns as trains approach the at-grade crossings will
also increase in frequency.
The Context Sensitive Solutions (CSS) Process
The context sensitive solutions (CSS) process was raised by the City in its comments to Caltrain
and the California High-speed Rail Authority, and represents good community-based planning
that gathers information and input prior to making decisions. CSS, as defined by one of the
leading practitioner’s website (www.contextsensitivesolutions.org), is a “collaborative,
interdisciplinary, holistic approach to the development of transportation projects.” The
organization further states that a CSS approach is guided by four core principles:
1. Strive towards a shared stakeholder vision to provide a basis for decisions;
2. Demonstrate a comprehensive understanding of contexts;
3. Foster continuing communication and collaboration to achieve consensus;
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4. Exercise flexibility and creativity to shape effective transportation solutions, while
preserving and enhancing community and natural environments.
The revised Community Engagement Plan in Attachment A provides a summary of how Staff
plans to involve community members and stakeholders and gather the input needed to craft a
shared vision and make informed decisions in this instance.
Community Workshops will be periodic plenary sessions for the wider community helping
anchor the community engagement process, along with focus groups and other methods
designed to provide information and receive input from as many Palo Alto residents and
stakeholders as possible (see revised Community Engagement Plan – Attachment A). A
Technical Advisory Group (TAC) and consultants with technical expertise will help City staff fully
understand physical constraints and requirements of other agencies, which will help inform
reports to the Rail Committee, PTC, and City Council Community input and technical
information/analysis will also be used to inform recommendations to those bodies.
Planning and Transportation Commission
The Planning and Transportation Commission (PTC) discussed the Community Engagement
Plan, as well as the suggested Problem Statement, Objectives, and Evaluation Criteria, at their
meeting on August 9, 2017. The minutes from this meeting are included as Attachment G. After
a lengthy discussion regarding the Community Engagement Plan, the PTC adopted the following
motion on a 4-2 vote (Alcheck, Monk against, Rosenblum absent):
“Palo Alto follow a CSS process for evaluation of rail grade separation including the
creation of a dedicated expert stakeholder group in parallel with neighborhood
stakeholders.”
The commissioners also offered input into the Problem Statement, Objectives, and Evaluation
Criteria, which included:
Reconsider inclusion of noise and vibration and other common issues near railroads in
Problem Statement.
Reduce the number of Objectives to the top four, eliminating ones that are “a given.”(
A video of the Planning and Transportation Commission discussion is available at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lp9s0vrPshY
A revised Community Engagement Plan and Problem Statement, Objectives, and Evaluation Criteria are included
as Attachments A and E. These revisions incorporate feedback and recommendations from the Planning and
Transportation Commission and the Rail Committee. Items marked with an asterisk (*) have been incorporated
into the revised documents.
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City Council Rail Committee
The City Council Rail Committee discussed the Community Engagement Plan, as well as the
suggested Problem Statement, Objectives, and Evaluation Criteria, at their meeting on August
16, 2017. The minutes from this meeting are included as Attachment H. After a lengthy
discussion regarding the Community Engagement Plan, the Rail Committee offered the
following input:
Focus Groups would be an appropriate supplement to the planned Community
Workshops*
The public comment format of the Rail Committee meeting could be modified to allow
for increased participation by interested stakeholders*
Staff should make efforts to open the Technical Advisory Committee (TAC) meetings to
the public, if feasible, and add expertise not currently represented.
The Rail Committee’s motion was recorded as follows: “Chair DuBois moved, seconded by
Mayor Scharff to direct Staff to propose adding members to the Technical Advisory Committee
(TAC), provide additional expertise in areas not currently represented, define those roles and
responsibilities, suggest potential subcommittees and to consider adding focus groups.”
As discussed at the Committee meeting, the TAC was designed to obtain staff-to-staff input
from other public agencies and those agencies may not be willing to provide staff or give advice
freely in public meetings. As an alternative, staff is proposing to include additional agencies on
the TAC such as the Palo Alto Unified School District, to structure Rail Committee meetings to
allow for more citizen input/dialog, and to create additional/alternate venues for citizen
advocates to meet with City staff and provide their insights about the process, available data,
and decisions along the way.
The Rail Committee also offered input into the Problem Statement, Objectives, and Evaluation
Criteria, which included:
Problem Statement
o Touch on the importance of enhanced Caltrain service at the beginning of the
Problem Statement*
o Describe high-speed rail as “probable,” instead of “possible(
o Add “commercial areas and Stanford University” after “surrounding
neighborhoods”
Objectives
o Reference previous rail corridor planning work explicitly*
A revised Community Engagement Plan and Problem Statement, Objectives, and Evaluation Criteria are included
as Attachments A and E. These revisions incorporate feedback and recommendations from the Planning and
Transportation Commission and the Rail Committee. Items marked with an asterisk (*) have been incorporated
into the revised documents.
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o Break third bullet into two separate Objectives*
o Delete the last three bullets from the Objectives*
o Add “by eminent domain” after “right-of-way acquisitions”*
o Add new Objective: “Facilitate land-use changes and station-area planning and
redevelopment.”
o Add new Objective regarding sustainability
Evaluation Criteria
o Reduce to only two tiers*
o Delete “at any single location” in second to last Evaluation Criterion
o Break last Evaluation Criterion into two separate Evaluation Criteria, with one
addressing the minimization of right-of-way acquisition “by eminent domain”
and the other referring to funding feasibility, with the latter being a Tier 1
Evaluation Criterion*
A video of the City Council Rail Committee discussion is available at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_kbx3QqniI
Discussion
To develop and evaluate alternatives, it’s important for City decision makers and the
community to have a common understanding of the problem we’re trying to solve, our
objectives, and ultimately the criteria we will use to develop and evaluate the alternatives.
While some may find it frustrating to dwell on these points and want to simply embrace and
pursue a specific solution, the adoption of a Problem Statement, Objectives, and Evaluation
Criteria will pay dividends as the community begins to evaluate trade-offs inherent in any
complex capital project with the potential to affect the long term future of Palo Alto. The
trade-offs don’t just relate to the physical form of improvements along the rail corridor, but
also to specific engineering, financing, phasing, and construction considerations.
A revised Problem Statement, Objectives and Evaluation Criteria are provided in Attachment E
and are explained below. To a large extent, these suggestions derive from input received at
Community Workshop #1 and the recent citizen questionnaire summarized in Attachments B
and C. They remain a draft for further input and discussion at Community Workshop #2, which
will begin a discussion about the development of Alternatives. A short discussion of constraints
that have been or will be considered as the planning process proceeds is also included below.
Problem Statement
Community Questionnaire #1 asked for input on a draft Problem Statement that starts with the
concept of connectivity, which was a clear focus of the vision statement in the 2013 Rail
Corridor Study:
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Community Questionnaire #1:
“The Caltrain corridor creates a physical and visual barrier to east/west connectivity
within the City of Palo Alto, and is also the source of safety concerns for pedestrians,
bicyclists and motorists, especially at existing at-grade crossings. These challenges
also create issues in surrounding neighborhoods such as noise, vibration, traffic and
visual impacts. These will continue to get worse in the future with increases in train
traffic due to Caltrain modernization (including electrification) and the possible
addition of high speed rail.”
2013 Rail Corridor Study:
“To create a vibrant, safe, attractive, transit-rich area with mixed use city and
neighborhood mixed-use centers that provide walkable, pedestrian and bicycle-friendly
places that serve the community and beyond; and to connect the east and west portions
of the city through an improved circulation network that binds the city together in all
directions.”
Individual responses to the recent questionnaire suggested a number of edits or changes,
including addressing suicide prevention, recognizing that Caltrain electrification will reduce
noise and vibration, a preference for undergrounding the tracks, and a statement assuming that
the High Speed Rail would be contingent on grade separations. The suggested Problem
Statement in Attachment D was adjusted slightly in response to the input from the
questionnaire. The revised Problem Statement in Attachment E has been modified to include
feedback and recommendations from the Planning and Transportation Commission and the City
Council Rail Committee (changes are tracked; additions are underlined and deletions are
crossed-out).
Objectives
Attachment D also includes suggested Objectives that are derived in part from the goals and
policies articulated in the 2013 Rail Corridor Study for potential consideration in the
Comprehensive Plan Update. These are provided below:
Goal 1: Rail Improvements Should Be Constructed in a Below-grade Trench.
Policy 1.1: The City’s preferred vertical alignment for fixed rail in Palo Alto is
below grade.
Policy 1.2: The City is opposed to an elevated alignment of rail in Palo Alto.
Policy 1.3: When examining the potential impacts of vertical rail alignments
equal attention shall be given to all Palo Alto neighborhoods. Adopted mitigation
measures should be proportionate to the impacts identified in the studies.
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Goal 2: Ensure the Highest Possible Safety at All Rail Crossings and Mitigate Rail
Impacts on Neighborhoods, Public Facilities, Schools and Mixed-use Centers.
Policy 2.1: Improve existing at-grade crossings. All at-grade crossings of the
Caltrain corridor should be improved to provide the highest possible level of
safety and convenience. This may be grade separations or safer at-grade
crossings, with the preferred choice being grade separation, if supported by
technical studies.
Policy 2.2: Provide additional safe and convenient crossings. Additional crossings
of the tracks, and in some cases Alma Street as well, are essential to provide
connections from neighborhoods to destinations such as schools, parks and
services.
Policy 2.3: Improve safety and minimize noise, vibrations and visual impacts of
operations in the Caltrain rail corridor. With or without the addition of a High
Speed Train, the Caltrain corridor should be modified to improve safety and to
minimize noise, vibration and visual impacts on adjoining districts, public
facilities, schools and neighborhoods.
Goal 3: Connect the East and West Portions of the City through an improved
circulation network that binds the city together in all directions.
Policy 3.1: Seek to increase the number of east-west pedestrian and bicycle
crossings along Alma Street, particularly south of Oregon Expressway.
Policy 3.2: All four existing at-grade rail crossings shall remain open to vehicular
traffic.
Goal 4: Provide Improved Access to Parks, Recreation Facilities and Schools and Assess
Future Needs for these Facilities.
Policy 4.1: Enhance connections to parks, community centers, libraries and
schools within the corridor or between the corridor and nearby facilities.
Opportunities to increase school capacity and facility development and use
should be evaluated and coordinated between the Palo Alto Unified School
District and the City.
Goal 5: Infrastructure Should Keep Pace with Development.
Policy 5.1: Implement plans and coordinate with other agencies where required
for parks, recreation and traffic improvements, as well as new or expanded
schools in order to keep pace with new development. Sewer, water, storm
drainage and wastewater management should be evaluated and implemented in
conjunction with development.
The suggested Objectives in Attachment D differ from these suggested goals and policies by not
pre-judging the below-grade trench solution. This is not meant to express a lack of interest or
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support for the goal of accomplishing grade separations below grade, but simply to provide an
opportunity for consideration of community objectives before alternatives are developed for
analysis, which is a key tenet of the context sensitive solutions process. Also, Staff does not yet
have a full understanding of the constraints that would dictate the form and cost of a below-
grade alternative, as discussed further below. The suggested Objectives recognized input
received from the questionnaire, which ranked suggested goals as follows:
1. Reduce congestion near at-grade crossings
2. Prioritize student safety
3. Separate motor vehicle from bicycle and pedestrian traffic
4. Deliver grade separations in a timely manner
5. Support planned Caltrain service improvements
6. Reduce unsafe driver behavior
7. Collaborate with neighboring cities and agencies
8. Keep construction period disruptions to a minimum
9. Reduce/eliminate train noise and vibrations
10. Fund project with existing funding from local sources
While the questionnaire results indicate a pretty clear hierarchy of goals in descending order,
Goals 1-7 were tightly arrayed and ranked quite high, with Goals 1-3 being clearly the most
important. Goals 8-10 were lesser priorities with #10 (funding) being clearly the least
important goal. Results suggest that the list of goals could be reduced to 1-7 or could be
grouped into Tiers (1, 2, 3) in order of importance.
The revised Objectives in Attachment E has been modified to include feedback and
recommendations from the Planning and Transportation Commission and the City Council Rail
Committee (changes are tracked; additions are underlined and deletions are crossed-out).
Evaluation Criteria
As reflected in the suggested Objectives, responses to Community Questionnaire #1
emphasized the importance of safety, and also touched on a variety of other issues including
the importance of rail service, traffic circulation and signal timing, bicycle and pedestrian
access, and more. Questionnaire responses ranked possible Evaluation Criteria as follows:
1. Pedestrians and Bicycle Circulation - Clear/safe passageways
2. Automobile Circulation - Reduce queue length and time
3. Pedestrians and Bicycle Circulation - Separated from auto traffic
4. East-West Connectivity - Facilitate movement across the corridor for all modes of travel
5. Automobile Circulation - Reduce traffic on neighborhood streets
6. Environmental Effects - Reduce noise and visibility of trains from neighborhoods
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7. Transit - Support Caltrain service improvements (level boarding, platform extensions,
etc.)
8. Construction Impacts - Minimize construction period disruption (detours/street
closures)
9. Cost - Fund the program with available funding sources
10. Construction Impacts - Able to implement in phases
Evaluation Criteria 1-3 were clearly ranked highest by respondents. Criteria 4-6 formed a tight
grouping of the second most important set of criteria. Criteria 7-10 were ranked least
important and well below other criteria. Grouping the criteria into Tier 1, 2, 3 might help when
evaluating alternatives, using Tier 1 criteria as “must address” criteria, with Tier 2 as “would like
to address” criteria, and Tier 3 as “ nice to have or bonus” criteria. As with the goals,
questionnaire respondents did not feel cost was an important evaluation criteria, although this
may change once more is known about project costs and available funding sources.
The revised Evaluation Criteria in Attachment E has been modified to include feedback and
recommendations from the Planning and Transportation Commission and the City Council Rail
Committee (changes are tracked; additions are underlined and deletions are crossed-out).
Constraints
Staff does not yet have a thorough understanding of the constraints that will help define
alternatives. For example, the total amount of funding that can be secured from all possible
sources is undetermined. This will require additional investigation and may ultimately prove to
be an important constraint. Similarly, there are technical requirements for freight and
passenger rail facilities that the Staff will need to explore before having a full understanding of
the physical constraints associated with grade separations. There will also be constraints
associated with railway and roadway operations and a host of other issues.
In CMR #6182 from October 13, 2015, which described the analysis of trenching below Churchill
Avenue, Meadow Drive, and Charleston Road, a number of preliminary constraints were
identified (see pages nine through 14 of the document at:
http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/civicax/filebank/documents/49398). For example, the analysis
noted the following as potential constraints because they would tend to dictate the extent and
cost of below-grade (trenching) alternatives considered:
The location and elevation of existing station locations
The location and depth of existing grade separated crossings
The location and depth of San Francisquito Creek
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Construction specifications such as a maximum slope of 1% for freight rail tracks unless
an exception is granted((
These and other issues will be explored by the City’s experts with assistance from a Technical
Advisory Group made up of senior representatives from organizations and agencies with
expertise or jurisdiction over aspects of the project or the project area.
Based on the recommendation of the City Council Rail Committee, Staff has initiated a white
paper analyzing the constraints associated with the planning, design and construction of a rail
trench. This white paper will be transmitted to the City Council, as well as the Planning and
Transportation Commission and the City Council Rail Committee, as soon as it is completed.
Resource Impact
The City included $1.9 million in the FY 2017 Capital Improvement Program in the Railroad
Grade Separation project (PL-17001) for the planning, engineering, and environmental review
necessary to advance grade separations in Palo Alto. As part of the Adopted FY 2018 Capital
Budget, $1.0 million of this funding was reappropriated to FY 2018. Staff is currently in the
process of reconciling FY2017 and reviewing the final year end expenditures for all capital
projects. Based on the year-end reconciliation of expenditures, this project, along with other
capital projects, will be recommended to be adjusted accordingly as part of the FY 2017 Year-
End action to Council. Santa Clara County 2016 Measure B funding, administered by VTA, may
be available to reimburse the City for some of these expenses. Measure B includes a total of
$700 million for grade separations that will be split among three jurisdictions with a total of
eight crossings (four in Palo Alto). Additional funding for grade separations may be available
from state and federal sources, although some additional local funding is likely to be required.
Environmental Review
The requested action is intended to help define a project and alternatives that will be reviewed
in accordance with the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), and is not itself a “project”
requiring review under CEQA. Alternatively, the requested action falls within the categorical
exemption established by CEQA Guidelines Section 15306 for information gathering activities.
Next Steps/Timeline
The Problem Statement, Objectives, and Evaluation Criteria adopted by the City Council will be
presented at Community Workshop #2, which is currently scheduled for September 16, 2017.
This workshop will begin the development of grade separation alternatives for later analysis
and screening. If a majority of Councilmembers wish to attend the September 16th workshop, it
The study identified a cost of approximately $1 Billion for grade separating Charleston & Meadow with a trench
using a 1% slope and a cost of approximately $500 Million for the 2%slope alternative, with the main differences
being the length and the need to rebuild some existing stations and grade separations if the 1% slope is required.
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will be noticed as a special meeting. Councilmembers are asked to inform the Clerk if they plan
to attend.
Attachments:
Attachment A - Connecting Palo Alto Community Engagement Plan (Revised) (PDF)
Attachment B - Connecting Palo Alto Community Workshop 1 Summary (DOCX)
Attachment C - Connecting Palo Alto Community Questionnaire 1 Summary (DOCX)
Attachment D - Connecting Palo Alto Problem Statement and Objectives (Suggested) (PDF)
Attachment E - Connecting Palo Alto Problem Statement and Objectives (Revised) (PDF)
Attachment F - Status of Grade Separation Projects (PDF)
Attachment G - Planning and Transportation Committee Excerpt Minutes 2017-08-09 (PDF)
Attachment H: August 16, 2017 Rail Committee Draft Transcript (DOC)
Connecting Palo Alto: Rail Program
Context Sensitive Solutions (CSS) Alternatives Analysis
Citizen Engagement Plan
I. Introduction
The Palo Alto Rail Program—now called Connecting Palo Alto—is a community based process to address
long‐standing challenges associated with at‐grade crossings on the Caltrain corridor that runs through
the community. This process will lead to project design decisions that will inform both community
aesthetics and mobility choices for many future generations. Community understanding, input and
collaboration will be a vital part of the decision making process. The Project Team will lead the
community engagement activities associated with Connecting Palo Alto to raise awareness, inform,
educate, gather input and connect citizens about potential rail design alternatives that can help prepare
the City for the transit landscape of the future.
The Alliance for Innovation, a coalition focused on emerging practices to transform local government in
partnership with Arizona State University and the International City/County Management Association,
has identified three types of community connections: citizens to each other, citizens to local
government, and the local government to citizens. The Alliance identifies the characteristics of the
connected community to include:
Citizen engagement activities are connected to what citizens perceive to be important
Citizens are connected to each other and to local government through engagement
activities
Citizens are connected by electronic and traditional linkages that permit generation of
information, consideration of alternatives and joint action
Participants in various citizen engagement activities are connected to each other to
expand civic capacity, activities are linked and support each other and new ventures
build on previous ones
Organizations in the community are connected to citizens and the local government as
partners in engagement.
The Alliance’s approach to citizen engagement aligns with the Context Sensitive Solutions process
identified by the Palo Alto City Council as the preferred framework by which to involve the community
and make decisions about the future of the rail corridor. As articulated by the Mineta Institute, the four
principles of CSS include:
Strive toward a shared stakeholder vision to provide the basis for decisions
Demonstrate a comprehensive understanding of contexts
Foster continuing communication and collaboration to achieve consensus
Exercise flexibility and creativity to shape effective transportation solutions, while
preserving and enhancing community values, and natural environments.
In terms of citizen engagement, the CSS process calls for the integration of stakeholders into the planning
process early and continuously to ensure the project reflects the views and values of the community.
The goals of community engagement under CSS are similar to many other public participation models:
ATTACHMENT A
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Identify stakeholders: Identifying interested parties and evaluating their concerns will
help guide the engagement strategy. Identify key stakeholders with the potential to
invite others to join the process. Identify cross‐cutting areas of interest.
Build consensus: Set a clear collaborative structure to integrate stakeholders into the
planning process and to empower them by providing a way for them to have a voice in
the process. Establish clear rules of engagement about how various views and
perspectives will be incorporated and shared.
Engage the community to define the problem to be addressed: It is important to engage
communities at the beginning of the planning process and reflect community values and
vision.
Integrate contextual elements: Ensure that a community’s vision for a project
recognizes constraints and will fit into other regional plans.
Analyze alternatives for best project selection: Stakeholder input is needed to define
the problem, develop alternative solutions, look at tradeoffs and determine
cost/benefits.
As outlined by the International Association of Public Participation, which is made up of members who
seek to promote and improve the practice of public participation in relation to individuals, governments,
institutions, and other entities that affect the public interest throughout the world, there is a public
involvement spectrum that can determine the level of public engagement, as well as appropriate tools
used to achieve that outcome. It’s important to be clear on the goal for engaging the public. Levels of
engagement include:
Inform the public with objective and balanced information. This is a one‐way flow of
information.
Consult with the public by informing them and then requesting input.
Involve/include the public in the decision by accepting input and reflecting this input in
the choice.
Collaborate by partnering with citizens and sharing the decision‐making with them.
Empower the public by putting the final decision in their hands.
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This Plan identifies a menu of engagement tools based on the level and type of public participation
anticipated to be needed. It is also a living document where community engagement activities are
aligned with the Rail Program’s technical efforts and deliverables. The Plan will be revised as
appropriate as the Connecting Palo Alto program progresses to incorporate community involvement and
ownership to the greatest extent possible.
II. Goals and Objectives
The goal of any citizen engagement effort is often twofold: to build civic capacity and community in
general and to drive public participation to decide a project or policy. The City hopes that Connecting
Palo Alto will do both. The significance of the project and the already high level of community interest
presents an opportunity to expand citizen participation and partnership with the City. The
configuration, design, and other choices that will need to be made to advance grade separations will
need a high level of community input, collaboration and ultimately, support, to be successful.
Specific objectives of the community engagement efforts include:
‐ Provide clear, accurate and easily accessible information on the Rail Program
‐ Facilitate communications between interested stakeholders
‐ Create engagement strategies for gathering input on grade separation alternatives and making
decisions
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‐ Identify meaningful metrics to evaluate community engagement efforts
‐ Document community input to ensure it informs the decision making process
III. Key Stakeholders and Concerns
The Connecting Palo Alto process will bring forward input and lead to decisions that will impact a wide
range of stakeholders so the identification of key participants is essential to a successful outcome.
This Plan identifies the following participants or target audiences:
‐ Palo Alto residents who live near or travel across the rail corridor
‐ Regular transit riders
‐ Senior citizens
‐ Citizens with special needs
‐ Low income residents
‐ City elected officials and staff
‐ Non‐profit organizations (i.e. Californians Advocating Responsible Rail Design and Friends of
Caltrain)
‐ Local businesses
‐ Local educational institutions
‐ Local environmental advocates
‐ Community‐based organizations
‐ Neighboring elected officials and staff
‐ Other members of the general public
Based on input at a May 20, 2017 Community Workshop and in accordance with findings of the Rail
Corridor Circulation Study, the City will consider multiple alternatives for grade separations to address a
number of areas of concern. While a final “problem statement,” project objectives, and performance
measures are still being developed based on community input, the areas of concern include:
‐ Community cohesion and connectivity generally
‐ Safety, noise, and aesthetics along the rail corridor
‐ Traffic congestion around at‐grade crossings
‐ Access for pedestrians and bicyclists
‐ Facilitating rail service along the corridor
‐ Rail program costs
‐ Equity between north and south Palo Alto in terms of investments and benefits
‐ The potential for disruption and impacts during construction
IV. Engagement Strategies
The Project Team will implement a series of community engagement strategies and tools as described
below.
Communication Tools and Platforms
Throughout the community engagement of Connected Palo Alto, the Project Team will use a regular set
of communications tools and platforms to inform, consult, engage and reach decisions. These include:
5
Stakeholder Database: The Project Team has developed an initial stakeholder base of
interested community members, as well as subscribers to the City’s two monthly e‐newsletters
that total about 7,500 individuals. The Team will continue to add to this database to expand
opportunities to connect with the community.
Collateral Materials: These will include the core messages developed about the project,
mailers, facts sheets, and other community informing materials
Website Updates: The webpage for the project at www.cityofpaloalto.org/connectingpaloalto
will be updated on a regular basis with the latest news and updates, links to background
documents, as well as opportunities to sign up for regular e‐newsletter updates
Social Media: Both Nextdoor and the City’s robust social media channels will be used on a
regular basis to cross promote community meetings/events, drive traffic to survey link and help
to keep community informed and engaged. This could also include boosted posts on Facebook
that are an economical method to broaden reach. The Project Team may also use Open City
Hall when appropriate to solicit feedback on specific project questions or ideas.
Email Newsletter: The Project Team plans to design an e‐newsletter to be distributed on an as‐
needed but regular basis to our stakeholder database. The first edition is expected to be
distributed by the end of August
Press Releases, Council Comments, Public Announcements: Announcements about upcoming
workshops, survey opportunities or other outreach activities will be included in press releases,
City Manager comments at City Council meetings and other regular communications avenues.
Advertising: It may be appropriate to consider creating/running ads for community events or
other outreach efforts
V. Levels of Engagement
1. Elected and Appointed Bodies
Level of engagement: Consult, Engage, Decide
The Connecting Palo Alto process includes engagement with three elected and appointed bodies:
Planning and Transportation Commission, Rail Committee and City Council. Public comments are
accepted at meetings of all three bodies, both written and verbal. All decisions related to the
Connecting Palo Alto program will be addressed transparently at each of these three bodies. Under
existing rules, an opportunity exists for the Rail Committee to allow for more unstructured public
comments and direct engagement during its meetings. The committee has the option of utilizing this
meeting structure to allow for community members who are particularly interested in a topic to
more deeply engage in the discussion and decision‐making process.
2. Community Workshops
Level of engagement: Consult, Engage, Decide
The first Connecting Palo Alto community workshop was held at Mitchell Park Community Center on
May 20, 2017 and attended by about 150 people. This was intended to be a “restart” of sorts
following several rail corridor studies and previous community discussions. The Project Team
gathered feedback and contact information from participants, as well as provided necessary context
for upcoming decision points.
6
The Project Team anticipates a total of six community workshops will be needed to allow for larger
discussions, as well as dialogue in smaller group sessions. The structure and purpose of the
meetings will be scheduled to align with project milestones including:
Identify a formal “problem statement” that captures the purpose of Connecting Palo Alto,
as well as objectives and evaluation criteria that speak to the need for the project and
provide , set its context
Identify potential alternatives for evaluation and analysis
Explore findings of the analysis and discuss outstanding issues, including potential impacts
and mitigation
Evaluate alternatives based on evaluation criteria and select a preferred alternatives for
further refinement
The City promoted the workshop through a variety of channels including postcards, Nextdoor, social
media, local media, website content and Council announcements.
A second community workshop is scheduled for September 16, 2017 at the Palo Alto Arts Center,
and will focus on the problem statement, objectives and performance measures, and begin to define
alternatives. The Project Team will utilize similar outreach tools to encourage participation and
attendance.
3. Focus Groups
Level of engagement: Consult, Engage, Decide
The purpose of Focus Groups is to collect information from a small group (for instance, five to 12
participants) in a systematic and structured format. An effective focus group is designed around a
clear and specific goal. Participants interact with a facilitator who presents the participants with
questions designed to yield insight into current and/or desired results in relation to a specific topic
or issue. Focus Groups will be used throughout the Connecting Palo Alto program to facilitate tough
decision making. Focus Groups may be convened in advance of Community Workshops to help
identify potential red flags that could derail the decision‐making process.
4. Stakeholder Interviews
Level of Engagement: Consult
The Project Team conducted an initial round of stakeholder interviews in April, May and June 2017,
in order to develop the agenda and presentations for Community Workshop #1. These interviews
also provided an opportunity for these highly‐engaged stakeholders to assist the Project Team in
developing the Community Engagement Plan and other program materials. Stakeholder Interviews
will be used through the Connecting Palo Alto program to inform the decision‐making process and
assist the project team with structuring the alternatives analysis.
5. Community Questionnaires
Level of engagement: Inform, Consult
Surveys and questionnaires are good way to solicit input on the project through targeted questions.
The Project Team plans to conduct at least two online questionnaires (via SurveyMonkey) and
promote participation through emails, website and social media. The first questionnaire was sent
out on July 5, 2017 to solicit community input into aspects of the four grade crossing alternatives, as
7
well as initial reaction to a problem definition statement. As of July 13, more than 700 individuals
had completed the survey online with 600 providing comments in the open ended question
indicating a very strong level of interest by the community. While not a statistically valid sampling,
the high level of participation shows the importance of this issue to Palo Altans.
A second online questionnaire is expected to be distributed once more details about the impacts
and benefits of grade separation alternatives are more clearly defined. Simple text–based surveys
may also be considered for use at community workshops and in other venues. These simple tools
release short surveys and polls to recipients’ mobile devices, which solicit reply via text messages.
Questions from software like Textizen, for example, can be added to a chain of subsequent
messages according to recipient responses. A limited amount of characters are available for
presenting inquiries and responses, and depth and length of insight tends to be superficial and
short. However, its simple module allows for a quick, timely, and cost effective exchange with
respondents.
Once there is a preferred alternative and financing options identified through the process, the
Project Team may consider potentially polling eligible voters, similar to other formal research polls
taken to determine public opinion.
Engagement Throughout Decision Making Process:
Additional Community Engagement Options:
Pop‐Up Open Houses
Level of engagement: Inform
Pop‐ups can be small tables or activities co‐located with either the site they address or events
engaging the same audience. Pop‐up Open Houses are often viewed as fun opportunity to
participate in civic process.
Community Events
Level of engagement: Inform
Use an existing event such as Farmer’s Market, concerts, school events, etc. to
promote/educate community about the project with booth/exhibit.
Community Initiated Meetings
Level of engagement: Inform, Engage
Meetings organized and run by members of the community, can be supported by having issue
experts/city staff attend to provide information.
Site Visits
Level of engagement: Inform, Consult
Invite members of the public to visit the project site to allow better visualization of alternatives.
Focus
Groups
Community
Workshop PTC Rail
Committee City Council
8
21st Century Town Hall Meetings
Level of engagement: Inform, Engage
Hold a large group meeting in person with technology facilitated platforms such as Facebook
Live.
VI. Community Engagement Metrics
The Project team will track the effectiveness of all Rail Program community engagement activities and
services through the following quantitative metrics:
o Total number of stakeholders recorded into stakeholder database
o Total number of meetings/ events related to Rail Program stakeholders logged into stakeholder
database
o Total number of inquiries recorded in stakeholder database
o Ratio of positive/negative feedback on Rail Program developments, rail separation alternatives,
and general community engagement activities and services recorded in stakeholder database
o Total number of stakeholders reached directly by collateral
o Total number of stakeholders visiting Rail Program’s webpage
o Frequency of stakeholder engagement with Rail Program’s website, social media platforms
o Total number of stakeholders reached by Rail Program surveys
o Ratio of recipients/respondents of Rail Program surveys
o Ratio of positive/negative feedback on Rail Program developments rail separation alternatives,
and general community engagement activities and services recorded in survey findings
o Attendance at public meetings
VII. Community Engagement Schedule1
Date Event Topics
May 20, 2017 Community Workshop #1 Review and discuss background,
context, problem statement,
objectives and evaluation criteria
July 2017 Community Questionnaire #1 Review problem statement, objectives
and evaluation criteria
August 2017 E‐newsletter #1
Discuss problem statement,
objectives, evaluation criteria and
upcoming Community Workshop #2
September 16, 2017 Community Workshop #2 Finalize problem statement, objectives
and evaluation criteria and begin to
develop alternatives
September 2017 E‐newsletter #2
Finalize problem statement, objectives
and evaluation criteria and begin to
develop alternatives
October 21, 2017 (tentative)
Community Workshop #3 Continue to develop alternatives
1 Please notice that this schedule will change according to project developments, needs, and milestones.
9
October 2017
Community Questionnaire #2 Continue to develop alternatives
November 2017
E‐newsletter #3
Continue to develop alternatives
November 2017‐January 2018 Focus Groups #1 Discuss Alternatives Analysis and
Selection of Preferred Alternative
December 2017 E‐newsletter #4 Discuss Alternatives Analysis and
Selection of Preferred Alternative
November 2017‐January 2018 Community Workshop #4 Discuss Alternatives Analysis and
Selection of preferred alternative
January 2018 E‐newsletter #5 Discuss Alternatives Analysis and
Selection of Preferred Alternative
February‐March 2018
Focus Groups #2 Adopt preferred alternative(s)
February‐March 2018
Community Workshop #5 Adopt preferred alternative(s)
February‐March 2018
E‐newsletter #6 Adopt preferred alternative(s)
Notes: This schedule of events and topics are subject to change. This summary does not include concurrent
stakeholder interviews or other engagement activities that may supplement workshops and newsletters; it also
does not include concurrent meetings of the technical advisory committee or meetings of City bodies such as the
City Council, Rail Committee, and Planning & Transportation Commission.
VIII. Technical Advisory Committee (TAC)
The Project Team is working to convene a Connecting Palo Alto Technical Advisory Committee (TAC).
The TAC will provide a forum for engagement with staff from the agencies with special knowledge about
the rail corridor. The TAC will help the Project Team and community identify the technical opportunities
and constraints for various alternatives. The TAC will not, in and of itself, be making any decisions
regarding the Connecting Palo Alto program. The first meeting of the TAC is scheduled to occur in
September and its membership is expected to include senior staff from the agencies and organizations
listed below in alphabetical order. The TAC will likely only be convened on an as‐needed basis moving
forward.
o California High‐speed Rail Authority
o Caltrain (Peninsula Corridor Joint Powers Board)
o Caltrans District 4 Traffic Operations
o City of Menlo Park
o City of Mountain View
o City of Palo Alto Planning and Community Environment Department
o City of Palo Alto Public Works Department
o City of Palo Alto Utilities Department
o Palo Alto Pedestrian and Bicycle Advisory Committee
o Palo Alto Transportation Management Association (PATMA)
o Palo Alto Unified School District (and interested site administrators)
o Santa Clara County Roads and Airports Department
o Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority
o Santa Clara Valley Water District
10
o Stanford University
o Union Pacific Railroad
Attachment B
All information related to the Connecting Palo Alto Community Workshop 1
Summary can be viewed by visiting the City’s Connecting Palo Alto web page at
http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/gov/depts/pln/transit/railways.asp .
Attachment C
Responses to the Connecting Palo Alto Community Questionnaire 1 can be viewed
at the following link:
http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/gov/depts/pln/transit/railways.asp
Information specific to the questionnaire can be found under the “What are the
latest updates?” section.
Attachment D
Connecting Palo Alto: Problem Statement, Objectives, and Evaluation Criteria
August 2017 Draft for PTC and Rail Committee Discussion Purposes
Page 1 of 2
Connecting Palo Alto: Suggested Problem Statement
“The Caltrain corridor creates a physical and visual barrier to east/west connectivity
within the City of Palo Alto, and is also the source of safety concerns for
pedestrians, bicyclists and motorists, especially at existing at‐grade crossings. These
rail corridor challenges also creates issues in surrounding neighborhoods such as
noise, vibration, traffic and visual impacts. While the City of Palo Alto benefits from
Caltrain service and supports Caltrain modernization (including electrification),
some of the issues experienced along the rail corridor These will continue to get
worse in the future with increases in Caltrain service traffic due to Caltrain
modernization (including electrification) and the possible addition of high speed
rail.”
[Tracked changes show modifications to the draft problem statement included in the July
2017 citizen questionnaire and are based on responses to that questionnaire.]
Connecting Palo Alto: Suggested Objectives*
To improve safety along the rail corridor
To reduce the traffic congestion that occurs at existing at‐grade crossings every time a train
passes by
To improve circulation and access across the rail corridor for all modes of transportation,
separating bicyclists and pedestrians from automobile traffic
To deliver grade separations and circulation improvements in a timely manner
To reduce train noise and vibrations and minimize visual changes along the rail corridor
To support Caltrain service enhancements
To minimize right‐of‐way acquisitions and local road closures
To ensure fairness in terms of the investments and improvements in north and south Palo Alto
To minimize potential impacts and disruption during construction while enabling continued
train service at all times
To maximize Palo Alto’s fair share of available funding sources
*Suggested objectives are loosely based on July 2017 questionnaire responses and prior studies. These
are suggestions only, and are subject to change.
Attachment D
Connecting Palo Alto: Problem Statement, Objectives, and Evaluation Criteria
August 2017 Draft for PTC and Rail Committee Discussion Purposes
Page 2 of 2
Connecting Palo Alto: Suggested Evaluation Criteria
The following evaluation criteria are suggested as a starting place to support the development
and evaluation of alternatives. These can be modified or supplemented with performance
measures or metrics based on community input and technical analyses.
Tier 1 Criteria: Most Important
East‐West connectivity: facilitate movement across the corridor for all modes of
transportation
Traffic congestion: reduce delay and congestion for automobile traffic at rail crossings
Ped/Bike circulation: provide clear and safe routes for pedestrians and bicyclists seeking
to cross the rail corridor, separate from automobile traffic
Rail operations: support continued rail operations and Caltrain service improvements
Tier 2 Criteria: Also Important
Environmental impacts: reduce rail noise and vibration along the corridor
Environmental impacts: minimize visual changes along the rail corridor
Local access: maintain or improve access to neighborhoods, parks, schools and other
destinations along the corridor while reducing regional traffic on neighborhood streets
Tier 3 Criteria: Somewhat Important
Construction: minimize disruption and the duration of construction activities at any
single location
Cost: minimize right‐of‐way acquisition & finance with available funding sources
Attachment E
Connecting Palo Alto: Problem Statement, Objectives, and Evaluation Criteria
September 2017 Draft for City Council Discussion Purposes
Page 1 of 2
Tracked changes show modifications based on recommendations from the Planning and
Transportation Commission and the Rail Committee.
Connecting Palo Alto: Suggested Problem Statement
“While enhanced rail transit service is important to the City of Palo Alto, tThe Caltrain
corridor creates a physical and visual barrier to east/west connectivity within the City of
Palo Alto, and is also the source of safety concerns for pedestrians, bicyclists and motorists,
especially at existing at‐grade crossings. The rail corridor also creates issues in surrounding
neighborhoods, such as noise, vibration, traffic, and visual impacts. While the City of Palo
Alto benefits from Caltrain service, and supports Caltrain modernization (including
electrification), some of the issues experienced along the rail corridor will continue to get
worse in the future with increases in Caltrain service and the possible probable addition of
high speed rail.”
Connecting Palo Alto: Suggested Objectives
To recognize and build off of the previous rail corridor planning work
To improve safety along the rail corridor
To reduce the traffic congestion that occurs at existing at‐grade crossings every time a train
passes by
To minimize right‐of‐way acquisitions by eminent domain and local road closures
To improve circulation and access across the rail corridor for all modes of transportation,
To separateing bicyclists and pedestrians from automobile traffic
To deliver grade separations and circulation improvements in a timely manner
To reduce train noise and vibrations and minimize visual changes along the rail corridor
To support Caltrain service enhancements
To minimize right‐of‐way acquisitions and local road closures
To ensure fairness in terms of the investments and improvements in north and south Palo Alto
To minimize potential impacts and disruption during construction while enabling continued
train service at all times
To maximize Palo Alto’s fair share of available funding sources
Attachment E
Connecting Palo Alto: Problem Statement, Objectives, and Evaluation Criteria
September 2017 Draft for City Council Discussion Purposes
Page 2 of 2
Connecting Palo Alto: Suggested Evaluation Criteria
The following evaluation criteria are suggested as a starting place to support the development and
evaluation of alternatives. These can be modified or supplemented with performance measures or
metrics based on community input and technical analyses.
Tier 1 Criteria: Most Important
East‐West connectivity: facilitate movement across the corridor for all modes of transportation
Traffic congestion: reduce delay and congestion for automobile traffic at rail crossings
Ped/Bike circulation: provide clear and safe routes for pedestrians and bicyclists seeking to
cross the rail corridor, separate from automobile traffic
Rail operations: support continued rail operations and Caltrain service improvements
Cost: finance with feasible funding sources
Tier 2 Criteria: Also Important
Environmental impacts: reduce rail noise and vibration along the corridor
Environmental impacts: minimize visual changes along the rail corridor
Local access: maintain or improve access to neighborhoods, parks, schools and other
destinations along the corridor while reducing regional traffic on neighborhood streets
Cost: minimize right‐of‐way acquisition by eminent domain& finance with available funding
sources
Construction: minimize disruption and the duration of construction
Tier 3 Criteria: Somewhat Important
Construction: minimize disruption and the duration of construction activities at any single
location
Cost: minimize right‐of‐way acquisition & finance with available funding sources
Caltrain Corridor Grade Separation Schedule, Estimates, & Alignment
Connecting Palo Alto: Rail Program
South San Francisco
Linden Avenue
San Bruno
Scott Street
Burlingame
Broadway & Broadway Stn.
San Mateo
25th Avenue & Hillsdale Stn.
Mountain View
Rengstor Ave
Mountain View
Castro St. & Transit Cntr.
Sunnyvale
Mary Ave
High-speed Rail
San José-San Francisco
Caltrain Electrification
San Francisco
16th St. & Railyard
$160-200M
$310-390M
$250M
Location Estimated Schedule Vertical Alignment
of RailroadCost
Estimate
Hybrid
Hybrid
Under Consideration
Under Consideration
At Grade
Unknown
N/A N/A
Unknown
Unknown
Unknown
$45M
$120M
At Grade
Under Consideration
Under Consideration
Under Consideration
At Grade: 1 xing
Hybrid: 3 xings
Below Grade
At Grade
$180M
Redwood City
Whipple Ave
Menlo ParkRavenswood Ave & Others
Palo Alto
Pending Outcome of CSS
2017 2018 2019 2020 2021
Planning Underway; Schedule Unknown
Planning Underway; Schedule Unknown
Planning Underway; Schedule Unknown
Planning LEGEND
Prepared By: City of Palo Alto Planning & Community Environment Department
Date Prepared: August 2017
Environmental/Design
Construction Vertical Alignment Alternative
Selected by City CouncilSchedule Unknown
Beyond Milestone
Final Design Complete; Remaining Schedule Unknown
_______________________
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 fifteen (15) 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
Excerpt Minutes 2
August 9, 2017 3
Council Chambers 4
250 Hamilton Avenue 5
6:00 PM 6
7
Study Session 8
Public Comment is Permitted. Five (5) minutes per speaker.1,3 9
Action Items 10
Public Comment is Permitted. Applicants/Appellant Teams: Fifteen (15) minutes, plus three (3) minutes rebuttal. 11
All others: Five (5) minutes per speaker.1,3 12
1.Recommendations Regarding a Suggested Problem Statement, Objectives and13
Evaluation Criteria to Support Development and Evaluation of Railroad Grade14
Separation Alternatives15
16
Chair Alcheck: I'd like to move on then with our first action item, Item Number 2, which is the 17
railroad grade separation item. 18
19
Joshuah Mello, Chief Transportation Official: Great. Thank you, Chair, Members of the 20
Commission, My name is Joshuah Mello. I am the Chief Transportation Official with the City of 21
Palo Alto. This evening I'll be giving a brief presentation on the Connecting Palo Alto Rail 22
Program and presenting some [unintelligible] problem statement, objectives, and evaluation 23
criteria for this program moving forward. 24
25
ATTACHMENT G
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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 fifteen (15) 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.
Alright, thank you for allowing me to present tonight. I'm going to kick it off by just going 1
through a brief recap of the existing conditions along the Caltrain corridor in Palo Alto. The 2
Caltrain corridor is roughly four miles long and runs roughly from the northwest to the 3
southeast of the City. This study is looking at the entire rail corridor all of the existing grade 4
crossings as well as existing grade separations. We're starting very broad and the intent is to 5
narrow down as we move forward so we're starting very broad looking at the entire corridor. 6
This is a map that we developed of the study area that shows the existing at grade crossings 7
which are where roadways are at the same grade as the railroad as well as grade separated 8
crossings which have the roadway and/or a bike/pedestrian path separated from the rail 9
corridor. 10
11
We currently have four at grade railroad crossings at Palo Alto Avenue also known as (aka) 12
Alma Street, Churchill Avenue, East and West Meadow Drive, and East and West Charleston 13
Road. You can see here the modes are a little bit different. The primary mode of 14
transportation is a little bit different on each grade crossing. Charleston Road carries a lot more 15
motor vehicles while Churchill Avenue carries more bicycles and Palo Alto Avenue actually has a 16
higher rate of pedestrian traffic. You can also see there is a significant amount of truck traffic at 17
Palo Alto Avenue and the delay in the number of gate openings varies by grade crossing as well. 18
There will be a lot more data collected as we move through this process. This is just to give you 19
a quick overview of our current grade crossings. 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 fifteen (15) 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
We have done a little bit of work as a community on the rail corridor prior to this project kicking 2
off. Notably back in 2013 City Council adopted the 2013 Palo Alto Rail Corridor Study. This was 3
commissioned in 2010 and it was ultimately adopted in 2013. It was developed by a 17 4
member task force comprised of community members and it focused on the rail corridor 5
circulation, connectivity, land use as well as urban design and public facilities. And this was a 6
very broad look at the rail corridor and it did not just look… it didn't get too far into detail on 7
grade crossing alternatives and it was more of a big picture look at land use and transportation 8
components along the corridor. 9
10
In 2014 staff and Council commissioned the Palo Alto Grade Separation and Trenching Study 11
and this is what I would call a feasibility analysis. This was a study done by an engineering firm 12
to look at what ifs. If we were to grade separate at Churchill, Meadow, and Charleston what 13
would the impacts be of different alternative configurations of those grade separations? So 14
they looked at traditional bridge over crossings, trenching the railroad, and other variations and 15
identified what the extents of those projects would be and what some of the property impacts 16
could potentially be. This was not a preferred alternative identified from the community. This 17
was a feasibility analysis of looking at what if these certain types of crossings were constructed. 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 fifteen (15) 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.
During budget discussions for the Fiscal Year (FY) 2017 to 2021 Capital Improvement Program 1
(CIP) we were able to secure $1.9 million in the CIP to begin work on our railroad grade 2
separations. And at that time Council ranked that, this project, as the highest priority project 3
for the City as a whole not just in the transportation realm. So this is a very high profile, high 4
priority project as you know for our community. Shortly thereafter we released a request for 5
proposal (RFP) for a consultant services for rail program management and we selected a team 6
to move forward within August of 2016. That fall, this is fall of last year, Santa Clara County 7
voters approved Measure B which is a transportation sales tax which will run for 30 years. $700 8
million of that funding has been allocated to building grade separations in Palo Alto, Mountain 9
View, and Sunnyvale. There are a total of eight grade crossings that this money will be directed 10
towards in those three communities. And we're currently working with Santa Clara Valley 11
Transportation Authority (VTA) to develop an implementation plan which will hopefully enable 12
the region to construct all eight of those grade separations within that 30 year tax timeframe. 13
14
Finally you’ll hear a lot about this this evening, but one of our directives from City Council was 15
to move forward with a context sensitive solutions/alternatives analysis process. We formally 16
kicked that off in March and I’ll talk a little bit more about what CS is… Context Sensitive 17
Solutions (CSS) is, but we were we've been moving very deliberately and very slowly on this and 18
this is the first check in of many with you and the Rail Committee and City Council as we move 19
along those CSS/alternatives analysis process. So I'm not sure that all of you are familiar with 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 fifteen (15) 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 CSS is, back in the old days highway engineers primarily state Departments of 1
Transportation (DOT) would sit in their office in the capital city start work on a project without 2
ever consulting the community. They had standard details for highway widenings, freeways, 3
they would often endanger the environment, impact communities, fail to consult with 4
community members and neighborhood organizations and so as a result there was a lot of 5
negative reaction to some of the projects that DOTs, particular state DOTs moved through the 6
planning and design process. 7
8
So shortly after the National Environmental Policy Act was adopted back in the 1960’s a new 9
way of thinking about projects was devised and this was piloted by some of the state DOTs. 10
New Jersey DOT was one of the early front runners in this process and it became known as CSS 11
because it thinks about the context of the project. One of the key tenants is to have continual 12
community involvement and instead of approaching a project with the solution front loaded at 13
the beginning and then defending your recommended solution to the community the goal of 14
CSS is to work collaboratively with the community and first identify what the problem is that 15
you're trying to solve. So the problem that you ultimately end up addressing may not be the 16
one that you identified or would typically identify at the beginning of the process. There's also 17
a very clear decision making process in CSS. Traditionally large roadway projects and other 18
infrastructure projects a lot of the decisions are made in back rooms without community 19
consultation and without the community being involved in a transparent decision making 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 fifteen (15) 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.
process. So CSS is a transparent collaborative process that there's a step by step process that 1
you follow and the step that we're at this evening is the problem statement objectives and 2
evaluation criteria step. So we're really going to talk a lot about what the problem is that we're 3
trying to solve this evening. A lot of us going into this project assumed that we knew what the 4
problem was and what the problem is, but in talking in the community we have a draft problem 5
statement that may not be what we thought we would have walking into this project. 6
7
The principles that we're proposing to follow on this trip that we’re going to take with this 8
project are very similar to what's espoused in the CSS process and we've built on the principles 9
from CSS. One of the things that we've really struggled with is this needs to be a flexible 10
process. So we're trying to tape take steps forward, but at the same time we need to be ready 11
to adapt the process and we don't know where we're going to, where this whole community 12
engagement and community decision making process is going to take us. So what we 13
ultimately decided and with the support of the Rail Committee we decided to hold a 14
community workshop, go over some of the background information with the community, do a 15
community questionnaire, develop a draft problem statement, some objectives, and some 16
evaluation criteria and then visit with the Planning and Transportation Commission (PTC), the 17
Rail Committee, City Council and then go back to the community again in order to finalize that 18
problem statement, objectives, and evaluation criteria. 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 fifteen (15) 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.
So as I said we're very early in the process. This is a chart that shows kind of the five steps that 1
we see. Where we're standing today we see five steps moving forward and we're currently in 2
stage one which is the problem definition and evaluation framework. As I said we're very early 3
in the process and this is designed to be a flexible process and an adaptable process and I think 4
you'll be able to help us as we move through this process adapt and make changes in order to 5
make sure that we are making decisions at the right level, talking about the right things, and 6
looking at the right alternatives and the right options. 7
8
So our work to date which I said started back in March prior to that the Rail Committee was 9
reconvened in December of 2015. It's met basically monthly. There was a break from 10
September 2016 to March 2017. The Rail Committee charter and the guiding principles were 11
updated by City Council in April 2017. And then as I said since March of 2017 staff and the Rail 12
Committee have been primarily focused on moving forward with this CSS alternatives analysis 13
process. And we spent a lot of time with the Rail Committee trying to figure out how to get this 14
moving and what the next step should be in the process. 15
16
And one of the very first things we did was we invited 15 members of the community into the 17
Downtown Library across the street and myself and some of my other staff members we sat 18
down and we conducted interviews with these stakeholders. And we asked them about the 19
previous studies, we asked them about what a CSS analysis alternatives analysis process should 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 fifteen (15) 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.
look like, we also asked about their opinion on problem, what the problem is. We tried to avoid 1
starting a discussion about solutions and alternatives because we think that's going to come 2
later and it really needs to come later after we decide as community what problem we're trying 3
to solve and what some of the objectives are. 4
5
So some of the key takeaways from these stakeholder interviews are early on we were as staff 6
we were not fully aware of how important the prior rail corridor studies are to the community 7
and how much work went into particularly the 2013 study so that was something we quickly 8
changed course on and got up to speed on the outcome and the process that went into that 9
study. There was also a little bit of confusion around the trenching study that was done in 10
2014. Some members of the community felt that that was a some type of alternative that 11
already been adopted by City Council and that there had already better an alternatives analysis 12
process when in reality as I mentioned earlier that was really just a feasibility study to look at 13
what some of the impacts would be of different alternatives. 14
15
There's also and you'll hear a lot about this tonight there's some different opinions on what a 16
CSS process looks like. There is a there are some folks who want to use the community 17
workshops that we've been holding as a “stakeholder group” where we'll make decisions at 18
these community workshops and we'll invite the entire community in to help participate. And 19
then there's another group of folks who would rather see a formal stakeholder group organized 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 fifteen (15) 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 would help manage those CSS process. As staff we believe that those are both consistent 1
with the principles of CSS; however, I think ultimately it'll be up to City Council to decide 2
whether to continue moving forward with a community workshop format or to convene a 3
formal stakeholder group. 4
5
There was also some concern from the stakeholders about presupposing solutions. So there 6
was a little bit of discussion about the trench option versus some more traditional options. And 7
the cost of the trench is really undetermined and it's really hard to start to evaluate the 8
different alternatives without getting a better handle on cost and impacts. And then we also 9
learned that safety and visual impacts are very important. There were a couple of stakeholders 10
who were very concerned about what the visual impacts of some of these alternatives could be 11
to their communities and their neighborhoods. 12
13
After conducting the stakeholder interviews we convened a community workshop on May 20th 14
at Mitchell Park Community Center. This was a Saturday. We had we started at 10:00 a.m., had 15
great turnout. We had 130 attendees. The morning was focused on background information a 16
lot of similar information that's presented in your packet and that I'm presenting to you this 17
evening. And then we talked about what the existing conditions and the future conditions will 18
look like with Caltrain electrification as well as the potential for high speed rail service and 19
additional trains along the corridor. Then we broke for lunch, continued the discussion over 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 fifteen (15) 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.
lunch and in the afternoon we started to delve into the problem definition. So we asked folks 1
in your opinion what problem should we be trying to solve? What are some of the issues that 2
you encounter along the rail corridor? And we also discussed the objectives and the evaluation 3
criteria. 4
5
One cool thing that we were able to do during the workshop was real time polling using 6
smartphones. And we ask people questions like is this time of day a good time for you to meet, 7
did you like the Saturday meeting, what's the best way to keep in touch with you? This was not 8
a scientific poll, but it was a good way to keep people involved and active in the conversation. 9
We did learn a lot about people's communication preferences and there was generally support 10
for the Saturday midday format of that day. 11
12
We took a little bit of a break over the summer while Council was at recess, but we did not 13
want to lose touch with the community and we did not want them to feel as though work had 14
stopped and that their attendance on May 20th was in vain. So we developed a community 15
questionnaire with the assistance of the Rail Committee and this community questionnaire was 16
intended to do two things. It was to maintain community involvement throughout the summer, 17
but we also wanted to we wanted the community participate in the drafting of the problem 18
statement, the objectives, the evaluation criteria that we developed after Community 19
Workshop 1 with the community during that workshop on May 20th. So we emailed out 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 fifteen (15) 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.
community questionnaire to 444 recipients on July 5th. We also advertised it I believe on 1
Nextdoor, Facebook, Twitter, all of the other social media outlets that we have access to. We 2
received 791 unique responses in I think the two week period that we had the survey posted. 3
And 98 percent of the people who started the questionnaire finished the questionnaire which is 4
pretty impressive. It was a fairly detailed questionnaire with some pretty intense questions. 5
6
So we were able to use the conversations that we had on May 20th with the community at 7
Mitchell Park as well as the feedback that we got on the questionnaire and the stakeholder 8
interviews that we conducted prior to the workshop on May 20th to develop a draft problem 9
statement for your consideration. I can read it if you'd like. If not we can talk about it during 10
the question and answer (Q&A) session. It's presented on this slide as well as in your staff 11
report. We also developed a series of objectives and these would be goals that we would strive 12
for as we developed alternatives and move through this process. And then finally we 13
developed a set of draft evaluation criteria and typically evaluation criteria is used in a 14
alternatives evaluation matrix. So we would assign some type of scoring mechanism for each of 15
these evaluation criteria and working with the community we would develop alternatives, 16
different types of grade crossing solutions, and each one of those alternatives would be 17
evaluated against this objective criteria. And that would be one component of the alternatives 18
analysis that would help us narrow down the alternatives and eventually get to a preferred 19
alternative that we would advance into preliminary engineering, environmental, and design. 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 fifteen (15) 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 next steps: we’ll be making the same presentation, almost the same presentation 2
of course with your input included following this meeting, we’ll be going to Rail Committee on 3
August 16th, so next Wednesday, and then we'll be following that up with a City Council 4
meeting on August 28th. We're also looking to convene the Technical Advisory Committee 5
(TAC) which would be a staff a committee of staff members from various agencies that would 6
have a stake in these projects. And this committee would primarily be used to look at technical 7
issues around some of the alternatives and some of the potential solutions. We’re also looking 8
to convene a Community Workshop Number 2 on September 16th. We would present the 9
outcome of the PTC, Rail Committee, and City Council meetings at that public meeting which 10
will be at the Arts Center Auditorium and September 16th is also a Saturday. And then 11
tentatively we have a Community Workshop 3 scheduled for October 21st where we hope to 12
start to delve into the development of some of the alternatives that we will analyze through 13
this alternatives analysis process. So this evening we are recommending that the PTC review 14
the attached community engagement plan, summary of Community Workshop Number 1 on 15
May 20th, and summary of questionnaire responses and provide input to the City Council on 16
the draft problem statement, project objectives, and evaluation criteria for discussion at 17
Community Workshop Number 2 and to inform the development and screening of grade 18
separation alternatives. And with that that concludes my presentation. 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 fifteen (15) 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.
Hillary Gitelman, Planning Director: Mr. Chair maybe I can just say a few words before we go to 1
the public comment. I’m Hillary Gitelman, the Director, and I just wanted to thank Josh. This 2
project really has the potential to be a second full time job for Josh. It's already been quite a bit 3
of work and there's a lot more on the horizon. I also noticed in the presentation that our slides 4
there didn't quite match the text in Attachment D. I think it's just because we have to 5
paraphrase on the PowerPoint slide so Attachment D is really where you'll find the suggested 6
language for the problem statement objectives and criteria that we'd like your input on this 7
evening. Also one of our objectives this evening is to determine which of you are or I should 8
say get the September 16th date on your radar screen. We would really invite the Planning and 9
Transportation Commissioners to attend on the 16th, that's a Saturday, for the next workshop. 10
And if you could let us know in the next week or so which of you are planning to attend we’ll 11
have to notice it as a special meeting if we have more than a quorum of Planning to be there. 12
Of course you don't have to attend, but I think if this is going to be such a kind of high profile 13
project and of such interest to the community that some of you may wish to participate. With 14
that we suggest that you take some public comment and then we're happy to answer your 15
questions and get deeper into these issues. 16
17
Chair Alcheck: Ok, thank you. I would recommend that staff circulates an email to the 18
Commissioners in the coming days to determine who will be in attendance to that meeting and 19
then they can consult their calendars. Alright, I am going to open the floor to our speakers. 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 fifteen (15) 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.
You’ll have five minutes to speak and I’ll call up the person and then the next person so that 1
you know you’re up. Our first speaker tonight is Stephen Rosenblum followed by Nadia Naik. 2
3
Stephen Rosenblum: Hi, I'm Stephen Rosenblum. I live near the California Avenue train station. 4
I’ve lived in Palo Alto since 1985 and I've been following the whole rail process since the time 5
that high speed rail proposed coming here and running their trains through Palo Alto on four 6
tracks. A lot of things have happened since then. I've campaigned throughout that time for 7
grade separation and preferably underground, but I know that's not the subject. The solution is 8
not what we're talking about today, but we all realize that this decision or the decisions that we 9
make about the rail configuration and the street configuration will affect the way Palo Alto 10
looks for the next hundred years probably. So it's a decision that we have to make with great 11
care and not just looking at the bottom line. I think we have to look at the quality of life that 12
residents will have as a result. And so we need to look at how we want Palo Alto to look in the 13
future, how we want people to get across the tracks in the future, and how to ensure that 14
people are safe; that there's no opportunities for collisions between trains and people and cars 15
and bicycles. 16
17
The process has been well begun by the City Council and particularly with the appointment of 18
the Rail Committee and the selection of CSS as a process for gathering input from the 19
community. At this point the main issue is the recommendation of the process that will be 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 fifteen (15) 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.
used for CSS. And I would strongly urge you to recommend to the Rail Committee and the 1
Council that we try to seek the widest possible community input at the beginning rather than 2
what I would consider the broken process by which high speed rail pretended to gather 3
community input and then did with they wanted to in the end and just create a lot of acrimony. 4
So I suggest that we add as Nadia Naik has proposed shared stakeholder meetings to the CSS 5
process in order to be sure that we're gathering the widest possible input from stakeholders 6
right at the beginning. So I would hope that this would be what would be recommended to the 7
Council. Thank you very much. 8
9
Chair Alcheck: Thank you. Our next speaker is Nadia Naik followed by Sara Armstrong. 10
11
Nadia Naik: Good evening everyone, I’m Nadia Naik. I'm a resident of Old Palo Alto and I'm also 12
co-founder of a group… it's ok. I'm also co-founder of a group called CARRD, it’s Californians 13
Advocating Responsible Rail Design. We were the group of citizen advocates that poked some 14
holes in some of the high speed rail groups data. So that's kind of how we became activists 15
with the train. 16
17
I wanted to really praise Hillary and Josh. I think they've been doing a tremendous amount of 18
work and it really has been a lot of work. Part of the reason that this is coming to you tonight is 19
we had originally as a City tried to hire a city manager, a rail project manager, excuse me 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 fifteen (15) 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.
follow this project and in they weren’t able to get somebody and instead they ended up getting 1
a consultant that will be helping Josh and Hillary and their team. So they are now having to sort 2
manage the work that's being contracted out to them which makes it tough. It also is exactly 3
the same reason why we need more, we need to have a dedicated citizen stakeholder group. I 4
think it provides the je ne sais quoi that the people who live here are able to explain frankly and 5
it just it's hard to explain to people who don't live in the City and who are consultants why hey, 6
that would never fly or you can't do this. 7
8
The CSS process isn’t your classic process. It's also not magic, right? I don't mean to say that 9
this is going to make it easy if we follow this process, but specifically what it does is you usually 10
have an entire project team which would be a dedicated stakeholder team, staff, the TAC and 11
everybody gets together and then decides what is the exact problem we're trying to solve. And 12
it may seem obvious, we need grade separations, but in some cases it's not. What if we have to 13
close one and open another one, right? Once you’ve all decided the exact problems you’re 14
trying to solve you then say well wait before we come up with a new solutions we're going to 15
come up with criteria to measure those things. And then once you've done all of that upfront 16
work you then kind of go back and start to deliberate. 17
18
And so frankly part of the reason I can't stand here today and tell you oh, you should do this, 19
this, and this is because we're not actually been able to have the real conversation of what 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 fifteen (15) 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 problem we're trying to solve. The May meeting that we had was a great into for the 1
community, but it didn't for example show what are going to be the future conditions in 20 2
years that might indicate hey, we have a bigger problem in South Palo Alto than North Palo Alto 3
which might actually change our process a bit. So all of those things if we were able to all get in 4
a room with citizens who can really focus the time to get through this data would really be able 5
to help figure out what that process would be. Because in the absence of that staff is having to 6
say well we'd like to have these community meetings and let's just see and that makes it a little 7
too open ended and loosey-goosey and really leaves it open for the classic Palo Alto process 8
which would go on and on. So when you do a good CSS process you keep going back to what 9
you're trying to measure, what you agreed upon, and how do you then deliberate through 10
those things. 11
12
Frankly the other thing is that citizens can help you question assumptions. A classic example on 13
the corridor for example is the issue of freight. Part of the thing that dictates how expensive 14
these grade separations are or how much flexibility we have deals with freight on the corridor. 15
An engineer that would be hired by the City would naturally say freight exists therefore I will 16
pencil out according to that, but citizens would be like well, can we push on that? What's 17
happening? They might pull in the fact that hey, the Dumbarton rail corridor is out there and 18
they're looking there's a possibility that you could run freight on the Dumbarton rail. There's 19
other alternatives, right? And this is the kind of good thinking that happens when you can get 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 fifteen (15) 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 a room with everybody, but otherwise it would be difficult for staff or even for the 1
consultants to come in and say hey City of Palo Alto you guys should even consider booting 2
freight off the corridor. It would be very politically untenable and frankly hard for them, but a 3
stakeholder group can come out and make those bigger statements, right? I think all of those 4
things is the reason why you need to have a dedicated stakeholder group. 5
6
Lastly I will just say if we're not going to have a dedicated stakeholder group that's ok, but then 7
we're not doing CSS and you should lose that name. And the reason is when high speed rail 8
was having the issue on the corridor we were able to convince the high speed rail folks to 9
create the peninsula rail program and follow a CSS process. They hired Bruce Fukuji, some of 10
you may know him. He did a great job, but ultimately it failed and the reason it failed was not 11
because Bruce did bad work. He did great work, but because the decision makers ignored 12
everything that was going on. There was no buy in and the people who participated were not 13
actually involved in any decisions. If we do that now we're telling Palo Altoans sure you're 14
welcome to come and give your feedback and then in the end they're not actually part of the 15
problem solving and they're not actually part of the decision making and that would be terrible. 16
It would be disastrous and I think you would have a lot of repercussions and we might actually 17
lose funding because of it. It would slow everything down and as you probably know we're 18
trying to get some Measure B money to actually make all this happen. So I want to thank you 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 fifteen (15) 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.
all for your consideration today and I really think a dedicated stakeholder group is the way to 1
go. Thank you. 2
3
Chair Alcheck: Thank you. Our next speaker is Sara Armstrong followed by Arthur Keller. 4
5
Sara Armstrong: I have some handouts for you guys. Just going to follow on to what Nadia just 6
said and appreciate the work that's been done. I've been involved in this for almost 10 years, 7
but the proposed process is not what we would call a CSS. It's missing several key elements 8
including the establishment of a stakeholder committee or what we would prefer to call a 9
program team that’s comprised of community members, City staff, domain expert consultants, 10
and transportation agency representatives. Some people might argue that that's a good thing. 11
Stakeholders those are the ones who drive a stake through the heart of your project, right? 12
There's plenty of examples that we could probably point to to say that there’s some truth in 13
that. And that's why we're not just arguing for a stakeholder group, but one that would engage 14
in a highly structured collaborative empowered decision making process that's been specifically 15
designed for complex transportation projects where we lack obvious an obvious solution that 16
meets basic community goals and can be paid for. 17
18
The years that we've spent on this corridor and the experience with previous grade separations 19
has convinced us that finding a consensus solution that improves our city will require out of 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 fifteen (15) 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.
box thinking. Some assumptions, presumptions, and requirements will have to go and some 1
reconceptualization of the problem will have to happen. This will require a dedicated group of 2
people who can go deep and to bring the public along the journey. Today's environmental 3
review process is used to justify choices rather than help design a project from the beginning 4
that reflects the issues and opportunities of existing conditions. Its multi-tiered project 5
approval process can sometimes help screen out poor proposals, but it often means multiple 6
rounds of very shallow review. In some cases a project will be bogged down by when someone 7
raises an issue at the last minute or other times projects fly through that actually could have 8
used much more input and you can probably think of examples of those. 9
10
We appreciate the transparency and wonderful community involvement that the Brown Act 11
gives us, but it can also create an unhealthy power dynamic between decision makers and the 12
people that you represent. Staff members have to deal with multiple objectives on from 13
multiple different bodies, but a team that is doing a deep review can result in a better project 14
that that saves time and money and avoids the pitfalls that you're going to hear about. 15
Thoughtful and creative responses simply take time. Having people join the process later is 16
problematic and a thorough systematic approach that surfaces potential issues early and 17
establishes common facts is really vital. Unhealthy dynamics between experts and community 18
members can arise when everyone isn't part of the same team and a transparent process and 19
staff or consultants can sometimes be several steps ahead of the community when it comes 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 fifteen (15) 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 technical information and this can also create as was mentioned with the corridor trench 1
study a sense that choices have already been made. 2
3
The current way of doing things tends to emphasize the concrete part of the plan and other 4
aspects are relegated to mitigations and become afterthoughts instead of an integral part of 5
the plan. And the goals as an example that the staff presented there are a good start, but they 6
really only scratch the surface of what we need. Each criterion has to be vetted by the public 7
and the agencies responsible with a full understanding of the tradeoffs and costs. And each 8
criterion has to be formulated in very concrete measurable objectives. One example, reduce 9
congestion verses maximum 95th percentile queue times during peak travel, right? We have to 10
be able to measure these things. Goals should be from the community and from transportation 11
agencies the City might want to specify capacity for the number of crosstown traffic and they 12
should be beyond the concrete the capacity numbers may be about people traveling corridor 13
and not in one specific mode. Emergency services may have their own requirements and might 14
require certain crossings to be open to their vehicles. The presumptions, assumptions, and 15
requirements need to be explicitly laid out and then validated as Nadia mentioned and 16
sometimes questioning these requirements leads to breakthroughs. 17
18
Nadia mentioned an example about the great separations accommodating diesel and freight. 19
Another would be the clearance levels that drive really high costs for some of the alternatives. 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 fifteen (15) 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 grade level that the train has to go on also drives costs. There are current examples on our 1
own corridor where trains pass through tunnels in San Francisco much smaller than the [dinette 2
mentions] that we're currently looking at. Those are just really in the weeds details. We need 3
to put together a team that can do the deep dive and analysis and it has to include people from 4
the community. We can do this old style, but I don't want to be back here in 10 years having 5
the same conversations that we had almost 10 years ago about involving the community in a 6
meaningful way. Thank you. 7
8
Chair Alcheck: Thank you. Our next speaker is Arthur Keller followed by Elizabeth Alexis. 9
10
Arthur Keller: Thank you. So I would like to make an observation. Many years ago I went to 11
college and I had Boston College and he had this sign over his desk and he said why is there not 12
enough never enough time to do it right, but always enough time to do it over? And my 13
corollary to that that I added is but there's actually rarely an opportunity to do it over. And I 14
think that this process is being done in such a manner that it's not taking the time to do it right 15
and I actually if it doesn't work I hope that in 10 years we can do it over, but I don't think we'll 16
ever get a chance to do it over. This is our one shot to do it. 17
18
And I think that if you think about public participation there’s a balance between narrow and 19
deep and broad and shallow. The public participation that is proposed in this document 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 fifteen (15) 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.
broad and shallow. And the stakeholder group that the previous speakers have talked about is 1
includes a process that is narrow and deep and I think that that's critical. You actually need 2
both and if we don't have a narrow and deep process where you have people who are 3
representing the community who are engaged the community who provide deep input from 4
the community and participate in the process deeply then you only essentially are paying lip 5
service to the public and getting them to talk about situations in which the public actually 6
doesn't really understand and is dealing with a low information environment. And so that's 7
why I think it that I associate myself with the previous speaker’s remarks. 8
9
Also in terms of thinks, think about this you have this TAC; so let me give you an example, you 10
have the Safe Routes To Schools effort which is a joint effort between the City and the School 11
District. Do they belong on the TAC? Maybe, maybe not. Do they belong if there's a 12
stakeholder group? Certainly having representatives on the stakeholder group makes sense. 13
So there is participation like that that are interesting and worthwhile because they are proper 14
stakeholders. Our schools are stakeholders to the effort. They may not provide technical input 15
to the effort, but they’re certainly interest in terms of commuter traffic for the schools so I 16
think that that's interesting. In terms of for example the Palo Alto Transportation Management 17
Association (TMA) that's representing Downtown. What about the rest of the businesses in the 18
City? What about the businesses in the Stanford Research Park (SRP)? Are we expecting 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 fifteen (15) 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.
Stanford University to represent the businesses in the SRP or are they only representing the 1
interests of people get commuting to Stanford? 2
3
So I think that this is why we really need a stakeholder group that really thinks about this 4
broadly. I don't think the TMA has any particular expertise in the technical aspects of this the 5
way that Caltrain or Union Pacific Railroad would, but they are stakeholders. So I think that you 6
need to think in terms of a stakeholder group that has stakeholders that are basically people 7
being involved in a deep way repeatedly meeting frequently coordinating with staff 8
coordinating with the TAC and really providing input to the process and I think that that's 9
critical. So I think that is why we really need to have this and I can't emphasize it enough, a 10
stakeholder group as part of CSS because that is the essence of a CSS process, not just 11
[unintelligible]. Thank you. 12
13
Chair Alcheck: Thank you. Our last speaker is Elizabeth Alexis. If anybody else wishes to speak 14
please hand a speaker card to staff. Thank you. 15
16
Elizabeth Alexis: Good evening, my name is Elizabeth Alexis and I'm also a member of CARRD 17
along with Sara and Nadia. I do want to just emphasize what Nadia spoke about and Sara spoke 18
about. We are unaware of any CSS approach that's ever been done that did not include a 19
permanent specifics and we don't want to use the word stakeholder, we really don't, program 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 fifteen (15) 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.
team. It's just an integral part of this that you have a set of people from these different 1
perspectives and different knowledge bases who go deep into something. So what I would like 2
to do is give you kind of make this process a little bit concrete. Like what would this actually 3
look like? We have a lot of mumbo jumbo words, but what would it actually look like? 4
5
So the first step would be to carefully construct a program team. There would be several 6
members of the community who might represent different neighborhoods or the school 7
community or senior citizens. There would be key City of Palo Alto staff. There would be 8
people from Transportation, from Engineering, definitely from Utilities. All projects like this 9
always include a lot of utility relocation and complications. There would be consultant experts 10
who would, you know, somebody on all the historic assets, somebody on hydrology, somebody 11
on traffic engineering. There would be people who might be sometimes part of the group and 12
maybe part of a subgroup on financing and ways that we can raise money. There might be City 13
Council members or Commission members who would participate in that side. You'd have 14
people from bike and pedestrian aspects. You'd have design people and then you'd have these 15
this group of people who staff has talked about being on a Technical Advisory Commission 16
[Note-Committee], but we would see them as part of the broader program team: Caltrain, VTA, 17
freight, maybe even somebody from the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) which is set some of 18
the rules that we're dealing with. 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 fifteen (15) 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.
Then you would start to have probably in this context we would see a series of sort of 1
educational workshops, kind of a teach in. We did have a teach in in 2009. We think this is a 2
good beginning step based upon sort of the initial work that's been done. You'd have 3
something to learn about the requirements for cars: the grades, the slopes, the clearance 4
levels, people, car… bicycles are different. Walking is different. Americans with Disabilities Act 5
(ADA) is different. Slopes/widths, all of that. You learn some… everybody would learn some 6
basic traffic engineering enough so that you could be a constructive member and suggestions 7
and start to see the complications with some of the things that people throw out. 8
9
You'd have something on railroad engineering understanding the one percent, two percent, 10
why you have these things. You might have a session on you’d start to get into fuzzier things 11
like what does it mean to have cohesion in a community or what creates barriers, because it's 12
not just physical things, right? I mean if you're actually in Palo Alto a lot of the barrier that the 13
rail corridor creates is not the physical tracks it's the fact that then the school districts become 14
based upon not having kids crossing tracks and then that creates divisions and separation. 15
You'd have something on hydrology because whatever we do anything that goes down into the 16
ground is going to have some a big impact on hydrology we know that. You might have 17
something on the ins and outs of eminent domain so we could get some facts established. We 18
hear a lot of people talking we can't take any houses or we should just buy up the houses oh my 19
God and it would be useful for people to understand what's actually involved with that because 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 fifteen (15) 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.
all the while you're trying to compile this list of facts and assumptions and you're going back to 1
your list of requirements that you would have created. 2
3
I've handed out this is something from Caltrain and high speed rail are trying to work together 4
to figure out how they're going to share the corridor. And they're using basically a context 5
sensitive framework. There are some issues because they haven't actually validated some of 6
their own constraints, but this is we thought a pretty good example of how this would work. So 7
as you're going into this then you start to go into the existing conditions, right? This is the this 8
and you'd start work on the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) sections. You define 9
and development the requirements and go back and forth. You’d settle on questions that the 10
broader community must answer. Then you would hopefully at that point be able to start 11
looking at alternatives which go beyond just thinking about the concrete. I mean at the end of 12
the day we're trying to get something that is a hundred year project as you said. I mean at this 13
point now we're saying it's CSS, but it's not CSS. We do think it is worth doing a group which I 14
know everyone is terrified of and this is not pie in the sky thinking. This really could happen. 15
It's not that hard. Thank you. 16
17
Chair Alcheck: Ok, thank you very much. I don't have any other speaker cards, but I’ll leave it 18
open in case anybody else shows up. What I would like to do is give the Commissioners an 19
opportunity to discuss anything, their questions for staff or comments on this item. I would 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 fifteen (15) 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.
encourage the Commission to open their packets to Page 226 and 227 so that they have the 1
suggested problem statement and the suggested evaluation criteria available to them so that as 2
you speak you can make sure to at least touch upon these items and give our feedback to the 3
staff. And then we'll see where we go. Would anybody like to begin? Absolutely, go ahead 4
Commissioner [Note-Vice Chair Waldfogel]. 5
6
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Thank you. Just before we launch into this and thank you for the 7
presentations and I'd like to thank the public for showing up. What are the definitive deadlines 8
for decision making on this? I mean do we have any… is time our friend or our enemy as we go 9
through this process? 10
11
Mr. Mello: So the last page in your… this for this agenda item is a schedule that shows where 12
we are in comparison to other grade separations that are in the planning or design process 13
along the peninsula as well as the high speed rail and the Caltrain electrification project. There 14
are no hard and fast deadlines, but we are in jeopardy of falling very far behind our peer cities 15
along the peninsula. Mountain View is much further along in the planning process and the 16
Measure B the $700 million in Measure B funding will be allocated over the 30 year period 17
through an implementation plan that's going to be developed by VTA at the beginning of 2018. 18
They're working on an RFP for that now and what they're going to look at is where each of the 19
three cities Palo Alto, Mountain View, and Sunnyvale are in their planning and design process 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 fifteen (15) 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.
for those eight grade crossings. So there are no hard and fast deadlines, but we do need to 1
think about where we lie in comparison to other cities that we’re vying for funding against. 2
3
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Ok, I'll probably come back to that because I think I'd like to know what 4
we have to have on that date certain in 2018, but we can come back. 5
6
Chair Alcheck: Ok, why don't we if we don’t mind, why don’t start on this end and make our 7
way down? 8
9
Commissioner Summa: Ok, so thank you very much staff and welcome back to those of you 10
who were on vacation or on paternity leave. And I'd like to start out by saying that I'm not an 11
expert on CSS. I heard about it at the rail the community meeting for the first time, but I've 12
been very taken by some of the emails and speakers tonight and also my own reading of this. I 13
don't think we can take something that's so complicated that is such a huge infrastructure 14
project that's going to last for such a long time and that people have such differing levels of 15
information about and expectations for and rush it. And I am very worried about a process that 16
doesn't involve resident stakeholders. I agree that we have to have all the people with 17
technical expertise involved and other local agencies, but I and I'm sorry that all of this is so will 18
create so much work for staff. But I don't know how else to do something like this; it's a huge 19
amount of money and it's potentially a huge impact on people even taking people's homes. It's 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 fifteen (15) 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.
not something I feel we can rush or do incorrectly. And I would really feel more comfortable 1
with the kind of stakeholder group or project team, program team that the women of CARRD 2
recommended. They've been going at rail stuff for such a long time. So that's the first thing. 3
4
Community meetings a really great, but they also don't have the same kind of flexibility that a 5
stakeholder group would have. They're kind of orchestrated and they're not as spontaneous. 6
They don't allow people to just kind of brainstorm because of the number of people there and 7
that staff has sort of a scripted approach to those kinds of things so those are really great to 8
get… give people updates in larger groups, but I don't think it takes in any way the place of a 9
stakeholder group. 10
11
And then I also feel that there as we move along we're going to learn more about high speed 12
rail and their expectations. It's now seems like they want more than the blended system. They 13
want extra rails; maybe there'll be three or four tracks. So there's a lot of huge moving parts 14
that are going to be changing constantly throughout the process that we have to respond to. 15
Even Dumbarton rail, questions about if we can do something about freight that it's a regional 16
thing and so in general terms. I think we got off to a great start, but I think we should really 17
take a step back and have a proper program team that is going to be devoted to getting us to 18
where we need to be with this. So those are my general thoughts on this program, the staff 19
report, and having been informed by the comments and emails from the public. 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 fifteen (15) 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 Alcheck: Ok, thank you. Go ahead. 2
3
Commissioner Monk: I just want to thank you Mr. Mello for the background on how we arrived 4
historically with this CSS program and the evolution. Could you just put that into context here 5
and why a stakeholder group wasn't considered or was it considered and how we arrived at 6
going this route in the first place? 7
8
Ms. Gitelman: Yeah, let me see if I can take a stab at that and then Josh can pile on. First let me 9
say I think that the City Council of course will get your recommendation, any Motion you make 10
tonight as well as the minutes from your meeting and I'm sure that they will be interested in 11
your thoughts on this question of the stakeholder committee. So I welcome you all to make 12
your feelings known based on the comments you've heard tonight. I think I would agree with 13
Commissioner Summa that this is a super complex set of issues we're talking about and by no 14
means do we want to rush this. I mean we have to take the time it's going to take to 15
thoroughly vet all of the issues, all of the constraints, there are going to be tradeoffs here that 16
are going to be difficult to make and the community has to be fully involved. 17
18
So the way we put the community engagement plan together with our team is to look at some 19
of the it's kind of a tool box of techniques that we thought we could use to engage with 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 fifteen (15) 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.
community and kind of in a in multi-direction so to educate and inform about what some of the 1
issues and constraints are, but also to get input and to make decisions with the community as 2
part of the process. And so you see that there are a number of different tools in there. One of 3
them is these big community workshops. We were delighted at the turnout we had at the first 4
workshop 130 people. I think we’ll get hopefully more at the September workshop. And one of 5
the reasons we didn't come out of the gate suggesting a task force is that we thought that that 6
was such a positive force that it showed such a level of interest in this community that that 7
number of people want to come out on a sunny Saturday and spend their time getting 8
educated and participating in this process. 9
10
So I think even if the Council were to say we want to do a task force or a stakeholder group we 11
would want to continue those larger forums and not rely just on 16 people in a room or 22 12
people in a room to filter the input and do the analysis. We want to keep engaging with as 13
many members of the community who want to as part of this process. So those are just our 14
thoughts. I think ultimately the Council is going to have to decide this issue of the structure. 15
We all want to get to the same place which is a fully informed decision making process that is as 16
expeditious as possible without being rushed or taken too lightly. 17
18
Mr. Mello: And I would just add a couple points. Convening a stakeholder group could lead 19
some of the other folks who are not appointed to that committee to feel left out of the process 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 fifteen (15) 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 we might lose some interest from some of the folks that were willing to come out to the 1
bigger meeting. And our ultimate intent was to the reason we asked some of the questions we 2
did using the real time polling about what's the best way to communicate with you, how often 3
do you want to be to receive emails and phone calls and newsletters was we wanted to keep 4
those people engaged. So we didn't want to just have a community workshop with 130 5
attendees and then have a second community workshop with 70 different people. We want to 6
bring those people along for this whole project and that would be our defacto stakeholder 7
group is this larger self-selected community group that would be open and inclusive to anybody 8
who wanted to participate; that was our thinking. 9
10
There could also be some schedule impacts if we were to move forward with appointing a 11
stakeholder committee. That appointment process could take up to three to six months to get 12
that committee up and running. But I know you did mention that you think we shouldn't be 13
bound by any type of schedule for a project this large we should take our time and do it the 14
right way so that may not be a concern for you that added time it would be needed to appoint 15
that committee. 16
17
Commissioner Monk: I appreciate that input and that further complicates the issue in that you 18
pointed out some interesting ideas in that it would possibly alienate a portion of the 19
community if they weren't a part of this proposed stakeholder group and how to account for 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 fifteen (15) 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 level of interest that you've seen and will probably continue to see rise. So I thank you for 1
your comments on that. I think this discussion is primarily about the process and how do we 2
engage the citizens and staff and this Commission to an effective outcome. 3
4
In looking at the plan that was presented in our package I thought it was quite comprehensive 5
and seemed to cover everything that you would expect. Of course I’m not an expert and in 6
hearing the speakers tonight it makes me want to learn a little bit more, review the materials 7
that were presented, and see what holes we might be missing and take a little bit of a deeper 8
dive in comparing what is being advocated by the folks here tonight versus what we have in our 9
packet. But just looking at what was presented to us in the packet it actually seemed a little bit 10
overkill in a way. Again, we know the City doesn’t have a full understanding of all of the 11
constraints yet we're doing a full blown study. We're also doing so many different types of 12
studies with the community groups and the questionnaires where people who are responding 13
might be living closer to an area and that area is going to be a greater priority to them. So 14
there's a lot of information that needs to get sorted out in order to really have a reliable study. 15
There's things like that that I would be a little bit concerned about. I would just direct the staff 16
to when moving forward on this plan if that's the decision to determine which options are 17
preferred of the engagement strategies so that staff is in charge of that effort rather than the 18
contracting group that you're working with. It's is it Circle Point? Is that who you’re working 19
with? 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 fifteen (15) 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 also with the schedule that's at Page 25 I know you're also doing stakeholder interviews 2
and workshops and all these other things so just looking at the total amount of effort being 3
spent on it just kind of streamline it would be my feedback on all those different pieces that are 4
going to be working together. And maybe you don't know the answer to this one, but the 5
survey answers differed from the community workshop where the community workshop had 6
East Meadow as the highest concern and on the questionnaire it was Churchill. Are there 7
strategies for rectifying those different outcomes and the different types of tools that were 8
used to get the information? 9
10
Mr. Mello: So this is going to be a very complex analysis process. There's going to be qualitative 11
and quantitative measures that we're going to need to use and I think every time we talk to 12
somebody different we'll hear different priorities. And it's going to be our job and the larger 13
community and Council’s job to distill all that into something that's legible and allows us to get 14
to a preferred alternative. I don't think we can we're ever going to hear the same answer twice 15
about what the priority is for a particular grade crossing or which grade crossing is a priority. I 16
think we can start to move towards a community consensus and that's the goal of this, but it's 17
going to be a very complex conversation and there's going be a lot of different opinions 18
throughout this process. 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 fifteen (15) 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.
Ms. Gitelman: I guess the only thing I'd add is this is why some of us got into the planning 1
business. It's really complicated. Everyone's going to have a different perspective and a 2
different set of priorities here. I think our hope is that we can collectively analyze and vet a 3
series of alternatives and at the end of the day end up with something that may not be perfect 4
from everybody's perspective, but which can be acceptable from everybody's perspective and 5
really reflect the kind of collective wisdom of this community. 6
7
Commissioner Monk: So to that I would just ask that it be made obvious where a certain 8
crossing received a great number of support, but that was because most people that lived 9
within a half a mile were the ones that responded to it. So just please have a really thorough 10
presentation of that data because I think that would be important to know that it's rated that 11
way because the majority of people around it voted for it, if that makes sense? And I think that 12
was something that I had to flip through and do my own analysis on. So just having that type of 13
detail that we can keep track of because it will be complicated will be helpful going forward. 14
15
Mr. Mello: If I could just interject so as we get into the real hard core decision making part of 16
this there's going to be a lot more analysis in front of you and in front of the Rail Committee 17
and the community and Council. Really tonight we're just talking about the very early stages of 18
this, but I don't want folks to glean from what's presented tonight that we're not going to dive 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 fifteen (15) 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.
really deep into the particulars about what's happening out there and what some of the 1
constraints are and what the technical opportunities are for each of these crossings. 2
3
Chair Alcheck: If you want we can do a couple rounds. [Unintelligible]. 4
5
Commissioner Monk: Yeah, why don’t I pass this along and next round come back to my other 6
issues. 7
8
Chair Alcheck: Ok, alright. So let me dive in. It's funny that you mention that about the 9
planning business because I feel the same way. I think what drew me to land use law was sort 10
of the immense and powerful result of what takes place when people make decisions in this 11
area. 12
13
So I'd like to start with the problem statement. The rail corridor also creates issues in 14
surrounding neighborhoods such as noise, vibration, traffic, and visual impacts and while the 15
City of Palo Alto benefits from Caltrain service and supports Caltrain modernization including 16
electrification some of the issues experienced along the rail corridor will continue to get worse 17
in the future with the increases in Caltrain service and the possible addition of high speed rail. 18
So I get this is a very general problem statement I think. I'm on the Page 226 and 227. I'm 19
going to focus most of my comments on those two pages. 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 fifteen (15) 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 there's a lot of reasons why… I think there's a lot of ways to address the safety of the 2
corridor. And well I guess it's just not clear to me that it's a certainty that this will get worse 3
with increased service. And I just want to make that point because my hope is that the 4
continued modernization of Caltrain will actually improve safety. I imagine that if we were 5
really wanted to grapple with safety concerns at our crossings we could come up with solutions 6
that had nothing to do with changing the actual physical elevation of our grade crossing. And 7
so I think there… I think the, I wonder if the problem statement is sort of missing the mark in 8
that the real question is, the real problem is are the benefits and consequences of changing the 9
physical nature of the rail worth it? But I don't know maybe this is the way you write that. I 10
just think to some extent the real problem here is that there is going to be a very difficult 11
decision that it's going to be very costly, it's going to require a tremendous amount of 12
coordination to enact a change and I think the question is, is that change worth it? And I 13
believe whether it's a stakeholder group or a much a very publicly involved staff led and 14
community leader led process that will be the heart of the question is are the options worth it? 15
I see your light on, go ahead. 16
17
Mr. Mello: Do you think quantifying the problem a little bit in the problem statement might 18
help address 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 fifteen (15) 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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Chair Alcheck: Let me ask you a question (interrupted) 1
2
Mr. Mello: Like being a little less broad and actually putting in some… using some analysis to 3
determine what some of the specific… 4
5
Chair Alcheck: Maybe. I didn't spend a lot of time thinking about how to author this statement, 6
but I did wonder if you if Palo Alto didn't support Caltrain modification I mean what relevance is 7
that? Whether we support it or not does it change this the question at hand? So I guess what 8
I'm trying to say is it’s not it’s… this isn't this is a good summary I guess. I just we're hearing 9
tonight about from people and we heard we had a letter from former Council Member Pat Burt 10
and got emails people talking about stakeholder group. My concern moving tonight is that 11
there is this impression that somehow if you didn't involve a stakeholder group you get it 12
wrong. I don't think that we should operate under that premise. We haven't even started the 13
process so to suggest that errors could be made that were so fundamental that no matter what 14
answer you come up with that it’s going to be the wrong one I think is dangerous and I think 15
what we should be focusing on right now is well what is the question. And I think that by 16
identifying the question more specifically by laying it out a little bit more specifically people will 17
approach how to design the process differently. So it's very open ended right now and it's not 18
entirely clear. 19
20
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Tonight we heard someone say something about diverting freight. I'm not entirely sure that 1
that would ever be under the purview of Palo Alto leadership's decision making. Maybe it is. 2
I’m doubtful. I don't actually know enough to answer that question myself, but the notion that 3
Palo Alto could make a decision about whether freight runs down Caltrain’s tracks in the 4
absence of all the other stakeholders and when I say stakeholders I mean the other 5
communities and the regional… My point is is that there are issues like noise, vibration, and 6
traffic, and visual impacts and this is not about solving all the problems related to living near a 7
train. And I want to and I'm afraid that that somehow that we can… I don't know that we be 8
able to solve all the problems related to living next to a train and I don't know that we should 9
be trying to. I think we really need to focus this. 10
11
I think there's one benefit to us being sort of late to the party which is that we can see to some 12
extent what our neighbors are doing and how they did it. I don't think that would justify 13
somehow slowing down our process, but anyways so let me jump in to some of the other 14
comments. I think that the question about citizen engagement I think this is… I have not I spent 15
time also reviewing CSS. I did not find in my review this sentiment that you should refrain from 16
using that terminology because you haven't suggested using a stakeholder group. Again I think 17
that's I don't think that's the case at least in my review. 18
19
_______________________
1. Spokespersons that are representing a group of five or more people who are identified as present at the meeting at
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I think one of the things that I think I walk away from and I'm using a federal definition here, 1
but to me CSS in general and I'm really happy to see that we're adopting those principles and 2
this process. I think in general what we're looking to do is employ very meaningful continuous 3
and early public involvement, stakeholder involvement. And I think one of the one of the 4
points I'd like to make tonight is that there is a tradeoff, right, with the citizen with each citizen 5
engagement model. And I would argue that with our Citizen Advisory Committee (CAC) process 6
which we used effectively in the Comp Plan process there is a lot more community ownership, 7
but there's also a more drawn out process. And I think it focuses more on philosophical 8
questions than technical issues. It lends itself to a more philosophical discussion than a 9
technical discussion. I think that's appropriate when you're talking about a Comp Plan which is 10
philosophical in nature. What do you want this city to look like? It's a very abstract question. I 11
think this is an abstract question. I think that may be a problem. I think this question needs to 12
be less abstract so that people understand that there's extremely technical issues here. And 13
that's why I think using a process that more heavily relied on experts, Planning staff, PTC, and 14
Council is more appropriate for where specifically because we have to deal with technical 15
details like budgeting, value capture scenarios, feasibility analysis. 16
17
I also want to suggest that stakeholder group presents an interesting issue which is conflict of 18
Interest. We always when we review projects we have to determine whether or not a 19
Commissioner is potentially conflicted out of discussing an item because they live too close to 20
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it. How would we put together a stakeholder group if that had to review potentially the 1
purchasing of homes if half the stakeholder group or one or it doesn't how many represented 2
potential homeowners? How do that are, that would be susceptible to it's… There is anyways 3
I'll say that about the stakeholder group that I think that this is a very difficult decision and 4
there will be winners and losers from the as perceived by the various individuals in our 5
community. And I think that no matter what this is going to be very controversial. That said I 6
don't necessarily think a stakeholder group is the right solution and so I wouldn't recommend 7
that to Council. 8
9
That said I would recommend that the approach adopted and articulated in your staff report is 10
an appropriate one and that we approach that in a very sincere and meaningful way. This is the 11
first, tonight was the first time in I think over a year I think that I've heard someone say Palo 12
Alto process with a negative, in a negative way. And I think that and I mention that because I 13
think we've come a long way. I think under our current staff leadership I think we've come a 14
long way from the days when people had very little predictability and felt inconsistently 15
inconsistent approaches. So I actually would very much welcome our current version of the 16
Palo Alto process in this because great examples of Palo Alto process the current version is 17
initial studies of potential impacts way before we would get to an Environmental Impact Report 18
(EIR) for example. I mean I think the we are doing, I think the staff and I would say the PTC has 19
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participated in a process that is really attempting to create meaningful depth, narrow, deep 1
community engagement. 2
3
Ok, that's the bulk of my comments on this item. I think I'll let everybody else comment and if 4
anybody would like to take a second chance at this we can do multiple rounds. And then at the 5
conclusion I hope we can provide some a recommendation to City Council when they get this. 6
Go ahead, Commissioner [Note-Vice-Chair] Waldfogel. 7
8
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Thank you. Let's see, I need to organize some thoughts here. I have to 9
say I’ve talked to maybe a half a dozen experts on this topic and I've gotten a lease and they all 10
know the answer on what should happen it just turns out they're all different. So I understand 11
how complicated this issue is. 12
13
One of the things that I'm… well let me just lay out a couple things I'm worried about. One is 14
you said 2018 and that's let's call that about a year away, 17-18 months. In my experience 15
that's two blinks of city time and it strikes me that if you really have to have something that's 16
reviewable by another agency that we really ought to start drafting it yesterday. So I'm just 17
looking for some commentary on what we think we have to have by whatever that date is. I 18
don’t know if it's early or late 2018, but where do we need to be in terms of the thoroughness 19
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of our understanding and our plan? Could we have a plan with five different options or what's 1
our objective relative to that? 2
3
Mr. Mello: There's no defined deadline, but the implementation plan that VTA will be 4
developing in early 2018 is going to look at where each of the three communities are with their 5
8, the 8 different grade crossings that are identified for the Measure B funding. So I can't 6
predict what the impacts would be, but if we were to push this out we could end up behind one 7
of the other communities, one of the other grade crossings, we may not. We may all end up in 8
the same place and it may just be based on a more objective prioritization. But the bottom line 9
is there's a 30 year timeline for this sales tax so one of those eight grade crossings will be built 10
in year 2025, 2028 chances are so that could end up being one of our grade crossings. 11
12
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: So you're saying that these will actually be sequenced it's we can’t all say 13
start our grade crossings in 2023? 14
15
Mr. Mello: yeah, the $700 million is not enough to build all eight grade separations so they'll 16
have to be federal funding and other funding identified and the implementation plan is going to 17
be a programmatic look at how to deliver those eight over the 30 year period. 18
19
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Vice-Chair Waldfogel: So I'm actually this is a really key point and let me just be clear on this. 1
So what we're saying is Caltrain will be electrified by I think it's 2021 and at that point based on 2
this funding schedule we're looking at 10 years of often uncrossable tracks because of dwell 3
times on the, on higher train service. Is that correct? 4
5
Mr. Mello: We will experience the impacts of increased train service well before we're able to 6
deliver our grade separations. 7
8
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Ok, so we're in and how many… Well, ok we probably don't know how 9
many years of that pain that we're anticipating, but it looks like we're already teed up for that. 10
And if you mean in other realms if I knew that I had a deadline in 2018 I mean I would have 11
some work in my back pocket that I was ready to that I was ready to go with. So I mean are you 12
in a place where kind of regardless of what process we recommend today you'll be able to 13
participate or depending on what happens and how these processes go will you perhaps have 14
to walk in in early 2018 and say hey, we're not ready yet? 15
16
Ms. Gitelman: Maybe I can jump onto that. I mean our hope is in mid-September at that 17
community workshop to tee up a discussion of what the range of alternatives are. I mean like 18
what are the options here? We have for grade crossings. We've looked at trenching; we've 19
looked at other solutions. What are the options that are on the table? And through the fall and 20
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early 2018 try and refine that list so there's a finite number of choices that we’re analyzing and 1
be able to let VTA know that we're making progress. When they're drafting their 2
implementation plan they know that we're starting to narrow down to a series of choices that 3
are being analyzed in terms of their tradeoffs (interrupted) 4
5
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: I guess I’m am not clear on what the deliverable is to them because for 6
example the pricing the financing workshop doesn't come until some indeterminate time in the 7
future which I would assume is probably early next year. So it seems like some of these early 8
discussions would be without even budgetary costing estimates or… 9
10
Ms. Gitelman: Yeah, I think we want a conversation with the community about what should be 11
analyzed before we start analyzing in a way so really the range of alternatives then we'll have to 12
get into what the relative costs would be, what the impacts would be vis-à-vis traffic, property 13
takings. I mean some of that testing was done with the study that Josh mentioned from 2014, 14
but there's a lot more of that kind of exploration that would need to happen and we can't do 15
that for an infinite number of alternatives and options. So we're hoping that the community 16
process will help us start narrowing down to a finite list of options for that kind of analysis and 17
the implementation plan that VTA prepares concurrent with that will recognize that we're 18
putting a good faith effort into working with our community to refine a list of options to get to 19
one or a couple, but that we’re serious about. 20
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1
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Ok, let me let me switch gears. So I've been looking at some of the 2
history of this and I actually briefly liaised to the Rail Corridor Task Force when I was in the 3
Utilities Commission so I think I went to those meetings in two thousand… probably 2011. Give 4
or take. And it feels like some of these alternatives have already been fairly thoroughly vetted 5
and explored. I see years and years of City policy outlining vertical alignment. I mean there are 6
some pretty clear statements deprecating elevated vertical alignments going back at least to 7
2010. There's pretty clear preferences for below grade rail alignment again going back to 2010, 8
reiterated in I think 2014, may be reiterated in 2017. And I'm a little puzzled by the idea that 9
we're now pushing the reset button on all those years of work. I mean all the studies, the task 10
forces, Council resolutions, I mean we seems like we've made some decisions and maybe we 11
don't agree with those decisions. I mean some of the list is easy and I think the problem 12
statement really ought to be how do we pay for the choices that we want, but it kind of feels 13
like there really three viable choices or something or and that it would be pretty quick to 14
identify those three viable choices and price them. I'm just kind of curious why I mean do, 15
where are we on a process like that if we're aiming for 2018? 16
17
Ms. Gitelman: Well I guess I hope you're right that it's obvious that there are three viable 18
choices and that when we get together as a community on September 16th it’s that clear. My 19
expectation is although there's been a lot of thought given to this corridor and a clear 20
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preference expressed by the community in any number of forums about a below grade solution 1
that it that will be a little more complicated than that particularly as we start learning about 2
cost and constraints, the impacts on existing grade crossings, and other aspects of our life 3
around this train that bisects our community. 4
5
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Ok, yeah. I would just hope that we understand that pretty well. I mean 6
I’ll just make one last comment on this round which is I mean we have a little bit of a history of 7
choosing the shiny object and then deciding a couple years later that we can't do it. I mean we 8
just went through a case of that with the ped/bike bridge over 101. We made a choice and 9
then as we got into design and bidding we discovered that that choice wouldn’t work. And 10
especially with something where we're relying on it sounds like a smorgasbord of funding 11
sources over a 30 year period. All this feels a little… the degree of difficulty of this dive is not 2 12
or 3 it's 8 or 11. It's the backward triple twist and I mean how are we even if with whatever 13
process we go through how will we make people sort of understand that whatever happens in 14
this process may or may not happen depending on other moving parts, other funding issues 15
that come up 6, 8, 10 years from now? 16
17
Mr. Mello: Well I think we're at a really key moment here with the approval of Measure B and 18
the backing of VTA and the tentative backing of Caltrain. Today we've had great conversations 19
with them about grade separations. I think our goal here is to move directly into a preliminary 20
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design and the environmental analysis immediately upon adoption of a preferred alternative. 1
So our goal is to not have this gap between phases. We want to get moving. We want to keep 2
moving until we have significant progress and we're able to secure the funding that we need 3
get it in the transportation improvement program, identify funding sources, work with the State 4
and VTA and Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC). So I think we're at a real 5
watershed moment here for grade separations in Palo Alto and I don't think we have to worry 6
about assuming that things continue on the course that they're on right now. 7
8
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Ok, well then if we need to sell bonds I hope we can sell them this year. 9
Anyhow I will I may have some other questions, but I'll pass this along. 10
11
Commissioner Lauing: Ok, well I guess we're doing the problem statement as well as sort of the 12
structure so just a couple comments on that. As I read this I first started with Attachment D so 13
that I could actually see where it was and then went back and looked at where it was before. 14
So first thing is I would salute the workshops. They worked hard, they gave good input. I 15
thought they clarified it pretty well, particularly the prioritization which I’ll talk about first. The 16
suggested objectives I kind of did a line below those and after about the fourth one I said that's 17
probably the basics and again this is without any prompts just so I did it on my own. And things 18
like reducing noise and vibration as Commissioner [Note-Chair Alcheck] mentioned I mean 19
that's probably not a great objective because you can't get rid of that. So I would rather see 20
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these objectives sort of condensed a little bit because of course there can be sub-points and so 1
on as we see in the Comp Plan. 2
3
And then a few of them I put in the margins is this apple pie? So stuff that support Caltrain’s 4
service enhancements it's not like we have a choice; they're coming through our town, right? 5
So that's kind of apple pie. And fairness in terms of the investments improvements in North 6
and South Palo Alto, sure, but we really need to optimize for where the bigger problems are 7
rather than just take sort of a friendly statement there. So I felt that was kind of an apple pie 8
one too. And then the ones below that are kind of what I call best practices. I’m not sure those 9
are really objectives at all. You don't want to disrupt things if you don't have to during 10
construction and funding is funding. So I'm not sure why that actually even needs to be listed 11
here. 12
13
And back up on the problem statement I think part of what you might have been saying 14
Commissioner [Note-Chair] Alcheck is that it's not just a problem, but there might be an 15
opportunity here. Not to put work words in your mouth, but this isn't just a problem. This is 16
they're coming through so what can we do now? This is actually what can we do here to make 17
this thing better? Not unlike when we were going to redo the golf course and we said well if we 18
moved it over here we create ten and a half acres in Palo Alto. So that's a little bit of what the 19
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positive view of the problem statement can be is how can we make our town even better, 1
which is what we're all trying to do every week. 2
3
I think that that said there's a hundred percent certainty that this congestion is going to get 4
worse. So I wouldn’t agree with a previous statement on that because there's just going to be a 5
lot more trains coming through and a lot of people taking trains. So the congestion is the core 6
aspect of the core problem statement and then the visual is definitely an aspect of it because 7
you have these choices to make. So I’d rather see the problem statement a little bit more 8
focused on how can we make the best choices from whatever the numbers of options are 9
because that's what it's about including no choice. We can just sit there and let it happen 10
although they might widen the tracks and we’d have to address that. So you might have a 11
status quo and some other options and kind of focus a little more on that because I think this 12
thing needs maybe shortening, but also beefing up in terms of the impact. It’s just a little bit 13
vanilla now in terms of what's really in front of us for the next few years as we sort this thing. 14
So that would be overall my comments on that. 15
16
On the structure I guess I'm not yet hearing that there's very much of a downside to what we’ll 17
call the complete CSS process. I mean I heard one comment that the stakeholder folks first of 18
all if I heard you correctly that’s anyone who wants to be a stakeholder, which is great for the 19
Palo Alto process. They want to come in and they want to spend their he said Saturday 20
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afternoons working on this stuff, fantastic. And that they might be offended if they weren't in 1
the stakeholder they weren't in the kind of other stakeholders group I’ll call it, I don't think they 2
would because they're still getting their input from their perspective. 3
4
That's different than the sort of what I'll call the expert stakeholder group. And the very fact 5
that the shareholder group that is here now is anyone I think could kind of argue for why you 6
need the other shareholder group because those are really the experts. If you're talking 7
hydrologists and engineers and people that can really provide input on well, if you do the 8
trenching here you’re going to have these problems that's not something that my neighbor is 9
going to come up with if he's not a hydrological engineer. So the document that was presented 10
by Ms. Naik talked about having both, the stakeholders led if you want to call it that or 11
stakeholder component of experts and the type of outreach that you're already doing which is 12
excellent. So I guess again I'm not seeing any downside of going with this process and I see 13
some upside by having these experts involved because it's such a significant thing for Palo Alto. 14
And if we can keep from making some mistakes or do some tweaks because we've got some 15
experts who are really a stakeholder group I think that's worth the investment. Maybe a little 16
bit more management, but you're going to be managing a lot of process and people anyway. So 17
that's kind of where I come on on that one at this point. 18
19
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I don't know how many of these hydrologists are going to want to work free which is another 1
issue. Is this a volunteer or are these actually a series of consultants that's beyond our purview 2
at this point. But the investment level and the impact for what folks have correctly been calling 3
a hundred years I think is worth the investment in the full process as I understand it right now. 4
And people can speak, can continue to educate me if I’m incorrect on that. So I’ll hold there for 5
now. Thank you. 6
7
Commissioner Gardias: Thank you. So members of the community and potential stakeholders 8
thank you very much for attending and for your presentations and thank you very much for 9
staff for your presentation. Congratulations again to Josh for the newborn. So send us out, 10
send out some pictures. 11
12
So the I think that this aspect of the stakeholders group is very important. I believe that we 13
should solicit actively very quickly the attention and participation of the major stakeholders 14
group. We should identify them, promptly send out the messages, request their attention, and 15
propose some framework for their work. I cannot imagine that this project of this magnitude, 16
this will be a big project, it will change neighborhoods for many years from now so I have no 17
doubts about this. I cannot imagine that some groups are left out or maybe their voice is if they 18
are key stakeholders is at the same level of my voice, right? I think that their voice should be 19
prioritized over mine. So in terms of recommendation my recommendation is please build very 20
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quickly a stakeholder group. Identify them, invite them to a meetings, propose the framework, 1
and incorporate into the process. 2
3
In terms of the problem statement I think that this problem statement should be written from 4
scratch. And then probably stakeholder team it should be the first task of the of the 5
stakeholder team when it's created. I also agree with some comments that some of the 6
objectives are very obvious here and then pre-much should be removed from the objective lists 7
because it's a normal mistake of writing objectives that people are writing issues that are not 8
really relevant, they are obvious, they bring the no value. And also when you build a schedule 9
like this there is always a value in identifying risks and tracking those risks down. Also 10
assumptions; assumptions, issues, dependencies they all fall into the categories of the risk. 11
That's a typical tool of the of any project management. And also some items that are in scope 12
and out of scope. When teams work on projects of this scale if they create agreement of this 13
set of the values from the beginning the rest is a pretty much about the execution, but I think 14
that you will get lots of help from the stakeholders group because I think that you can approach 15
this issues in in a variety of different ways. And I'm sure that they will provide the value in here. 16
17
There is one more comment. I think that there should be a permanent presence of a 18
Commissioner or maybe even two at those meetings because there will be lots of meetings. So 19
this is something that we ask Jon about making sure that we are embedded, the Commissioners 20
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are embedded at various initiatives and this is very big one so probably there should be even 1
two of the Commissioners either rotating or being present at various meetings and observing 2
the process and bringing the live comments from each of this meeting. 3
4
Otherwise I think that those would exhaust my comment. I would be interested in those three 5
options that my colleague Asher mentioned. So I never heard about them so if somebody can 6
share them at this meeting I would be interested what they are. Thank you. 7
8
Commissioner Lauing: There are three options, but nobody agrees on what the three are. 9
10
Commissioner Gardias: That’s fine. Just tell us what the options are (interrupted) 11
12
Chair Alcheck: I thought you said there were six. 13
14
Commissioner Gardias: I haven’t heard them, right? But (interrupted) 15
16
Chair Alcheck: Hold on, I do want to say something. I would like to discourage a discussion of 17
those options tonight and the reason why is because… yeah, it's not… I agree with you actually 18
that the premise of your question really is you don't even really know, we haven't really 19
stepped into this yet. As a Commission we don't many of us probably are unfamiliar with what 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 fifteen (15) 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.
this group that Asher, Commissioner [Note-Vice-Chair] Waldfogel mentioned earlier has done 1
which is a really fair point. We are so early in this process that many of us on this Commission 2
have not significant familiarity with what we’re the totality of what we're talking about. But I 3
wanted to I don't want to spend too much time especially I don't want staff to spend too much 4
time getting into that because that's the whole point of the process that we're trying to design. 5
6
Commissioner Gardias: Yeah, but with the whole respect, right? Sorry for interrupting, right? 7
This is very simple thing, right? I mean I'd like to just have somebody disclose these options, 8
right? If somebody can take this as an action item forward an email to us with this what was 9
developed earlier on, right, so it's not a private knowledge of (interrupted) 10
11
Chair Alcheck: No, that’s fine. 12
13
Commissioner Gardias: Vice-Chair Waldfogel just tell and we will all know and it's a normal 14
question. Thank you. 15
16
Chair Alcheck: Yeah, do you want to respond that real quick? 17
18
Ms. Gitelman: Yeah, I'm getting a little confused by the description of three options. 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 fifteen (15) 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 Alcheck: I know. 1
2
Ms. Gitelman: But we did include links in the report to the prior Rail Corridor Study which is 3
worth a read. I mean it's really well done and trenching analysis that Josh talked about which 4
looked at a below grade trench solution for Meadow, Charleston, and Churchill and there are a 5
couple different options studied in there. So it's a little more complex than three options, but 6
there's a lot of information available and there are links provided in the staff report. 7
8
Chair Alcheck: More importantly I want to suggest that I think we don't have our attorney here 9
today, but I think discussing the options and even referencing potential preferences would be 10
highly damaging to the whole notion of the process that we're trying to discuss here and so the 11
whole notion of PTC being involved in this in some point means that we participate in a process 12
that we don't really step in to making statements tonight about specific options. Ok, why don't 13
we do one more round if that’s alright? I would encourage us to be as concise as possible. I 14
have typically have a problem with that myself so I know that, but let's try to be concise 15
because we've got a big agenda tonight or a big topic tonight and I'd like us to get to it soon. So 16
go ahead, please Commissioner. 17
18
Commissioner Summa: Ok, so appreciated many of the comments of my colleagues and 19
specifically with regards to the problem statement maybe being too boilerplate or general and 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 fifteen (15) 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 some of the objectives don't really need to be there I mean. But I wanted to ask after the 1
other cities using the CSS process with the what many feel to be an integral or essential part of 2
it a stakeholder group? The other cities, do we know that? 3
4
Mr. Mello: They're all doing it a little bit differently. They're generally just following more of a 5
traditional alternatives analysis process where their city councils are making the bulk of the 6
decisions. I mean CSS is a is more of a spectrum. It's more of a philosophy than this clear cut. 7
There's thousands of papers on what CSS is and every agency does a little bit different so I don't 8
know if they're intending to use CSS, but I've been following some of the work in our adjacent 9
communities and it's it seems to be more of a traditional alternatives development alternatives 10
analysis process. They're not starting necessarily with a problem statement and starting as 11
broadly as we are. 12
13
Commissioner Summa: And the Rail Corridor Taskforce that I guess it was disbanded and you 14
guys started it up again. How, who is on that? Is I think that's what… 15
16
Ms. Gitelman: Well there was a Rail Corridor Taskforce that generated the report in 2013 that 17
we linked to in the staff report. I think Josh was referring to the Rail Committee of the City 18
Council. 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 fifteen (15) 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 Summa: Oh, ok. I was confused. 1
2
Ms. Gitelman: That was reestablished. 3
4
Commissioner Summa: Ok, I (interrupted) 5
6
Ms. Gitelman: And that consists of four Council Members. 7
8
Commissioner Summa: Ok, and then so I'm also kind of confused how this is all going to fit 9
together I think timing wise and how to prioritize that. But I do I just I think I made myself clear 10
earlier, but I do think it's very important for the city staff not to have the full weight of this on 11
their shoulders and that's why a stakeholder group is of residents and then the technical 12
experts I think will be so important. And I think the one of the speakers made an analogy to not 13
wanting to go down this the road of high speed rail which people are not very happy with the 14
lack of transparency and feeling that they didn't get what, they're not going to get what they 15
voted for and that they didn't understand enough. So I just want to make it really clear that I 16
think it would be a great help to staff to have really devoted citizens to take some of the wait 17
and in addition to the community meetings. So that would be my… Yeah, I think that's enough 18
for now. Thanks. 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 fifteen (15) 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 Monk: I'll try to be succinct, but probably won't happen so apologies in advance. 1
I also just want to acknowledge and thank all of the members of the community for coming out 2
and speaking tonight. I think you shared a really deep understanding and presentation of the 3
issues. There was a lot of new information to us and maybe to staff as well. It's apparent that 4
there's deep concern from the community and a lot of work went into presenting to us tonight 5
and I just want to acknowledge that. I thank you for all the materials that you brought to us 6
tonight and all the words that you shared. 7
8
I'm not sure that going with this approach is a trade off to the shareholder citizen engagement 9
type model which is the closest model would be like what we did with the CAC. And that was 10
what I think Chair Alcheck was alluding to earlie when he was referring to the distinction 11
between the philosophical and the technical issues. So I am still trying to flesh out my thoughts 12
on that, but I am concerned about falling behind and risking losing any Measure B funding. I 13
saw that we're already behind our neighboring cities. I think that the planning and design 14
process timing is critical and we're competing with our neighboring cities for funding so just 15
balancing that out would make me lean towards going with what's been proposed by staff. 16
17
I did like what Commissioner Lauing said about what opportunities this can lead towards. And 18
I'm wondering with the increase in train service that's anticipated are there going to be any 19
connections or thought put into connections for office workers, anything along those lines? 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 fifteen (15) 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.
don't know that we've looked at opportunities can come from this so that might be something 1
to explore and something to present to Council. I'm sure those are the types of things that at a 2
higher level they'd want to hear from. 3
4
If you just give me a moment I want to quickly look at my notes. A lot of questions were 5
answered that I had so I have a lot of different things on here… Ok, did anyone here talk about 6
the value capture? Did you mention that? Is there any comment that you want to make on 7
what would happen if a corridor was trenched and there were any possibility to build it on top 8
of it? Has there any been discussion on that? 9
10
Mr. Mello: That would be something that would be analyzed when we move into the 11
alternatives analysis phase of this project. That could very well be one of the alternatives that 12
we decided to analyze. 13
14
Commissioner Monk: Ok, thank you. 15
16
Chair Alcheck: Ok, I’ll try to make my responses quick. I'm glad you asked that question about 17
our neighboring cities. I love to know what our neighbors are doing and I typically ask that 18
question and I didn't tonight and I'm glad you did. It doesn't necessarily mean we should 19
always copy them, but it is I'm always curious to know. I think that it sounds for those who feel 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 fifteen (15) 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 a CSS that the CSS approach requires a stakeholder group then I think the more 1
appropriate description of the approach staff is suggesting would be like a hybrid of what our 2
neighbors are doing with significantly more a stronger amount of community engagement. But 3
I think that what staff’s proposed actually is a lot greater than that. I mean this is one of the 4
most sort of just the approach of creating the criteria and not identifying the options at the 5
outset of the process I find to be one that is essentially inviting the community to participate in 6
a really unique way. As we as somebody mentioned tonight there have been options that have 7
been investigated and I think one of the, look one of the issues that is again, I think this boils 8
down to this will become a very difficult decision for the community to make because we even 9
if you're not familiar with the options I think our report was sufficient enough to know that the 10
options have some significant costs. And it's always difficult to make a decision that has such 11
significant costs. 12
13
I do want to also suggest that I'm glad you brought up the bike/pedestrian bridge. 14
Commissioner Gardias were you a part of the Commission when we did the pageant show? I'll 15
tell you something that was what fun that was. I mean I was a young Commissioner, right? But 16
we had this thrilling design pageant they architects and design teams I don't know 50 I don’t 17
how many presented to a small community group and then those people selected their finalists 18
and then the… you weren’t part of that. So then and then the Commission the seven of us got 19
to have a four way competition between four design firms and then we picked our what we 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 fifteen (15) 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.
thought was gorgeous and anyways the result is there's no bike/pedestrian bridge. And I 1
thought that process was magnificent. I really did at the time. I thought it was so amazing and, 2
but at what cost, right? How did that process affect the result and to what extent was the 3
resulting inaction unavoidable because of the process? 4
5
If look I think we've heard a lot of commentary. If the issues are so clear, if there are six experts 6
that have six different opinions then we're going to need to have a decision making group that 7
can make that decision and there's really one body that can do that. I would not suggest that 8
we start from where the Rail Corridor Study left off seven years ago. I think that staff’s effort to 9
basically it's sort of two, it’s two, there's two elements here. It's there's an education; I think 10
that going through the process with a lot of public engagement will educate everybody and also 11
potentially provide meaningful feedback. And I think the most important thing that I’d like to 12
say right now is at our meetings we host the public to make comments. And I would strongly 13
suggest to every individual in this City that they're the opinion of one member of this 14
community is not more valuable than another member of this community. But that doesn't, 15
but just because the process is driven in a PTC led format does not necessarily mean that our 16
opinions are more important than community member’s opinions. And so again I don't think 17
anybody on this Commission will participate in this process and not appreciate the significance 18
of the issues. And I think that I will reiterate this because the next part here is to make a 19
Motion to recommend a process and criteria and a draft problem statement to City 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 fifteen (15) 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 my last comment will be that while I really appreciated the work of the citizen advisory 2
group on the Comp Plan I do think that there is a tremendous flaw involved in citizen advisory 3
groups which is to say that they are so demanding of time that by their very nature they 4
alienate a tremendous number of individuals in our community whose perspectives are 5
important and meaningful, but who will never have the time to participate in such a group. 6
And while that's a tradeoff they could come to certain meetings and communicate their input I 7
would much prefer a process that was City led that really encouraged a sort of an informative 8
reach out and then invited the bulk of our community to participate in this decision making 9
process. Because number one, I think that's what the City Council will need to make this 10
decision to insulate them so that they make the decision that the community supports. 11
Because I don't think that anybody would be satisfied with the with an option supported by 25 12
members that didn't necessarily represent the community at whole. So again, I think this has to 13
be a community wide involvement process and I think that staff’s recommendation gets it right. 14
Again I don’t think it's worth spending too much time and I hope we can get a Motion going 15
that supports some elements of this and then we can make our, we can move on and make a 16
recommendation to Council and move on. 17
18
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: Great, thank you. Let's see, couple things, so on this one I think I'm 19
inclined I mean the people in the room have spent the most time on rail issues are the two 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 fifteen (15) 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.
women from CARRD who can explain all 3 of the 12 possible corridor options or 17 or whatever 1
the number is so I'm slightly inclined to defer to their view. I mean I think that the engagement 2
that's described in the report is all important. I see this as kind of inner rings and outer rings of 3
engagement, but it's important. I think the critical thing is we have to get through this pretty 4
expeditiously and we just have to figure out how to use all the tools at our disposal. 5
6
I do have one request and you can tell me if this is an appropriate add to the problem 7
statement, but can we add something about mitigation during the interim period between 8
when electrification and the number of trains increases and when we get to a permanent 9
solution? I mean is there anything we can do? For example, should we be budgeting money to 10
widen the Embarcadero underpass right now? Because that’s a passageway that we know is 11
available or is accessible to us. I mean I'm not saying that's the right answer. I'm not trying to 12
tee it up as a proposal, but I would just like a really quick study of that done as part of this 13
scope if that's appropriate. 14
15
Mr. Mello: I think that could be done and I think an appropriate place for that might be the 16
objectives. So an additional objective that is to mitigate the impacts of additional rail service 17
prior to major infrastructure investments or something to that effect. 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 fifteen (15) 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 Waldfogel: Yeah and if that's appropriate I would just love to see something like that 1
included in this because I'm really worried about 2020 to 2030 based on this discussion. I 2
wasn't before and you've really got my attention. 3
4
Commissioner Lauing: I think the start has been made or has been excellent by staff, great 5
work. As I said I think that the stakeholders group from the neighborhoods as I’ll call them is 6
very effective. And when we did the Parks Master Plan when I was over there it was 7
extraordinarily over a couple years affective to get that kind of input. Different from the other 8
kind of stakeholder’s group that was sort of expert, not in the way that you guys need it in 9
terms of the technology, but when we had some bird experts really telling us how we needed 10
to get the stuff written correctly that was better than just two or three people that like birds. 11
No disrespect to any of those four people that I just mentioned it’s just helped us a lot. So I 12
would I like the start. I totally love leaving it open and not talking about options right now. 13
That's part of what the this group has they do. With respect to us sort of improving or codifying 14
a problem statement I think we're had very collegial discussion the inputs to the problem 15
statement that maybe is enough for you to distill because there wasn't any diametrically 16
opposed stuff there. It’s just a lot of good collegial comments on how that might be improved. 17
So that's all that I would say at this point on that and then move on. 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 fifteen (15) 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 Gardias: When writing objectives it would be nice to differentiate between Palo 1
Alto objectives and Caltrain objectives. And just wanted briefly make a reference to this what 2
Mike was saying. Actually I was part of the second meeting when pretty much we were 3
selecting one of the four bridge options, pedestrian options over 101. I wasn't part of the first 4
meeting, but his comment led me to repeat the recommendation that I made over there and I 5
also made the same recommendation over at the couple of other meetings although now it 6
may be too late to incorporate one, but I think that this is this keeps coming again and again 7
and again. How to extract if we have a project like this the question is how to extract the best 8
talent and knowledge and proposals to make solution. And I advocating that Kingdom of Saudi 9
Arabia (KSA) resolved this problem like 30 years ago already. They were doing this very 10
cheaply, frequently, and you can just I would recommend again to Palo Alto to pretty much 11
follow the footsteps of that country. And then if we have projects of this size pretty much 12
create a competition send the invitation to the students of U.C. Berkeley Department of 13
Architecture. They will do it for $20,000. We’ll have plenty of different solutions to choose 14
from and options will come available to us at any time. So that's in reference to a pretty much 15
how we can move quickly and select good or solicit good options for projects of this size. Thank 16
you. 17
18
Chair Alcheck: Ok, at this time I'm going to make a Motion that... Oh, sorry. 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 fifteen (15) 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 Lauing: I was going to make a Motion. 1
2
Chair Alcheck: Well I’m going to beat you to it. At this 3
4
Commissioner Lauing: The Chair is going to beat the Commissioners to making a Motion? 5
6
MOTION 7
8
Chair Alcheck: Yeah, I'm just going to propose a Motion real quick. I'm going to suggest that we 9
move to have staff include the themes discussed tonight about the suggested problem 10
statement and the suggested objectives and incorporate some of the comments that we made 11
in their rewrite of that as they move it towards Council and adopt the process and recommend 12
that Council adopt the process as outlined in the staff report. And I say that I will welcome 13
Commissioner proposed amendments to that so that we can… Anyways so do I have a second 14
to that Motion? 15
16
SECOND 17
18
Vice-Chair Waldfogel: I’ll second that Motion. 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 fifteen (15) 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 Alcheck: Thank you. Before we take a vote I want to invite anyone to make any 1
amendments or to offer any amendments to that. 2
3
Commissioner Lauing: So I'll just comment on your Motion first of all as I just said I’m not sure 4
we have to codify the first part of that. 5
6
Chair Alcheck: I agree. I was actually I was following your lead in suggesting that staff have the 7
liberty to incorporate some of our comments in their revision to the problem statement and 8
objectives. I think Asher’s comment about mitigated efforts could easily be incorporated into 9
objectives. I think staff got that. And I think that I don't think that anybody proposed really any 10
specific language to the problem statement, but the sort of feedback I think will instruct them 11
and hopefully when they move it forward that they will incorporate that feedback was my 12
suggestion in this. 13
14
Commissioner Lauing: So that wouldn't have to be in your Motion then. 15
16
Chair Alcheck: I’m, well I’ve not, I’m making a Motion and the purpose of the statement 17
regarding those elements was to suggest that I'm not moving to recommend that Council 18
consider this version of the problem statement. What I'm suggesting is that staff incorporate 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 fifteen (15) 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.
our feedback to the problem statement, objectives, and evaluation criteria in when they bring it 1
to Council and then recommend the process that staff outlined in their packet. 2
3
Commissioner Lauing: So to me it seems like you're motioning two different things. 4
5
Chair Alcheck: No, I think there's (interrupted) 6
7
Commissioner Lauing: But we if (interrupted) 8
9
Chair Alcheck: I think this issue here, the statement, the objectives, and the criteria are one 10
element of our discussion tonight and the second element of our discussion is whether the staff 11
recommended approach the way it is or as many of our members in the community suggested 12
and some of the Commissioner Members suggested a stakeholder groups should be 13
incorporated. What I would like to do is sort of put on the table what we discussed tonight and 14
then give someone an opportunity to make a Friendly or Unfriendly Amendment about the 15
stakeholder groups so that Council could in theory understand where the Commission stood on 16
that specific item. Does that makes sense? Is it… I guess my question is is it… 17
18
Commissioner Lauing: So… 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 fifteen (15) 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 Alcheck: How is there an issue that you have with the… 1
2
Commissioner Lauing: Well, yeah because I would make a different kind of Motion entirely 3
relative to going (Interrupted) 4
5
Chair Alcheck: Would you like to make a Substitute Motion? 6
7
Commissioner Lauing: Yeah, that’d be fine. That’s I was trying to make it simpler and just have 8
you do something else, but [unintelligible]. So I (interrupted) 9
10
Chair Alcheck: I’m inviting a Substitute Motion. 11
12
SUBSTITUTE MOTION 13
14
Commissioner Lauing: I would suggest that here's the Motion as I've written it up. That Palo 15
Alto follow a full CSS process for evaluation of rail grade separation including creation of an 16
expert stakeholder group in parallel with neighborhood stakeholders. 17
18
Chair Alcheck: So just so I’m clear before I ask for a second you're using a term of art that I think 19
is defined, the CSS. I'm a little concerned about that, but I think that you are a little bit more 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 fifteen (15) 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.
explicit about your request to have an expert group which I am assuming does not necessarily 1
mean made up of residents. And then my second question is the second group that you just 2
mentioned is that what are you referring to the stakeholder group as a member a group of like 3
the CAC? I'm just trying to get clarity here before we I call for a second. 4
5
Commissioner Lauing: Consistent with my comments earlier the existing stakeholder group of 6
citizens (interrupted) 7
8
Chair Alcheck: Is two separate groups. 9
10
Commissioner Lauing: Terrific and needs to stay and I want to make sure that we stay that in 11
the Motion. So I put that in the Motion. We need an additional one as was suggested by the 12
document from a [unintelligible] to have this expert stakeholder group. So those are the two 13
things that I'm covering. 14
15
Chair Alcheck: Ok, sorry; one more question. What stakeholder group that's in existence are 16
you referring to? 17
18
Commissioner Lauing: The one that they were already worked with for the workshops. 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 fifteen (15) 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 Alcheck: That’s still together? 1
2
Commissioner Lauing: It's not only together, but they want to continue it is what Josh said. 3
4
Ms. Gitelman: It's just a series of community workshops with people participating as self-5
selecting their participation. 6
7
Chair Alcheck: Ok. 8
9
Commissioner Lauing: Yeah. 10
11
Chair Alcheck: Ok, you're not you don’t mean an appointed stakeholder group? 12
13
Commissioner Lauing: Could we get a second on that? 14
15
Chair Alcheck: Sure. Are there any seconds to this Motion? 16
17
Commissioner Summa: I will second it if you make it clear that it's a stakeholder group made up 18
of devoted residents and also the experts that staff already identified as part of the TAC. 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 fifteen (15) 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.
Because you didn't specify residents and my goal is to get residents involved in a stakeholder 1
group. So if you… 2
3
Commissioner Lauing: Yeah, but that means you have to write it. 4
5
Commissioner Summa: You want me to write it? 6
7
Commissioner Lauing: Because that's a complicated add to whatever (interrupted) 8
9
Commissioner Summa: I'll make a suggestion that you add just add the word made up of 10
residents and experts that staff has already recommended as the TAC. 11
12
Commissioner Lauing: But doesn't that leave out new experts that they would find? 13
14
Commissioner Summa: No, they're going to appoint a stakeholder group made up of residents 15
and the already identified TAC and hone that down. The idea is to get residents involved with 16
technical experts and in addition they have I think identified 7,500 people that through various 17
through the committee community meeting and through the [what you might call it] the 18
survey, thank you. Have already that's the group that they were referring to. They want to 19
keep those people engaged and those people can be maybe can be engaged on that level of 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 fifteen (15) 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.
occasional community meeting or a written comment or survey, but we also want a stakeholder 1
group that can just go to work, dive down made up of residents and technical experts. So 2
(interrupted) 3
4
Chair Alcheck: Ok [unintelligible] hold on a second. I'm going to interrupt for a second because 5
I my I could be wrong, but I feel like we're talking about two very different things. When we are 6
when it's when you refer to a stakeholder that's like a term of… that refers to anybody that has 7
sort of an interest in the matter in a variety of ways. But I think when Commissioner Summa is 8
talking about a stakeholder group she's referring to a community a team that's identified and 9
then throughout the length of the process is essentially tasked with doing the work. And I'm 10
confused and I'm only asking this question because you referred to staff’s stakeholder group. 11
And I think staff’s stakeholder group is the community. They keep reaching out to the 12
community to participate in the engagement schedule, but there isn't a specific list of 13
stakeholders that is exclusive. And so is that, am I right? 14
15
Ms. Gitelman: If I can make a an observation it seems to me that the Commission is heading 16
towards a Motion that basically is the staff recommendation with the addition of a citizen task 17
force made up of residents and experts some of which are already identified on this TAC. 18
19
Chair Alcheck: Is that what your Motion is? A taskforce? 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 fifteen (15) 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 Lauing: Yeah. I've read these documents on CSS this long seven page memo and 2
that process which is an established process is what from what I'm hearing is what we should 3
follow. That doesn't mean that we should do anything different with the workshops with 4
citizens and that should continue because it's a very valuable. I’ve seen that for 10 years in the 5
City. So all we're doing is we're doing what I call the full CSS process which incorporates that 6
and that was not in the original staff recommendation so. 7
8
Ms. Gitelman: And I just think there's a lot of interpretation about what the full CSS process is. 9
10
Chair Alcheck: Right, that’s my concern. 11
12
Ms. Gitelman: If we can just say I mean you have to tell me if you think this is where you're 13
headed, but that the recommendation would be the staff recommendation with the addition of 14
a citizen task force made up of residents and technical experts. 15
16
Chair Alcheck: Is that your Motion? 17
18
Commissioner Lauing: I think (interrupted) 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 fifteen (15) 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 Alcheck: She’s suggesting you not use CSS because unfortunately it's not an agreed on, 1
we’ve demonstrated tonight that there's some confusion here about that term. And so I think 2
the question is: are you interested in a task force that's appoint, appointed, would be the right 3
word? Identified and appointed in addition to the staff (interrupted) 4
5
Commissioner Lauing: I'm not sure what's wrong with the language of full CSS practice. 6
7
Ms. Gitelman: I think the staff disagrees that it's a mandated part of the full CSS to have a task 8
force. Now a task force can be part of a CSS, but I don't think it… I mean I haven't gone through 9
[unintelligible] through the handouts that we’ve received this evening so it would just be 10
helpful for us to understand what it is you're asking for and using that terminology. 11
12
Chair Alcheck: Do you want staff to interpret your Motion or would you like (interrupted) 13
14
Commissioner Lauing: Well for example in the document we got from former Mayor Burt he 15
notes essential differences between the nationally recognized full CSS best practice and the 16
staff proposal. 17
18
Ms. Gitelman: And again I don't with all due respect to the comments we received, I don't think 19
it's quite that clear that CSS must include any specific type of community task force or group. 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 fifteen (15) 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.
hear that you want to make that recommendation and I think that is a great idea. I think the 1
Council will be very receptive to your suggestion. I'm just suggesting let's make it a little more 2
clear what it is exactly that you want. Is it a citizen a group of a stakeholder group made up of 3
residents? 4
5
Commissioner Lauing: It's consistent with the comments in the in the letters and the speakers 6
that it would be very beneficial to have important technical expertise to advise all along the 7
way. And that can be negotiated exactly who those people are. I certainly don't have the 8
expertise to define that. 9
10
Chair Alcheck: Alright, so for the sake of clarity it's the staff report inclusive of his task force 11
that is (interrupted) 12
13
Ms. Gitelman: With technical expertise. 14
15
Chair Alcheck: Diverse. With technical expertise (interrupted) 16
17
Commissioner Summa: Can I jump in? I would recommend that we use almost Commissioner 18
Lauing’s wording. We take out the word full, but if we want to acknowledge it we staff 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 fifteen (15) 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.
recommendations we want to follow the CSS process with a resident stakeholder group that 1
will work with the TAC. Do you like that? 2
3
Commissioner Lauing: Yeah, although the resident group could be technical too so I don’t know. 4
5
Commissioner Monk: May I weigh in on the Motion? 6
7
Chair Alcheck: Hold on a second. Let me just ask staff. From a process standpoint I have a 8
Motion on the floor which got a second. I have a Substitute Motion which may or may not have 9
a second. How do I… I would like to operate in an organized fashion. I understand that people 10
would like to reword Motions. My preference here would be that if this Motion as worded isn't 11
sufficient to receive the second maybe somebody else make a Substitute Motion and then we 12
see if that get a second. Are you comfortable with that? 13
14
Ms. Gitelman: If I understand Commissioner Summa is trying to achieve the clarity that will 15
allow her second of the Substitute Motion to stand. So that (interrupted) 16
17
Chair Alcheck: Ok, so then why don’t we leave it to the two of you for a minute to communicate 18
this so that the two of you can get on the same page so that we can have sort of follow the 19
process and I appreciate that you want to 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 fifteen (15) 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 Lauing: Yeah, no that’s fine. 2
3
Chair Alcheck: If this doesn't work then you can offer your [unintelligible] in a second. 4
5
Commissioner Lauing: You have to read it with the amendment or I 'm sorry, the clarification. 6
What I first said was a follow a full which you're taking out CSS process for evaluation of rail 7
grade separation including creation of a dedicated expert stakeholder group in parallel with 8
neighborhood stakeholders. 9
10
Chair Alcheck: Ok. 11
12
SECOND FOR SUBSTITUTE MOTION 13
14
Commissioner Summa: I think that's clear staff, don’t you? [Ok], I’ll second. 15
16
FRIENDLY AMENDMENT TO SUBSTITUTE MOTION 17
18
Chair Alcheck: Ok, alright. I have a Substitute Motion on the floor. I'm going to propose an 19
amendment which you can treat as unfriendly if you wish. My amendment would be to not 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 fifteen (15) 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.
require a task force or stakeholder group as you've defined it and to proceed with the staff 1
suggested approach. Do you accept that amendment? 2
3
FRIENDLY AMENDMENT FAILED 4
5
Commissioner Lauing: No, that’s a 180. 6
7
UNFRIENDLY AMENDMENT TO SUBSTITUTE MOTION 8
9
Chair Alcheck: Ok, so let’s treat that as an Unfriendly Amendment. As I'm going to (interrupted) 10
11
Commissioner Monk: May I offer an (interrupted) 12
13
Commissioner Lauing: Should I just speak to the Motion for a minute? [Unintelligible] 14
15
Chair Alcheck: Hold on I’ve got to (interrupted) 16
17
Commissioner Lauing: Yeah, Doria seconded. 18
19
Chair Alcheck: I just have to see if I have a second of my Unfriendly Amendment. 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 fifteen (15) 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 Lauing: Sorry. 2
3
Chair Alcheck: Does anybody wish to second my Unfriendly Amendment? 4
5
SECOND 6
7
Commissioner Monk: I second it. 8
9
Chair Alcheck: Ok, so we're going to quickly vote on (interrupted) 10
11
Commissioner Gardias: I’m sorry; I just need to chime in. I don't believe that this is along the 12
rules. 13
14
Ms. Gitelman: Excuse me. 15
16
Commissioner Gardias: Yes exactly. So I (interrupted) 17
18
Ms. Gitelman: If I can (interrupted) 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 fifteen (15) 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 Gardias: Need to this is not along the Robert’s Rules. 1
2
Ms. Gitelman: I’m trying (interrupted) 3
4
Chair Alcheck: Go ahead. 5
6
Ms. Gitelman: Thank you. I think that the amendment is really a restatement of the original 7
Motion. So I think the Commission should vote on the Substitute Motion by Commissioner 8
Lauing seconded by Commissioner Summa, once that's resolved you'll know whether the 9
Substitute Motion or the original Motion is going to be the opinion of the Commission. 10
11
Chair Alcheck: Ok, that's fair actually. We can treat the fact that there is a original Motion on 12
the floor as sufficient enough to determine this... 13
14
Ms. Gitelman: Yeah. 15
16
Commissioner Monk: May offer an amendment? 17
18
Chair Alcheck: You may. 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 fifteen (15) 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 Monk: I don't have the language parsed out, but instead of the language around 1
it creating a task force (interrupted) 2
3
Chair Alcheck: Hold on, hold on a second. I’m sorry, what was that? 4
5
Jonathan Lait, Assistant Director: I’m just looking at your rules to find out the procedures for 6
amending a Substitute Motion so I need a minute on that if you want to explore that. 7
8
Commissioner Monk: It’s already been amended by Commissioner Summa, correct? 9
10
Commissioner Lauing: No. 11
12
Chair Alcheck: No. No, no. 13
14
Commissioner Lauing: There was a second. 15
16
Commissioner Monk: Ok. My head is spinning. 17
18
_______________________
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 fifteen (15) 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 Lauing: She just worked to clarify the language, but then we went back to pretty 1
much the original language and then she seconded it. So it's just a straightforward Substitute 2
Motion. 3
4
Chair Alcheck: Yeah, we can give staff… the only, I'm only attempting to give the Commission an 5
opportunity to sort of identify where people stand on that on this on the Substitute 6
Amendment [Note-Amendment to Substitute Motion?] you have and I think staff’s suggestion 7
that having a amend, having a proposed Motion and a Substitute Motion actually does that 8
without having to make the suggestion amendment that I suggested. So why don’t we give 9
them another minute to determine whether amendments are even permitted and then we can 10
vote on it. And I'll give you a chance to speak to your Motion before we vote. 11
12
Commissioner Monk: Can I just ask the staff a question then? 13
14
Chair Alcheck: Yeah. 15
16
Commissioner Monk: So I'm hearing two different concepts coming together and I'm wondering 17
if it's possible to just broaden the TAC to encompass the key stakeholders that have been 18
omitted such as the Safe Routes to School as Arthur Keller had mentioned, such as the CARRD 19
stakeholders, other key folks and therefore maybe it would just obliterate the need for having 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 fifteen (15) 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.
completely independent task force. I think the problem that I have in supporting the Motion 1
right now is that it doesn't let staff have time to digest all of the information that was presented 2
tonight that might be incorporated into a deeper dive of on the CSS plan. So I'm not inclined to 3
support it right now without having staff heading a deeper dive into what was presented 4
tonight. 5
6
Chair Alcheck: Ok. 7
8
Commissioner Monk: So staff that is a question for you. Is that something that could, can the 9
TAC be broadened so as to sort of address the concerns of the key stakeholders without… 10
11
Ms. Gitelman: Well, I think that might be one of the potential outcomes of the Motion that's on 12
the floor, of the Substitute Motion. 13
14
Chair Alcheck: Yeah, I’d like to I want to give I want to defer to our process so I want to give this 15
Substitute Motion an opportunity to be voted on and then you can speak to your Motion and 16
we can vote on it and then excuse me, we can vote on it, you can speak to your Motion and I’ll 17
give an opportunity to people who dissented to speak as well. So are you guys comfortable 18
voting on this Motion? Does anybody need clarity on what we're voting on? 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 fifteen (15) 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 Monk: Please repeat the Motion. 1
2
Chair Alcheck: Ok. 3
4
Commissioner Lauing: Is Jonathan done with his research? 5
6
Chair Alcheck: I'm assuming you're withdrawing your offer your decision to voice and 7
amendment so it's probably moot. She's not going to try to amend your Substitute Motion. So 8
(interrupted) 9
10
Commissioner Monk: I was just trying to get clarity on what is trying to be achieved within the 11
Motion and whether or not that's already being achieved or can separately be achieved with 12
the existing plans around the TAC by broadening that committee to include these stakeholders. 13
Does that make sense Commissioner? 14
15
Commissioner Lauing: Yeah. 16
17
Chair Alcheck: I know. Me too. 18
19
Commissioner Lauing: Ok, so… 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 fifteen (15) 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 Alcheck: Well why don't… 2
3
Commissioner Lauing: Did you want to hear it again? 4
5
Chair Alcheck: Yes, please. 6
7
Commissioner Lauing: Ok, so that Palo Alto the Motion [Note-Substitute] is that Palo Alto follow 8
a we don't say full anymore. The CSS process for evaluation of rail grade separation including 9
creation of a dedicated expert stakeholder group in parallel with neighborhood stakeholders or 10
stakeholder workshops if you prefer. 11
12
Chair Alcheck: Alright, we have (interrupted) 13
14
Commissioner Lauing: We have the second already. 15
16
Chair Alcheck: Yeah, we have a Motion [Note-Substitute] on the floor. I would like to ask 17
Commissioners who are in favor to raise their hand and say aye. 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 fifteen (15) 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 Lauing: I thought we're going to speak to the Motion and then get any dissents. 1
It’s very simple (interrupted) 2
3
Chair Alcheck: You speak to your dissent after it takes place. 4
5
Commissioner Lauing: Pardon me? 6
7
Chair Alcheck: People speak to their dissent after they've (interrupted) 8
9
Commissioner Lauing: Not if their opposed to an intended vote against it and want to… 10
11
Chair Alcheck: No, no, no. Typically can help me out here? 12
13
Mr. Lait: So the Substitute Motion has been made, seconded so the maker can speak to that 14
Motion as well as the seconder. There is debate, vote. Anybody who votes against it has an 15
opportunity to speak their dissenting views. 16
17
Chair Alcheck: Alright. So I'm going to give you the opportunity to speak to your Motion and 18
the seconder may speak to their Motion and then we’ll vote. 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 fifteen (15) 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 Lauing: Very simply it's very high stakes. There is no reason not to do this 1
because it just adds a risk. No reason to take that risk. I haven't heard any substantive 2
downside at all to beefing up the expertise and I've heard a lot of upside from our ex-mayor 3
and very informed consultants. So we should use all the expertise we can get to surface and 4
vet all the options and optimize for the best decision. 5
6
Commissioner Summa: I’m good. I think I've made it clear that I think the process would be 7
made more transparent and with the participation of residents and that it would help staff. 8
9
Chair Alcheck: Ok, if anybody would like, are you suggesting I have to host a debate on this? 10
11
Commissioner Lauing: If somebody wants to say something. 12
13
Mr. Lait: Yeah, I mean if there's an opportunity for people to speak to the Motion. 14
15
Chair Alcheck: Would anybody else like to speak to the Motion? I will provide an opportunity 16
for anybody to speak to the dissent, speak to their dissent if they wish. Ok, seeing none I'm 17
going to host the vote then. All of those in favor of supporting the Motion on the floor, the 18
Substitute Motion on the floor please raise your hand and say aye. Ok, we have four ayes. All 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 fifteen (15) 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.
those opposed? Two. Ok, the Motion passed, the Substitute Motion passes 4-2. Would you 1
like to speak to your dissent? Commissioner Monk. 2
3
MOTION PASSED (4-2-1, Chair Alcheck and Commissioner Monk against, Commissioner 4
Rosenblum absent) 5
6
Commissioner Monk: I find the Motion convoluted in that there seems to already be an existing 7
TAC and so I don't know what this additional group that is being proposed in the Motion is 8
doing what functionally. So it just wasn't clear to me. I'd prefer to see staff look at what was 9
presented tonight by the citizens that came and spoke on this and perhaps come back and 10
determine if there's any changes that need to be made to the CSS plan based on what we 11
learned tonight. And my recommendation would be just to broaden the TAC to add the key 12
stakeholders and the folks that were here tonight. My concern is that in having a separate 13
group that we would be excluding the broader community that Director Gitelman referred to 14
earlier and I think that is something that I would be concerned about if we just had a select 15
group to represent the whole of the community. 16
17
Chair Alcheck: Ok, I'll speak to my dissent as well. The reason why I don't support this Motion is 18
because I don't I would I would like to communicate that I don't think that a community 19
stakeholder group should be appointed to participate in this process in the way that the CAC 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 fifteen (15) 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.
was developed to run the Comp Plan process. I also want to suggest that I am going to accept 1
some responsibility here tonight because I think that the reason why it's so important for 2
example to be really clear in our Motions and I wish I could have done something about it is 3
because this is a perfect example where I don't believe that the CSS “method” is a universally 4
agreed upon uniform set of rules. And I think that the greatest and the clearest evidence of 5
that is the fact that staff disagrees with individuals in this room about whether or not a 6
stakeholder group has to be incorporated. I also think that the Motion is problematic because 7
it doesn't clearly define the group that you would like to appoint as a stakeholder group in the 8
way that I believe the members of this community some of them have communicated to us. So 9
I'm not entirely sure that this Motion reflects for example the letter that Pat Burt suggested to 10
you which is that a group of community members be chosen to lead this effort. 11
12
Finally, I think the justification for not supporting that process would be that it is very time 13
intense. Not only would the group have to be chosen which could take several months if not 14
half a year. Then the process of engaging that group to meet and run their own process could 15
take a significantly long time, which again I think it would be problematic because we are 16
behind the curve and we need to get we need to focus on the technical issues at hand here and 17
have community input on those technical issues as quickly as possible. Ok, is anybody else 18
interested in speaking at this time about the Motion? If not… 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 fifteen (15) 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.
Ms. Gitelman: Commissioner [Note-Chair] Alcheck I’d just like to con… I mean first of all thank 1
you for your work. I recognize this got a little messy at the end, but we appreciate the work to 2
come up with a Motion and we’ll convey that to the Rail Committee and the Council. Also I was 3
hoping that you would allow us based on the comments we got this evening about the problem 4
statement and objectives to summarize your thoughts in our staff report to the Council. 5
6
Chair Alcheck: Yeah, yeah. 7
8
Ms. Gitelman: So they have the benefit of that and that if the Chair would like to appoint a 9
representative to come on August 28th you can that representative can amplify and clarify 10
anything additional they want to add. 11
12
Chair Alcheck: Yeah, thank you for mentioning that. It sort of slipped through the cracks here. 13
It wasn’t included in the Motion the notion of incorporating some of the themes that although 14
the maker the Motion had suggested that you guys appreciated those comments and I 15
assume… Do you feel like I need to make a Motion to suggest? 16
17
Ms. Gitelman: I think we can do that without a Motion as long as that we have the sense of the 18
Commission that that's where you're comfortable. 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 fifteen (15) 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 Alcheck: Ok, well and when this is going up to staff? 1
2
Ms. Gitelman: It goes to the Council on August 28th. 3
4
Chair Alcheck: Ok, well it's very fitting because Commissioner Lauing is our representative to 5
City Council in August and so our maker of our Motion will be present hopefully at the August 6
meeting because he's already lined up to do it. So barring any issue with your attendance at 7
that meeting if there is an issue we can choose somebody else, but I think actually this works 8
out really well. Ok, sorry that that was a little messy. Let's take a five minute break and get 9
right into Item Number 3 and 4. 10
Commission Action: Motion: Have Staff Include Themes Discussed Tonight About the 11
Suggested Problem Statement and Objectives and Incorporate Comments Made in 12
Their Re-write as it Moves Toward Council Process as Outlined in the Staff Report 13
(Motion Chair Alcheck, Second Vice-chair Waldfogel). Substitute Motion: Palo Alto 14
follow a CSS Process for Evaluation of Rail Grade Separation Including the Creation of 15
a Dedicated Expert Stakeholder Group in Parallel with Neighborhood Stakeholders. 16
(Substitute Motion: Commissioner Lauing, Second Commissioner Summa) Substitute 17
Motion Passed 4-2 (Alcheck, Monk against, Rosenblum absent) 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 fifteen (15) 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.
Palo Alto Planning & Transportation Commission 1
Commissioner Biographies, Present and Archived Agendas and Reports are available online: 2
http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/gov/boards/ptc/default.asp. The PTC Commission members are: 3
4
Chair Michael Alcheck 5
Vice Chair Asher Waldfogel 6
Commissioner Przemek Gardias 7
Commissioner Ed Lauing 8
Commissioner Susan Monk 9
Commissioner Eric Rosenblum 10
Commissioner Doria Summa 11
12
Get Informed and Be Engaged! 13
View online: http://midpenmedia.org/category/government/city-of-palo-alto or on Channel 26. 14
15
Show up and speak. Public comment is encouraged. Please complete a speaker request card 16
located on the table at the entrance to the Council Chambers and deliver it to the Commission 17
Secretary prior to discussion of the item. 18
19
Write to us. Email the PTC at: Planning.Commission@CityofPaloAlto.org. Letters can be 20
delivered to the Planning & Community Environment Department, 5th floor, City Hall, 250 21
Hamilton Avenue, Palo Alto, CA 94301. Comments received by 2:00 PM two Tuesdays preceding 22
the meeting date will be included in the agenda packet. Comments received afterward through 23
2:00 PM the day of the meeting will be presented to the Commission at the dais. 24
25
Material related to an item on this agenda submitted to the PTC after distribution of the 26
agenda packet is available for public inspection at the address above. 27
Americans with Disability Act (ADA) 28
It is the policy of the City of Palo Alto to offer its public programs, services and meetings in a 29
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24 hours in advance of the meeting, program, or service. 34
CITY COUNCIL RAIL COMMITTEE
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Special Meeting
Wednesday, August 16, 2017
Chairperson DuBois called the meeting to order at 8:00 A.M. in the
Community Meeting Room, 250 Hamilton Avenue, Palo Alto, California.
Present: DuBois (Chair), Filseth, Fine, Scharff arrived at 8:02. A.M.
Absent:
Oral Communications
Chair DuBois: (Inaudible)
Nadia Naik: Good morning everyone. Nadia Naik from CAARD and Friend of
Caltrain at the moment. I’m here to reiterate what Adina has been talking
about, which is that they are doing the presentations for the Dumbarton Rail
Corridor. There’s a couple of meetings coming up but notably, there’s
nothing in Palo Alto and so I really would urge you guys to see if there’s a
way that they could come present to the full Council. They are presenting
everywhere in San Mateo County but not for us and as you guys know,
Dumb Barton Rail Corridor actually has a huge effect on traffic in Palo Alto. I
think it’s a big deal and so I would urge you guys to think about maybe
putting that on and trying to get them into City Council. I know it tight but
they are trying to move very, very quickly with this. They want decisions
within the next month or two. We’re hoping to be able to dive into some
more of the details. Some of the things that are – so it’s good that they
started the report but there are some things that need to be tweaked. For
example, they’re looking at being able to have bus and rail but they would
them illuminate the bikes, which kind of doesn’t make sense because bikes
don’t take up a lot of space. So, I think there needs to be some tweaking but
overall, it’s excellent that there’s a study but I think you guys are going to
want to dive into those details. Thank you.
Chair DuBois: (Inaudible)
ATTACHMENT H
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Joshuah Mello, Chief Transportation Official: I’ll provide more information on
the Dumbarton study under the next agenda item.
Chair DuBois: Our next speaker is Roland Lebrun.
Roland Lebrun: Thank you and good morning and I absolutely second
everything Nadia said one hundred percent. The reason I am addressing you
today is to give you a heads up about a letter that you are going to be
receiving from me hopefully next week, which essentially is going to echo
what I say to the Technical Advisory Committee (TAC) and the PAC. That is,
we look at what’s happening in (inaudible) – at what Caltrain’s plans are and
there is absolutely no way they are going to be able to handle the demands
that we are going to have on the system. Especially, as you know, what
Google is doing in the Sunnyvale area and actually, it is going to hit
Mountain View because slap bang in the middle between Mountain View and
various above. So, the proposal is that we are going to double the length of
every single baby bullet platform to 1,400-feet and of the City’s one in Palo
Alto. Now Diridon, we tackled this over six months ago so we’re coming – we
have nine platforms at grade and hopefully, we are going to have two
underground platforms, also the same length, which will have the same
capacity as the nine at grade platforms. We’re done with Mountain View and
so far, the reception has been good. Sunnyvale, I think knows what’s
coming and then now, I want to talk about Palo Alto and talk about some of
the opportunities here. Essentially, it’s a 1,400-foot platform, it’s four tracks
so that you can pass and traffic can go through. We don’t block the line like
they do in some San Mateo County cities and it starts off by branching off
the line for about 800-feet so that you branch off pretty close to maximum
speed. You now have your 1,400-foot platforms and another 800-feet at the
end so that the total thing is 3,000-feet but since you are looking at grade
separations, it gives you an opportunity here with Alma. If you start forking
between the bridge and Alma, you will have four tracks at Alma and then the
situation is that there is no such thing as a grade crossing with four tracks;
you get automatic grade separation. In terms of funding, the opportunity
that you have is not just the $700 million that the Santa Clara Valley
Transportation Authority (VTA) has for grade separation but you can also
use some of the $300 million because you are increase line capacity; which
is what those $300 million (inaudible). So, there will be a letter over to you
with more details and what the opportunities are in Palo Alto. Thank you.
Chair DuBois: Our last speaker is Richard Brand.
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Richard Brand: Good morning, Richard Brand, 281 Addison and it’s good to
see everybody again. I – since the last meeting there was an announcement
that was made by High Speed Rail that they have to tunnel 14-miles to get
through Pacheco Pass which this didn’t come up before. I just want to make
the Committee, if you are not aware of it, that that’s the case and it’s – I
don’t know Nadia, it’s about $1.3 billion for – anyway, it’s a very expensive
tunneling project. I think that if they are going to go ahead and do that just
to get into San Jose directly, rather than over the Altamont Pass as you’ve
heard me talk about. I think they ought to have money for us to actually pay
for grade separations and I don’t know how – I’ll have to think about how we
might address that but San Mateo County got funded for some of their grade
separation requests from High Speed Rail and that’s something that – I
know we’re going to get into that in the other agenda item but I am just
putting it out there as something new. Maybe we go back and request High
Speed Rail representatives to come back in again. Thank you.
Chair DuBois: Alright thank you.
Agenda Review and Staff Update
1. Receive and Review Rail Program Briefing Paper From June-July 2017.
Chair DuBois: We’ll proceed to Item Number 1, a review of the rail program.
Joshuah Mello, Chief Transportation Official: Sure, good morning Chair and
members of the Committee. I’m Joshuah Mello, Chief Transportation Official
with the City of Palo Alto. Included in your packet is a Rail Program briefing
paper which covers the period from June 15th to August 2nd and provided
you with an update on all the activities that transpired over that period. Item
1 was the planning for Community Workshop Number 2 and I’ll talk a little
bit more about those in our presentation on the next steps for the program.
However, it is important to note that this workshop will be held on
September 16th at the Palo Alto Art Center auditorium. It will have a similar
time frame as the previous workshop on May 20th, which was 10 AM to 2 PM
with a lunch provided during a break period. I’ll talk more about the
programming of that workshop later in my presentation. Item Number 2,
we’ve also tentatively penciled in a Community Workshop Number 2 or
Number 3, excuse me, for October 21st; also at the Community Art Center
auditorium. Number 3 in the briefing packet is an update on the community
questionnaire. You remember the meeting that the Rail Committee held prior
to summer break, we discussed doing a community questionnaire in order to
solicit input on the problem statement, the objectives, and the evaluation
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criteria. The questionnaire was extremely successful. We had almost 800
unique responses to the questionnaire and got some incredible feedback on
the problem statement, the objectives, and the evaluation criteria. That
feedback has been incorporated into the presentation that you’ll see later
on, on those components of the program. Item 4 in the briefing paper is an
update on a Measure B Caltrain Grade Separation Program meeting that City
Staff had with VTA Staff on August 2nd. This was a very productive meeting,
we learned a lot about their approach to the Measure B Caltrain Grade
Separation Program. Some key take away from that meeting is that VTA is
working on a Request for Proposals (RFP) currently to complete an
implementation study to determine how to best allocate that funding and
construct all eighth-grade separation over the 30-year tax time frame. We
will be involved in the preparation of that RFP and I will assume that we will
be able to provide comment. Their goal is to kick that off in early 2018 and
they were excited to see that we were making progress on our planning
efforts. They also seemed open to discussing some creative ways to utilize
the grade separation funding. They seem open to closing grade crossings,
redirecting some funding to maybe some more expensive grade separations
and they also seemed open to changing the language that we are concerned
about. We are still in discussions with them and they haven’t made that
change yet. The final program guidelines are going to the VTA Board on
September 7th so that’s our last chance to get this language changed. The
language that I am referring to is, funds will be allocated to the most cost-
effective grade separation alternatives. We feel like this may preclude
communities from adding local funding and other funding sources that do
something that may be more expensive but in the community interest.
We’ve recommended some changes to that language. They would more
specifically call out the cost-effective use of Measure B funds and that would
leave open other alternatives that may bring some additional funding to the
table. We have talked to Staff from Sunnyvale and Mountain View and
Sunnyvale concurs with that change. I have not heard back from Mountain
View yet but we have asked VTA Staff to make that change before this
September 7th meeting to the program guidelines. Item number five in your
briefing packet is an update on the Dumbarton Transportation Corridor
Study. I’ve also attached a presentation that was delivered when they
announced that the draft plan was released. I’ll be attending a stakeholder
meeting at Menlo Park City Hall this afternoon, which is all of the agency
representatives that are involved in the Dumbarton Transportation Corridor
Study. I’ll be able to provide further information after I attend that meeting.
Our speaker, Nadia Naik, did mention that there are some public meetings
that are also scheduled. We’ve also reached out, at the request of the
Chairman, to invite SamTrans here to present on the study and they have
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agreed tentatively to attend the September Rail Committee meeting; if you
are all interested in having them present. The public comment period is open
until the end of September so we fully expect that we’ll be drafting a letter
after we receive some input from you. I think we can wait until after the
presentation from Staff before we start drafting that letter, we do have until
the end of September to submit comments. Item Number 6, recently San
Gabriel – in the San Gabriel Valley and southern California a trench – a
railroad trench was opened and this Committee asked for some information
on that so I’ve included a budget. It was a little hard tracking down any kind
of project fact sheet or any information for the specific project but I was able
to determine that it was a 1.4-mile long trench. The total budget was $312.7
million and they separated several roadways using the trench. They did an
interesting thing which creates a Joint Powers Board (JPB) just to construct
these grade separations and what’s included in your packet is actually the
2018 budget for that JPB. It has some pretty detailed information on the
funding sources and the total budget and some photos of the project. This
was really the only information that I could track down without actually
calling somebody from the JPB. If you would like additional information, I
can do that and see if they have any kind of project fact sheet or update
specifically on the trench project. Then finally in the briefing paper, we have
the latest expenditures from our consultant team attached and I will say that
we had a little bit of a reset over the summer with our approach to the Rail
Program. Starting this summer Staff has taken more of a leading role in the
management of this program and we’re using our consulting team
strategically for technical support and community engagement support when
needed but going forward, you’ll see Staff play a larger role in this process.
That’s why the briefing paper was actually prepared by Staff this month. So,
with that, any questions on the briefing paper, I’ll be glad to answer.
Chair DuBois: Any questions? So, we do have some members of the public
so maybe we should have them speak quickly and then go back to
questions. So, on Item 1 we have Richard Brand, followed by Elizabeth
Alexis.
Richard Brand: Richard Brand, I applaud that Joshuah – you’ve done a good
job here in this report and I especially like it – it was brief to the point and
covered a lot of the things that needed to be covered. Once again, I thank
you for that good work. One of the things about the Dumbarton thing is
included in here in the meeting and I’ll be at that meeting tonight and I
invited Joe Simitian to come too. Is that we – it’s true, we have no
representation from VTA going to this at all. I’m glad that our City is taking
that option to go. I wondered if we can get our old colleague Mark Berman
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involved in this too. It might be something that the Committee would do, to
send a letter to Mark and say hey Mark, I need a little help here, because it’s
a regional issue. It’s not just San Mateo County issue so I just offer that as a
thought. I think the Committee ought to consider sending a note to Mark.
Thanks
Chair DuBois: Thank you. Elizabeth Alexis to be followed by Roland Lebrun.
Elizabeth Alexis: Good morning. I want to talk about the VTA piece also. I
think while we are making progress, I think we really need to push for reset
of the VTA entire approach, I mean on two different levels. I think they have
now sort of said that this isn’t just like a bike project grant program where a
couple of good projects will rise to the top. That yes, you need to do
everything but they are still talking about a 30-year time horizon and that’s
just not the time horizon that Caltrain is going to be on. Transbay Terminal
is going to open sometime between 2025 and 2030, Caltrain demand, just
from that alone, will double. The number of people who live in Palo Alto who
take the train will probably triple just based upon an analysis that we’ve
done with sort of similar towns. The same kind of things will happen in
Sunnyvale though and will happen in Mountain View and even before then. I
mean we see eight trains for Caltrain in not that distant future and we would
see ten trains for Caltrain by 2025. No major – during the peak hours, no
grade crossing will effectively be open after that time period or one of the
Cities will stand in the way of the expansion of Caltrain and the option is
gridlock on 101; more people going there. I mean whatever we do, it’s a bad
situation and the entire County needs to mobilize behind this idea that this
needs to get done. I’ve heard well, it’s a 30-year tax measure, well I mean
you borrow against the sales tax. I mean the $700 million that they have is
in 2017 dollars are ready. They’ve already assumed that it’s sort of
borrowed and right now interest rates are low and they might not be low in
the future. I mean we need to reset this as something where everybody’s
major – I mean we need Sunnyvale stuff to get done, we need Mountain
View stuff to get done. This idea of pitting everybody against each other,
they should simply allocate it out, divided up by the number of grade
crossings per City and then let the Cities allocate across their own – make
their plans. No one is going to be wasting money, I mean everybody’s
projects are going to cost more than their prorated share of the money,
everybody. So, everybody will have to come up with the difference. So,
there’s the incentive to do that and we need to make this where we all
understand that we are all in this together, instead of some kind of
composition. We do not benefit – I mean, we will have a time pressure of
this – of Caltrain’s expansion; the Cities will have that but quite frankly, the
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other Cities also – they need to have some planning time. We have heard
this competition and that we’re falling behind. I know the situations in all
those Cities, they are not going to benefit either by rushing their programs
through.
Chair DuBois: Thank you. Next speaker is Roland and then our last speaker
is Adina Levin.
Roland Lebrun: So, that was a perfect segue into my public comment, right?
We know there is this massive problem, it was right there, we’re not seeing
any answers in governing and business plans. That’s why we decided to take
the matter into our own hands and we also know that we are specifically
speaking the entire (inaudible) will not get grade separated. So regardless of
what we do in Santa Clara County, you’re going to get stuck but we do have
an opportunity that if they don’t get their act together (inaudible) the road,
is to actually start taking trains up the mountain rail and address the
congestion that way. So, half of the traffic will be going across the bay and
the rest will be going to San Francisco. Anyway, I want to talk about what’s
going on with Dumbarton Rail and I think Nadia already brought up one of
the problems. The figures they gave us last night, that they need 65-feet for
the trains, are totally incorrect. That’s four tracks and we’re only going to
have two tracks and they only need 35-feet, which means there is plenty of
room left for peds and bikes trail. I put a post on Adina’s blog last night that
actually gives the references directly from the Caltrain Standards and how
the calculations were arrived at so that’s point Number 1. We also – I don’t
know if you know what (inaudible) is or what the deal with Union City is?
Union City is what blew up the entire Dumbarton Rail last time because they
want $400 million to reroute Ace and Capital Corridor to Union City but we’re
safe from the beginning; we don’t need this; I mean this is just a
boondoggle. All we need is (inaudible) which is where BART and the tracks
intersect so you can transfer from Capital Corridor and Ace right there at
(inaudible).It’s not going to be an infestation, it’s just going to be a pure
transfer station. There is $130 million right there in (inaudible) that
(inaudible) approved for this. So, last night we are hearing from Caltrain oh,
the $130 million is not all for (inaudible). We are saying this over and over
again over there at SamTrans, this has to stop, we’ve got to get rid of these
people because they keep ripping us off. The $12.5 million (inaudible) Metro
Lane cost, well look at what’s there, ok? They are not red, they are still gray
just like they were in Metro Lane days; the money is gone. The $125 million
bridge loan, while we are waiting for the FGA to come through, that money
is also gone and it just goes on and on; it’s got to stop. Now going back to
Dumbarton Rail, one thing they are not even considering is a tunnel; it’s not
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even on the map. If we tunnel, we will be able to grade separate both Willow
and University. Just think about that – for that – what that would do for us;
(inaudible). I think that’s it for now but we’re going to go out there tonight
and I strongly encourage you to go to East Palo Alto and listen to what’s
going on. My take on this is we’re going to have to ask Facebook to basically
take over the entire thing and just get the job done. We’re never going to
get anything done with SamTrans. Thank you.
Chair DuBois: Ok, and our last speaker is Adina Levin.
Adina Levin: Morning Council Members. Adina Levin, Friends of Caltrain and
here to piggy back on what Mr. Lebrun said about the Dumbarton Corridor.
While we’re not done pouring through their several hundred-page reports,
the fact that this is ambitious and it’s talking about ridership on the level of
the mid-twenty thousand to thirty thousand is good. That’s really different
from what came out a decade ago, which wouldn’t have been worth
investment and this is worth investment but there’s also a lot of specifics in
there that are worth a lot of attention. There are near term bus
improvements that make eminent sense and could be done tomorrow, which
is great but some of the issues in there in terms of how do you use bus and
rail together seem really perplexing in terms of how you would actually run a
transit system. The fact that it’s multi-modal, great, but how they work
together is kind of odd. The – having buses and rail use the right of way and
crowding out the bikes, the data that came to Palo Alto from Stanford on the
general use permit showing twenty to thirty percent bike mode share within
five miles when you have good connections. That could suck up twenty to
thirty percent of the drivers between Redwood City and Facebook if that was
done and it’s basically ignored because the Metropolitan Transportation
Commission model doesn’t forecast bikes and therefore you can’t forecast
bikes; that needs attention. The proposed improvements not only for –
there’s a – it looks like there’s about $800 million in freewayizing 84 in
there, with the hope that it will improve the traffic but if you have drivers
coming up, they still need to get off of 101 and how much extra room is
there on Willow hill towards 101 or University hill towards 101? None, so will
that actually just move the bottleneck? That’s needs a lot of attention for the
amount money towards the amount of value. Lastly, even though there are
all kinds of details in there that need to be hashed out, it’s good to see the
funding in the expenditure plan for RM-3 and if somebody made a call, it’s
time to make a call again because that expenditure plan is in flux. There are
political issues in Sacramento causing people to be fighting over what’s in
there and so talking to Marc Berman and Mullen and Hill and anybody else
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you have relationships with, let’s keep the money in, figure out what to do
with it and pay a lot of attention towards making it good. Thank you.
Chair DuBois: Alright so back to the Committee, does anybody have
questions?
Mayor Scharff: Yeah, I do.
Chair DuBois: I do too but go ahead.
Mayor Scharff: I think that the change – oh yeah sure. So, the change in the
language if we get it and I guess Mountain View hasn’t weighed in, is that it?
The practical differences of the language are the language we’re suggesting
allows us to do a trench if the trench is cost effective. Is that roughly the
difference?
Mr. Mello: The language that we’re requesting would give communities more
flexibility to add additional funding on top of Measure B for something that
maybe more expensive like a trench.
Mayor Scharff: So, it’s basically adding the – is that we – it basically allows
us to take whatever the low-cost alternative is, add any money to it and do,
as opposed to not getting the money because it’s not cost effective.
Mr. Mello: The current language makes it sound as though VTA will judge the
projects based on the total cost when they measure the cost effectiveness.
Not the most – not the cost effectiveness of the Measure B funding and you
know, using Measure B funding to leverage local funding and other funding
is actually more cost effective than just picking a lower cost alternative.
Mayor Scharff: So, Mountain View people tell me that they are pretty much
done. That they’re ready to go, they are looking for the funding and they are
hoping to get the funding to fund the whole thing and move forward with
their grade separations. Sunnyvale tells me they are going to have – do you
know their (inaudible) because I think they said something to me like they
are basically planning on two meetings and then just moving forward.
Mr. Mello: I have a table and I’ll talk more about that later but their ready –
they are going to have preferred alternatives identified by early 2018 and
then they are going to move into design.
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Mayor Scharff: I mean it seems like both Sunnyvale and Mountain View are
going to get their grade separations and that they are moving really quickly
and that seems to be the facts on the ground. Have we had any discussions
with VTA? I mean do we have any commitment at all about – the whole 30-
year thing really concerns me as well and I think it concerns the speakers. I
was – do we have any sense at all of what they are thinking on that stuff?
Mr. Mello: We know that they want to build all eight grade separations. We
know that the horizon for the sales tax is 30-years.
Mayor Scharff: Are they talking about bonding or are they not…
Mr. Mello: They have not talked about bonding recently. That was a question
we continue to ask through the holding Measure B development process. I
would assume that they are still talking about that; their financial folks but
we haven’t heard an update on that recently.
Mayor Scharff: Then in terms of the trench over at San Gabriel, the
relevance to us is that it shows what a trench might cost or does it not really
have any relevance? I mean we don’t – we did some preliminary estimates
of what a trench would cost. I remember us having our consultants look at
that but do we think – what do we think the relevance to that is frankly, to
our own trench numbers and what would it take for us to actually get – to
get some context around what a trench would cost; those kinds of
information. What are the constraints on building a trench and what’s that
going to take for the City?
Mr. Mello: So, we provided the information on the San Gabriel trench at the
request of Committee Members. I do not know enough about the project to
know how relevant it is to our trench discussions. We can look into that and
get some more information on that project if that’s something you’re
interested in.
Mayor Scharff: No, no, I…
Mr. Mello: As far…
Mayor Scharff: … if it has no relevance, I have no interest. What I am
interested in knowing what it would cost to build a trench in Palo Alto. So,
my question is – I mean if it does have relevance, I want you to look into it
but if it’s really not that helpful then I want to know what it would take to
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get good numbers or at least starting to get some handle on a range of
numbers or where we are on that.
Mr. Mello: We’re planning to start the development of alternative at the
September 16th community workshop number two. You know very—in quick
order, upon starting the alternatives development we’ll start putting
together some planning level cost estimates to get that kind of a magnitude
of cost for things like a trench, a standard overcrossing, and an under
crossing. I think September or October we’ll start to get a hand on what the
order of magnitude is.
Mayor Scharff: So, there’s the over crossing but as – do we have any issues
– does VTA have any issues with an over cross? That’s an elevated track,
right? I know (inaudible), it’s an overpass and then we have the underpass
and then we have the trench. I mean is there any other options?
Mr. Mello: I think there could be a whole host of different options.
Mayor Scharff: Like what? I can’t think of any.
Mr. Mello: Closure, a hybrid which is raising the rail a little bit and lowering
the road a little bit. It’s also going to depend on the location of the
overcrossing and under crossings. How do we interface with Alma Street? Do
we sever the connection with Alma Street or do we raise or lower the
intersection? I think there’s going to be a pretty significant number of – you
know in our universe of alternatives before we start to narrow down. We’ll
start to have this discussion pretty intensively in September and October
and I think we can narrow them down relatively quickly when you start
looking at costs and constraints.
Chair DuBois: I had a couple quick questions. The Art Center Auditorium, is
that the space in the back?
Mr. Mello: Yes.
Chair DuBois: So, are we concerned that it’s not large enough? I mean the
first meeting there was – probably wouldn’t have fit in there.
Mr. Mello: Yeah, there are 180 seats available and we’re going to use the
courtyard as well for activities; the weather should be good.
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Chair DuBois: Ok, I guess we don’t have a choice for this next meeting but
the third meeting – again, I’m just concerned that it’s not a big enough
space.
Mr. Mello: Yeah, we’re very limited on the space that’s available. We tried
and tried to get the Mitchell Park room again.
Chair DuBois: So, even in October?
Mr. Mello: Yeah, there was very little availability for Saturdays.
Chair DuBois: Is there any other spaces larger than the Art Center?
Cubberley?
Mr. Mello: Claudia helped secure the space. I don’t know if you have any
more information, Claudia? I don’t think there’s a space large enough at any
other location.
Claudia Keith, Chief Communications Officer: We do have the Art Center
which holds 180 and the October dates, we had originally had a late October
date for Mitchell Park and then when we changed dates, it was tough to find
a place. We’ve looked at other venues that are not public facilities like the
Elks Club and things like that but it does have a cost. I think the Art Center,
we’ve had some large gatherings there and we do have the court yard which
it should be nice weather so at least in terms of activities –we can search for
the October date and see…
Chair DuBois: Yeah, I am just – again, if we can get to September and if it’s
standing room only, we may not have enough time to adjust.
Ms. Keith: I mean the El Palo Alto room definitely holds more, for sure.
Chair DuBois: Yeah and I know we did the Sustainability Summit in the
multi-purpose room in the schools so there might be some other options like
that. So, I’m glad to hear about the conversation with VTA and funding. Is
there’s recognition that Measure B funds aren’t going to cover all these
grade seps?
Mr. Mello: Yes, and I think the enroll mentation plan is going to look at what
other potential funding sources there are. I think they’ll look at a high level
at what a package could be for the whole eight. You know VTA does have
the ability to program other federal funding through their TIP.
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Chair DuBois: So, they can help us with that or we could do that ourselves
as well, right? Look for other sources of funding?
Mr. Mello: Yes.
Chair DuBois: Ok. I’m glad to hear that we’ve got SamTrans committed and
I guess we’ll talk about that at the end of this meeting. The San Gabriel
trench, I guess I found it very interesting. The part that I found relevant was
again, the funding plan and looking at how they put together a bunch of
funding sources. I guess we’ll talk about it at the next item but one of my
concerns is that this isn’t a linear process and we should really probably
start to talk about a funding strategy sooner rather than later. They – just
looking at it pretty quickly, they – it looks like they had 35 percent funds
from State grants, forty percent came from the MTA and 25 percent were
federal and local together but the idea that JPB—to assemble all these
funding sources, looks like a pretty big effort. That is something that we
haven’t even started to talk about. Then the last one, again I appreciated
this report and the Staff taking more of leading role. I noticed that seventy-
two percent of the funds on the circulation study has been spent. When are
we expecting to get that study?
Mr. Mello: They are working on a modeling of the scenarios right now and
soon as they’re in a legible format – the output is in a legible format, we’re
going to have a meeting with them and put together a draft report on the
findings.
Chair DuBois: Is that going to be used at the next public meeting, to…
Mr. Mello: That’s the goal, yes.
Chair DuBois: Ok. I mean if it’s not ready, it seems like that’s pretty
important information to start to look at alternative impacts and…
Mr. Mello: Yeah, they started modeling immediately after the last Rail – after
the time period for comments on the scenarios expired, we directed them to
begin modeling those scenarios.
Chair DuBois: Cool, I guess that was it so thank you. Yep, Adrian?
Council Member Fine: Thank you and thanks for this report. A few things, so
I actually agree with Council Member DuBois about the JPB. I thought it was
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interesting so one was the organization they used. The other things were
kind of that they were looking at multiple trenches in multiple areas and
they had a pretty nice project plan for (inaudible) showing where they were
in the works. I think Sunnyvale does a good job of that too. With regard to
VTA, so do I understand that you correctly that there are multiple agencies
helping VTA write an RPF to study how disperse the funds?
Mr. Mello: VTA is authoring the RFP and we will have input into the scope
and we already gave them some opinion on the time line but the project will
be managed by VTA in consultation with Palo Alto, Mountain View,
Sunnyvale, and Caltrain.
Council Member Fine: So, do they not have established ways of dispersing
funds likes this?
Mr. Mello: They – you know a lot of their funding projects have different
criteria and different grant – they use completive grants for a lot of the
programs like Go Bag and TFCA and some other funding streams. This is a
little bit different and I think they recognize – well, it’s a little bit different
because they’re – they’ve to date committed to delivering all eight grade
separations. So, to do a completive process would not work because you
wouldn’t be able to strategize about how – what the funding package looks
like for all eight so I think this is a different animal when it comes to all the
different funding programs.
Council Member Fine: Yeah, I mean I guess I would just echo what some of
the public speakers said, like this seemed like a public County Wide Measure
and as you mentioned, there’s an opportunity here for each local
municipality to leverage their own matching funds and VTA should be
looking at that bottom line. What can we do to help? I mean should we
contact the VTA Board?
Mr. Mello: I think we need that language changed before it goes to the
Board on September 7th and we have the example – the recommended
language in the briefing report.
James Keene, City Manager: Can I jump in? (Inaudible) my questions were
going to be (inaudible). I’m sorry guys, I didn’t wear the Staff uniform today
the blue shirt, the dark jacket, and the jeans and I really apologize for being
out of uniform. I agree with what Elizabeth was saying, I mean first of all it
seems absurd that we would be thinking about trying to do this without
funding for it at all. I mean over a 30-year period if we have $27 and the
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elasticity of sales tax over that period of time. Even there’s an equity issue
about really who is paying and who is benefiting. I mean is this completely
open and up for debate or is it – are we able to get that commitment in
some way because without, I really think we’re at risk. I think it’s very
difficult for us to be doing any near-term planning on gap funding if we don’t
know what and when (inaudible) is going to be available.
Mr. Mello: I think a lot of this discussion will occur in the development of the
implementation plan because they are going to look at what the bigger
funding package is, can they deliver all eight with their existing funding
sources, do they need to bond? I think we need to stay on top of – you know
we need to make sure that the scope includes things like – that would need
– be needed to do an analysis of whether bonding will work and those types
of tools.
Mr. Keene: I just think we need to die on this hill honestly. I mean the – or
else the …
Council Member Fine: I think that’s my question, for now, thank you.
Chair DuBois: Alright, let’s move on to Item Number 2.
NO ACTION TAKEN.
Action Items
2. Recommendations Regarding a Suggested Problem Statement,
Objectives, and Evaluation Criteria to Support Development and
Evaluation of Railroad Grade Separation Alternatives.
Joshuah Mello, Chief Transportation Official: So, in the interest of allowing all
of the Committee Members to participate in the maximum amount of
discussion, we’ve broken this into two separate discussions – two separate
presentations. The first on the process, the Context Sensitive Solutions
Process and then the second part of the presentation and discussion will be
on the problem statement, objectives and evaluation criteria.
Council Member Filseth: (Inaudible)
Mr. Mello: Council Member Filseth is going to participate in the first part of
the discussion which is the process and then he’ll recuse himself for the
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second part of the discussion, which is the problem statement, objectives
and evaluation criteria. Do you want to…
Council Member Filseth: In advice of the City Attorney it’s because I live
within 500-feet of one of the grade separations and that I’m conflicted.
Chair DuBois: Are we going to be talking about specific grade seps or are we
talking about overall objectives?
Molly Stump, City Attorney: Is it helpful if I chime in? Good morning, City
Attorney, Molly Stump. So, the conflict rules include a set of rules on real
property proximity to significant projects or events. The problem statement
talks about the four grade crossings in a way that takes them on as a group
and talks about beginning and decisions making process on potential
projects and the grade separations. Council Member Filseth does own real
property quite proximate to one of the crossings. Council Member Fine asked
whether the public generally exception would apply here? It does not
because that exception means that it – to qualify for that, the decision at
issue needs to effect twenty-five percent or more of property in substantially
the same way. While the grade separations solutions at the four crossings
will affect all Palo Altans and in fact, people throughout the region who travel
to Palo Alto, it does not affect them all in the same way. Both in terms of
short term construction and long-term solutions of the properties that are
very proximate to the crossing will be affected in a more intense and quite
distinct way from others who may live further away who will also have some
effects but not similar effects.
Mayor Scharff: So, Molly it did strike me that the Alma crossing where
Council Member Filseth lives close to is actually very different and distinct
from the other three crossings and the issues facing it. I actually was
wondering if we could segregate out the other three? Do a problem
statement for them and then have a discussion to see if we want the same
problem statement for Alma because Alma actually is a completely different
animal in the way the whole thing looks and so that would work for me.
Ms. Stump: We certainly looked at that segregation role and again, for those
who aren’t familiar, that allows a decision to be broken into pieces and taken
separately to narrow the recusal but there are some specific requirements to
use that rule. We don’t think that we have access to it under the currently
defined process at this time, although hopefully at some point we will. What
it requires is that the piece that – where the conflict lies, which in this case
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is the Alma Street crossing that’s close to Council Member Filseth’s real
property, it has to be able to be addressed in a way that is not linked in any
way to the remaining items that the Council Member would participate in. It
can’t be linked in terms of money, timing, engineering, policy; it has to be
completely separable. It very well may be that at some point in this process
one or all four of the crossings are separated out to be considered in a
distinct way but right now, at this early stage as we read the report, we
really are talking about them as a group and there are potentially some
trade-offs and exchanges to be made in terms of priority and approach.
Where a decision on one will impact the decision on another and given that
situation, it can’t be separate at this time.
Chair DuBois: Can you just clarify, is Council Member Filseth going to
participate in any overall objectives and criteria that are at a high level?
Ms. Stump: So, certainly Council Member Filseth has participated thus far on
the rail policy statement. That is at such a high level that we think that
works. There are some procedural items in terms of how the City is going to
tackle this conversation that we’ve been able to say, those really don’t have
to do with a specific potential option at the crossings and then that – the
problem statement then actually does.
Mr. Mello: Yeah, we have broken the presentation into the first part will
cover the process, including a discussion of how decisions will be made and
then the second part we’ll delve into the problem statement, objectives and
evaluation criteria.
Chair DuBois: It just seems like the criteria and objectives were totally
general, there were nothing specific grade crossings. I guess we could take
this up from any future meetings.
Ms. Stump: I think we all are sensitive to wanting to maximize participation
while making sure that we follow the ethic rules. I think as the process
works its way forward, the Staff and Council can be mindful of what ways to
frame these items that come before the Committee and the Council to allow
that.
Council Member Filseth: Council Member Scharff’s point or Mayor Scharff’s
point, you know the Alma Street crossing is such a different beast than all
the rest of these and essentially all the discussion that we’ve had dating
back to 2010 has been how do we deal with rail between San Antonio Road
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and at the very, very north part of University? Everybody assumes that
basically there’s not that much to be done with the Alma Street crossing, it’s
not the most critical one anyway. All the issues related to cross town traffic
and so forth associated with the entire rationale for doing grade separations
don’t apply at the Alma Street crossing. So, it seems ridiculous that the
Alma Street crossing should be dragging around policy on how Palo Alto
deals with grade separations.
Ms. Stump: So, I may be then that in this process as it moves forward in the
near term, there can be some priority on defining that approach to that
crossing in some way that’s distinct but remember it needs to be distinct in
terms of budget and funding availability. In other words, there – for FPPC
purposes it can’t be the case that the funding and the timing of one say
approaches on the mid and south Palo Alto crossings are in substance linked
or traded off against. If that’s the case, then they are not separate for
conflict purposes but if the conversation is framed in a way that focuses
earlier on, on separating out that, then I think we would get sooner to this
place where we really did have this separation and then there would be the
ability to participate in the other crossing discussions.
Mayor Scharff: I think that’s a good question that you frame it that way is
that I agree completely with Council Member Filseth and that all of the tough
issues here relate to the other three crossings and I almost think we could
segregate that crossing out. I mean we’re probably not going to be grade
separating that one on the same time frame. That may be the 30-year grade
separation, is the one down there. The other three are hopefully much
sooner so I’m wondering what that segregation would look like and obviously
we’re not going to solve that today but the question is, what would you need
from the Committee and the Council to segregate this in a way that would
allow Council Member Filseth to participate? Obviously, that’s not necessarily
the goal but my gut sense is that the Alma Street crossing is so different
than the others and in terms of funding, timing and all that, that I think that
that’s the way it would go. We need to obviously have that discussion and
decided and obviously, we wouldn’t just be doing it for you, I think it just
falls that way. So, the question is if we have those votes and we have the
discussion at Council, how do we segregate it out and we should do that
earlier. If we’re not going to segregate that out, I think Council Member
Filseth should know that as well. So, how do we do that, that’s really the
questions?
Ms. Stump: Well, we certainly know what the conflict rules are, their settled
and what they require. What we don’t know is how this conversation is going
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to progress so if that’s the Committee and the Council and the community’s
intention to address that issue and separate it completely in terms of – so
that it’s not linked or related to the other set of decisions in timing, budget,
engineering, policy. Then we can support that as a Staff, we can get there
and then we’ll be in a situation where we can use that rule.
Council Member Filseth: Let me ask a – maybe this is the same thing but
slightly different (inaudible) so it’s slightly different but how we define the
problem, does that make a difference because if we define the problem as
by 2025 Caltrain is going to be running ten trains an hour in both directions
and it’s going to be impossible to get my car from one side of Palo Alto to
the other. If we define that as the problem, the Alma crossing is irrelevant to
that issue so if we define that as the problem, then can I un-recuse?
Ms. Stump: We’ll need to look at the rest of the decisions and see if we’ve
achieved – if we’ve met that legal standard of having the – any approach at
Alma not be linked to the rest of the crossings. So, for example, if there’s a
substantial question that the community and the Council needs to grapple
with about other types of improvements at Alma, are those prioritized for
budget and timing purposes first or behind other crossings. Then I think for
FPBC purposes, they are going to say that those decisions are not fully
separate. That one, in fact, depends on the other and so then they would
say that that’s standard for separation is not met. If…
Council Member Filseth: Even that can’t be totally a black and white thing
because I mean you could make an argument that if we decide to declare
Alma Street a quiet zone, then that’s going to take a certain amount of
money and digging a trench in South Palo Alto, that’s going to take a certain
amount of money so it’s all money so it must be connected, well that’s
ridiculous too. So, how do we differentiate that?
Chair DuBois: I’d like to suggest that we just have this conversation after
this meeting. I think – I don’t see us changing the decision for this particular
meeting and then we should work this out before the next meeting.
Mayor Scharff: I agree completely with that. I think the only difference is if
we have to give direction to Staff to ask what that would look like and what
decisions we need to make. I mean right now I don’t know how we make
that decision without us making decisions about how we break it up. I mean
I think I need a Staff report or something that says, you’d have to take it
this way, you’d have to make these decisions, you’d have to – the
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community would have to look at it this way. I mean I don’t see how we
could have – I don’t see how you can get to what you need and Council
Member Filseth can get what he needs without Staff telling us what we need
the decisions to look like from this Committee and this Council because it’s
how we phrase it whether or not he’s recused. I mean we could just say
we’re not dealing with the Alma Street crossing. We’re not going to grade
sep or we’re not looking at it. It’s a separate path and separate track, I’m
not sure – I’m not say – advocating that or thinking about it but that would
be a decision that would seem to allow him to participate or we can say
we’re going to look at Alma but it’s a different and then you would have to
tell us what that looks like. Am I wrong on that?
Ms. Stump: I think we do need to work our way forward but I hope that I’ve
been clear about the standard. For example, if there’s a common pot of
money that is available for all of these projects, simply declaring that the
Alma Street project is separate is not going to meet the standard.
Mr. Keene: It seems to be that if you were going to have any more of this
particular conversation, at a minimum it should take place at the end of this
process discussion because I think that there are some implications for the
process discussion even based upon these kinds of conflict issues.
Chair DuBois: Ok, so why don’t we go ahead with the Staff presentation.
Mr. Mello: Great, so as I mentioned earlier we’ve broken this presentation
into two parts. The first will cover the Context Sensitive Solutions Process.
As you know there’s been a lot of discussion about whether or not to have a
Stakeholder Committee as part of this Context Sensitive Solution Process.
Back in the spring prior to our May 20th community workshop, we presented
you with this table that shows kind of the five steps – you know five
decisions that need to be made moving along this process at the top;
process milestones. In order to move this forward, we decided to come to
you and recommend that we just move forward with stage one of this, which
was to create a community engagement plan and host the first community
workshop with a goal of getting to a problem definition, objectives and
evaluation criteria decision point. We’re currently at that point today. We
went to Planning and Transportation Commission August 9th and we are
bringing this forward to you today on August 16th. Then we are planning to
go to City Council but there is a little bit of a change on this. We were
originally going to City Council on August 28th, it’s not September 5th. That
has been moved forward a week and then finally we’re hoping to go back to
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the community for community workshop two on September 16th. We do
believe that the process that we’re following adheres to the Context
Sensitive Solution principles. This is from a report documenting a successful
Context Sensitive Solution processes. Just take a step back, Context
Sensitive Solutions came out – and it’s a solution so highway departments
were really struggling with how to integrate transportation facilities into
existing communities. Particularly after the adoption of NEBA back in the
1960’s and historically they had just used cookie cutter for highway designs
and plowed through existing communities and neighborhoods. Some pretty
cutting-edge Department of Transportation (DOT) started to deliver project
that were context sensitive so sensitive to the context that they are located
in. Those became known as Context Sensitive Solutions and then a whole
group of academics and others started to look at how those projects were
delivered and found some commonalities in how those projects were
delivered. That became the so-called Context Sensitive Solutions (CSS)
Process but ultimately, you know CSS is judged on the context – how well a
project fits into its context. Does it enhance the community? Does it create
barriers? Is it in harmony with the surround community? Does it solve
community problem or is it just addressing something that somebody – a
bureaucrat in a DOT decided that was the problem? So, that the origin of
CSS so out of all those studies and kind of forensic audits of how these
projects were delivered, some principles were developed. The principles are
really around continuous engagement of the community. Thinking about the
context of where the project is located. Every single neighborhood is
different, every single context is different so a cookie cutter highway design
or a grade separation design is not going to work in harmony with every
community; every community is different. One of the key components of
Context Sensitive Solutions is transparency, so continuing communication
and collaboration with the community. You don’t come to the community
after a decision has been made in a back room and say this is the
alternatives that we’ve developed, what do you think? That’s the design and
the defend model where you – engineers and others sit in a room and they
think they know what’s best for the community, develop a solution and come
out and present it. Have a faux public hearing where they take comments
from the community and then go back and come back with something that is
very similar. This is a totally different process under CSS, it’s much more
transparent. We’ve brought those principles into our Rail Program. Our goals
– kind of our principles that we’re operating under here and these are not
formal principles but this has what’s come out of the discussion of the Rail
Committee and Council and other in the past is that we’re going to build on
the work that was done from the prior two Rail Corridor Studies. We’re going
to set the context at the beginning, which is what the point where at today,
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define the problem and then define the measures of success. We fully expect
this process to evolve. We’ve said this over and over again throughout the
spring and this year that we’re not locking ourselves into a process early on
because as we have discussion and as we continually involve the community
in this decision-making process, I think we may end up somewhere that
we’re all not expecting and we need to be ready to adapt. Then our current
process is to use broad based community workshop, establish Commissions
and Committees and elected bodies for decision making. We don’t currently
have a stakeholder group created just for this program. On the top is a flow
chart that shows our current decision-making process, which takes
somewhere – for each decision it would take somewhere around two months
and that’s being somewhat ambitious. It takes about four weeks for us to
prepare for a community meeting. The shortest time that we can prepare for
the Planning and Transportation Commission (PTC) and Rail Committee is
about two weeks and that’s agenda preparation and preparing materials. For
more complex decisions, you know there could be a two-week period of
meeting preparation in advance of that so it could be up to four weeks for
each of those Committees. Fortunately, we’re able to use a lot of the same
materials for PTC and Rail Committee. City Council agendas are you know,
we start work on those five weeks in advance of the City Council meetings
so it shouldn’t be taken lightly when we add other steps and we – these
decisions are going to take a long time to make. If we were to add a
stakeholder group, at the bottom we’re estimating that that would add
another two weeks to potentially four weeks to the process every time we
want to make a decision. So, that doesn’t sound like a lot but cumulatively
when we make multiple decisions throughout this process, we could be
adding months to the decision-making process and the entire alternatives
development process. This does not include – we’re anticipating that if a
stakeholder group was convened, it could take three to six months to get
that group up and running, which would put us in a holding patterning
pattern for three to six months. Then you add any additional weeks that it
would take to prepare for the stake holder group meetings and we’re looking
at a several months push back of the schedule ultimately. To put that in
context, this is a chart that we developed that shows where are peer Cities
along the peninsula are as far as grade separation; as well as the schedule
of Caltrain electrification and High Speed Rail. Since the report was prepared
we got more information on Sunnyvale so I super imposed a green bar there
and the red line represents when Sunnyvale will be complete with their
alternatives analysis and they’ll have preferred alternatives selected.
Mountain View already has preferred alternatives and they have final design
actually for Rengstorf Avenue. So, they are ready to go to construction on
that project and they have a preferred alternative identified for the Castro
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Street grade crossing. So, if we were to push back—and we’re currently on
schedule if we continue along a path that we’re on, it will – it is ambitious
and we will need to maintain schedule but we are hoping to have
alternatives identified at the same time Sunnyvale has alternatives
developed. This jives very well with VTA’s plans to begin work on their
implementation study because then all three communities will have a pretty
clear picture as to where they are in the process when VTA begins the
implementation study. We’ll be on equal footing with Sunnyvale and
somewhat equal footing with Mountain View, which is farther along in both
Sunnyvale and Palo Alto. We did go to PTC last week and we made a very
similar presentation to them. At the end of the discussion they passed a
motion that read Palo Alto will follow a CSS process for evaluation of rail
grade separation including the creation of a dedicated expert stakeholder
group in parallel with neighborhood stakeholders. So, they did recommend
to Council that a stakeholder group be convened in order to execute those
Context Sensitive Solutions Process. With that, our Staff recommendation in
regard to this section of the presentation is to review the attached
community engagement plan, which is Attachment A. Then provide a
recommendation to the City Council on the CSS decision making process.
Chair DuBois: Yeah, I guess let me know if you want to speak about both
and I’ll keep your card for the second discussion. Alright, so the first two
speakers that I have are Nadia Naik and Elizabeth Alexis. Do you want to
speak on CSS?
Nadia Naik: Good morning everyone. I appreciate Josh’s presentation, thank
you, Josh. This slide, which wasn’t actually included in our packet but it was
sort of an add on which is super helpful, I think is missing a lot of decision
points. So, I think we’re getting to what in my public comment described
that we need to flush out the process more but I don’t see the kinds of stuff
that you’ve got to tackle ready that’s looking at having Caltrain, High Speed
Rail, Water District, all these people being involved. Where are all those
decision points in terms of where their feedback is? I think what’s important
to lay here for people to understand the process and not feel blindsided is
that it doesn’t matter what you do, stake holders or not, expanding attack or
not, you need to the layout that these are all the things that we’re going to
discuss. This is how we’re going to input those people and these are the
ones making decisions. When does the City Council make a decision? When
is PTC making a decision? You guys asked last time that PTC review stuff,
what exactly is their role? What exactly is going to be the TAC’s role and
how is the community input – is there going to be an actual decision from
the community at these large community meetings? In the end, are you
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going to do thumbs up or thumbs down on do we even look at taking
people’s homes or not? Do we look at a trench or not? I mean those things –
those important decision points, those are kind of the tree diagram of
alternatives that you guys are looking for that need to be flushed out in
order for this to make sense. Otherwise, you’re really not spelling out the
process. You’re going through some of the motions, you’ve got some great
terminology going but we’re not quite there yet. So, I would just say that
that’s something that you guys need to look at and I’d like to speak again on
the other topic as well. Thank you.
Chair DuBois: I am going to start using a timer because we have so many
speakers.
Elizabeth Alexis: Ok. Oh, I see, I won’t take that personally. First, I want to
just – Nadia sent a letter yesterday that was kind of – if you’re going to go
ahead and have a Technical Advisory Committee, one way to kind of split the
baby is just added some people – members of the community there and do
the matrix to see that we have different expertise covered, different
neighborhoods covered. I mean especially if you’re going to have all Council
Members or PTC Members who live near a crossing not there. I mean it’s
absolutely essential that you have people who actually understand those
places as part of that process. The second thing is CSS is this sort of
complete transparency thing so any Technical Advisory Committee meeting
should be open to the public. I mean they should be – people should be able
to go to whatever they want. I mean this is in addition to the big public
meetings. I mean you’d rather have people be bored than feel left out, even
if there’s nothing actually exciting happening in the room. Just going back to
this idea on the decision making, so we keep talking about this idea that you
have to start with this giant list, which you amend and keep sort of a life;
assumptions, presumptions, and requirements. There’s an additional feature
to that which is really the decisions to be made and the decision to be made
is not just community ones, like are we comfortable with eminent domain or
do we want to do all of them or whatever else. There are other ones that
are—like one of the things that drove the high cost of the trench was this
thought that you had to have a 24 ½-foot clearance for Caltrain, which you
may or may not really need to have. That you need to have additional 8-foot
clearance under a creek for VTA, which or the Valley Water, which I’m not
sure if you actually need that much. There are other agencies which actually
would meet the deciders on some critical assumptions that drive cost. So,
you really have to have this list of all the different decisions and you just –
this is a list that lives and who makes those decisions. So, even a Technical
Advisory Committee, I mean we were talking about who does it really report
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too? Is it Staff or Council and we’re like no, it’s not anyone person. For each
decision that’s being made, it reports to that decision maker. So that is –
that’s part of this and that just needs to be explicit. I mean we should be
having at the back of these 333-page reports, I mean we could really go for
600 pages but there should be an ongoing list of assumptions,
presumptions, requirements where we keep moving things up and down. As
well as the decision to be made and who’s going to make them and when do
they need to be made? Are these decision that needs to be made sooner or
later? Thank you.
Chair DuBois: Next speaker is Roland Lebrun. Did you want to speak to the
process?
Roland Lebrun: No, I don’t want to speak on the CSS, I want to speak on
what Josh talked about just now about what’s going on and how it relates to
you and how to address the issues with the FPPC.
Chair DuBois: Oh, the recusal issue? Ok
Roland Lebrun: Roland: The FPPC is serious business. I don’t know if you
know [Roseanne Fowl], she’s been there twice. The second time around she
got a $5,000 fine. The Chairman of the Caltrain Board right now is a Council
Member in Redwood City and he’s currently under investigation. He’s about
to get another investigation because of his interest in the building on
Townsend Street, which is less than 400-feet from 4th and Kings station and
directly in the path of the Caltrain downtown extension. So now I want to
talk about Mountain View and Sunnyvale and how that relates to you and
come up with some solutions. In Mountain View, essentially what they are
doing is they are closing Castro and Moffett. That’s essentially like if you
here where to close University at the station, it’s serious business but this
grade separation is really part of the building of the station – I mean a
massive station (inaudible). My (inaudible) over there is to have the VTA on
one side of Castro and Moffett and then Bay Corridor platforms will be on the
other side. One of the Council Members has to recuse himself because he’s
got a nice property which is less than 500-feet away from that so I’ll come
back to that in Palo Alto in a minute. In Sunnyvale, they are grade
separating Mary, which is like you’re three separations and they are also
going to grade separate Sunnyvale. That again is going to be part of this big
– you know let’s do a station and let’s have this massive concourse for bikes
and peds and whatever. So, moving onto Palo Alto, Alma, as you say, is a
completely different animal and as I mentioned during public comment, if
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you are going to go ahead and have this massive bullet station at that point
in time, Alma now becomes part of basically the redesign of Palo Alto.
Potentially what you are doing with the pedestrian underpass and everything
else and the other three are going to be a lot more like Mary. Now the key in
Sunnyvale is that you’ve got to go to the website and see what they are
doing; it really is first class. They have – they had the first presentation on
Mary and they are showing eight different alternatives which are totally
focused on adjacent property impacts. You can tell right at the end which
one they are going to go for, it’s called a jug handle, it’s really creative and
then they are going to have a complete separate discussion about Sunnyvale
next week. So, my advice to you is watch what they are doing because I
think they are on the right track. Thank you.
Chair DuBois: Next speaker is Richard Brand; do you want to speak to this
topic?
Richard Brand: Yes.
Chair DuBois: Do you want to speak to the other topic as well?
Mr. Brand: I’ll differ because I haven’t seen the presentation yet because it
had to be broken up this way and that’s unfortunate. Yes, I’ll hold that open
but I will try to be brief. A couple things, I did consult with at least one PTC
Committee Member who asked me some questions about this. That Member
had known that I was attending the Rail Committee meetings and involved
in this process and so I supported the idea. Having been a stakeholder and
still am I guess in the Committee meetings, what I find and I’m looking at
this time line here, is that a stakeholder group will actually truncate or
shorten the work of the Staff. In fact, that’s one of the values – I know this
is a push pull kind of question but with the Residential Preferential Parking
Program (RPP) we found that we were able to come up with a lot of ideas
that could then be put in and Staff didn’t have to come up and review that.
So, I think this two and a half months versus two months can be shortened
because this is a continuum here that will truncate that six weeks into less
time. So, I would argue that this may not be the case in terms of the time
and time is of the essences here, no doubt. The other thing is that I support
Nadia’s letter that if – we should just have one group and a TAC should
include local residents as stakeholders as well. So, I think that one group
could work out together, although looking at the TAC list, it’s a long list
already. I think the list needs to be culled and reviewed in order to make
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this an efficient process so that this can be cut down from six weeks to less
than six weeks. Thank you.
Chair DuBois: Our next speaker is Herb Borock.
Herb Borock: Thank you, Chair DuBois and good morning Committee
Members. I want to speak on both parts of this and as – since Context
Sensitive Solutions is a process type question, I want to just add reminders
which I’m sure you all know but it doesn’t hurt to put it on the record. On
the conflict of interest, that whatever portion someone is not participating in,
it means that you can’t be at the table that the Committee Members and
Staff are sitting on during that conflicted matter. Also, that definitive
decisions about participation can only be in a written response from the Fair
Political Practices Commission to request—and elected officials and Staff
frequently get their own independent Council to help them frame the
question. On Context Sensitive Solutions, Josh Mello gave a very useful
distinction between the old way of doing things and Context Sensitive
Solution, which is a new way. One way to continue doing it the old way is
just to label it Context Sensitive Solutions and when you have that situation.
Very often proponents of Context Sensitive Solutions fall into the trap and
feeling that they have to bargain with the other position. If they get
something—some part of it, that looks like Context Sensitive Solutions and
they are willing to call it that. My advice to the public who know more about
Context Sensitive Solutions than I do, if something is not Context Sensitive
Solutions but is rather something resulting in a bargain with the old way, it’s
still not Context Sensitive Solutions and people should still be advocating for
that and labeling the process for what it is. Thank you.
Chair DuBois: Thank you. The last speaker is Adina Levin.
Ms. Adina Levin: (Inaudible)
Chair DuBois: Great, thank you. Alright so come back to the Committee.
Anybody have any questions or comments? Eric.
Council Member Filseth: Yes. Did Mountain View have a separate
Stakeholder Committee and a separate Technical Committee?
Mr. Mello: I’m not sure. I can check on that for you. I would like to address
if I could, a couple of the comments – the public comments. The TAC is not
shown on this because the TAC will not be making decisions. The TAC will be
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advising the community and PTC and Rail Committee and Council as
decisions are made. We’re not intending to allow other agencies to make
decisions on our behalf around different alternatives but their knowledge will
be important so that’s why they are not shown on this. Just another point of
clarification, this is not intended to show the alternatives analysis, -- the
Context Sensitive Solutions Alternatives Analysis process. This is only
showing how we’re intending to make each decision in that process along
the way so it’s not actually showing the decisions that will be made. It’s
showing the process that will be used to make those decisions.
Chair DuBois: Alright, go ahead.
Mayor Scharff: In terms of the process and making the decisions, when I
look back at what we’ve done in the past and where we are going. The big
issue that came to Council was that when we looked at the different options,
we obviously had an option for South of Oregon for a trench, which is only
south of Oregon that came up. Then you had the crossing at Meadow and at
the time people talked about taking 29 homes fully and 8t partially at
Meadow and Charleston together. At property acquisition, if you maintained
the turns of Alma, thirty-two full homes, and seven partials. Those are a big
number of homes and I think that’s one of the reasons and there are other
reasons as well as to why the trench was such an attractive option. It seems
that one of the things is until we know if the trench is a constraint option
that we can do or not, it’s really hard to figure out how the decisions are
going to be made. I mean it seems like are we going to – as we go through
this process, how are we going to get to that decision point of do we want to
do a trench or not? I mean it seems to me that we don’t know yet because
we haven’t gone through the process but the community would prefer to
have a trench. At least that’s what was in our – Council voted and that was
the preferred alternative, that’s the feedback that we’ve gotten. That the
trench is the preferred alternative and that with the trench is was unclear to
me if there are no homes taken or if it’s just the smallest number but I think
there was some hope that there were no homes taken with the trench. So, it
seems that the trench is going to be something that everyone wants to know
how much is it going to cost, whether or not it’s feasible and it’s going to be
impossible to think any other decisions until we have the information on the
trench. When I look at the schedule, what I see happening is unless we
understand the trench—and the trench is complicated. I mean I think as
both members of the public have mentioned, we have to have decisions
about can we do a two percent grade, can you – is – first of all, are they
even going to allow us to do a trench? They may simply say we’re not
allowed to do that and they are not going to let us do that. So, there are all
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these agencies corporations, there’s all these understanding of what permits
are going to be required and how we go through that process. I think there’s
going to be a significant amount of time spent on that so when you look –
when you create this Palo Alto process to come out in the middle of – I
guess it’s up till the last quarter of 2018, for a decision, what are your
thoughts on that? How are we planning on dealing with that?
Mr. Mello: The process that we’re currently planning to follow is beginning
September 16th and starting to develop what’s called a universal alternative.
So, we would consult with the community, let them put their ideas down on
paper, what are the ideas that you had around these four grade separations
– grade crossings, get some ideas on potential solutions and I fully expect
the trench will be one of those solutions that are identified. Then we will go
in and generate all the technical data that’s required to evaluate each of
those alternatives. So, the cost will be one of those components and of
course, we’re only going to be able to estimate at a very high level what the
cost is until we start moving into engineering but we’ll get an apple to apple
comparison of the different alternatives. Then we will reconvene the
community, present the universe of alternatives and start to use our
evaluation criteria to narrow those down. The narrowing down will be a
decision point that will need to go through our decision-making process to
pick the ones that we’ll study a little deeper and then eventually we’ll get
down to one preferred the alternative. We may end up prioritizing the grade
separations, we may end up deciding that we only want to identify preferred
alternatives for three out of the four and the red line that’s shown on that
chart is when we adopt a preferred alternative. So, that’s – after we adopt a
preferred alternative, that’s the point where we start moving into design and
we get a much better handle on cost but we’re hoping to have a pretty good
understanding of the costs of the different alternatives by the end of this
year.
Mayor Scharff: I don’t think anyone was happy with the way our bridge went
over 101, so this reminds me a little bit of the bridge. So, how did we get
out of the bridge trap? It goes something like this, we say we’re going to
build a bridge over Highway 101 – a bicycle and pedestrian bridge. We
decided, let’s build a beautiful bridge, let’s have community engagement,
let’s have a design composition. We get all these people involved, we have a
design composition and we choose a beautiful bridge. We go through that
process, we then look at the costs and we’re like that doesn’t work and now
we have an unattractive bridge. I mean it’s not terrible but I mean – and it’s
– but – and the process for choosing the other bridge was really just chosen
on cost and we went through all this community engagement, built up all
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these expectations and then didn’t deliver. I don’t think we’re paying enough
attention to the fact – we’re pretending that the trench is not the preferred
alternative and that the community may choose something else. I think
that’s a very low probability and without constraining it and saying – without
having the information in a good way, how are you going to tell the
community that the trench works or it doesn’t work? Once we go down the
path that yes, we think the trench is going to work but there are all these
issues. I mean, how are you going to make that decision? How are we going
to get there? That’s my concern is that I don’t want to spend all the time
and get to the end of it and say, oh, actually the trench doesn’t work. Then
we’ve spent 18 months designing, going through it and not having the
feedback. I mean how do we get that and then it could be complicated. I
mean it seems like the issue on the two percent versus the one percent in
itself is a negotiation that’s not resolved in a month, that’s not resolved in
two months. Then I – I mean I guess the other question is the cost, I mean
– so if I am wrong, just stop me but my recollection on the California
Avenue garage was we were at like $10 million to start with, something like
that and now we’re $30 million and so a high – when you say a high-level
cost estimate, I panic. High-level cost estimate, what does that – what value
does that have in making a choice if we’re not going to have numbers that
actually we can then go ahead and find?
Chair DuBois: So, Greg I agree with this conversation and I totally agree
with what you are saying. I’m just wondering if you’re not getting into the
next section versus the CSS process discussion.
Mayor Scharff: I was actually talking about the schedule because that’s what
was in front but is that – and that’s the process on CSS. When I am really
deciding or asking is my concern that I have here is that we act as if CSS
says everything is on the table and there are no constraints. Where there
are clearly constraints and you want to start with a rational – instead of
constraints that the community can work within. If you say that that’s not
true, I think we could very much end up like the bridge and so that’s why
I’m trying to figure out how we do the process and the schedule and if we
are actually being realistic; that’s my concern.
Mr. Keene: I don’t think you’re – you’ve actually bled over into this other
area. I think the Mayor’s, as I hear it, is a little more theoretical or
conceptual which is saying how we’re thinking about how we design this
process really has some life impacts on schedule and what we do and we
need to be thinking about that. If I could just add something to this, could
you put – oh, you’ve got it back up there, good, you’ve got the schedule
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back up. I think that’s – this is really important because if you look at this
right now, this is saying that vertical dotted red line looks like the end of the
first quarter of 2018, which is basically saying we’ve got to, at a minimum,
kind of catch up and be ready in whatever that is; 8 or 9-months. I agree
with Nadia’s comment that we need to flush out the steps and the process
more but I think it’s really important to think about setting what we think is
when we’ve got to be ready and then reverse engineering back from that, as
opposed to looping it. What I heard the Mayor potentially saying is we could
vaguely also design a process that anticipates some things but then unfolds
or balloons way out of our control and we lose our opportunity. I think we
really need to think about that. If I could add one other frame work for
thinking about this and I mentioned this to Tom when we were having
breakfast. I think we need to get clear about what it’s going to take to
ultimately get to making a decision and I think the language that we need,
needs to be accurate. I mean unless I’m really missing something, the real
decision makers in this are ultimately, the City Council. Now that doesn’t
mean there are some exterior decision makers who are going to make
determinations on one percent versus two percent or those kinds of
questions but the real question ultimately is that we’re going to engage,
we’re going to inform, we’re going to get recommendations from – through
different approaches but there’s no confusion that at the end of the day, the
City Council informed by the Rail Committee is going to have to make the
choices and the decisions of the official positions on behalf of the City. Now
ultimately if that means we’ve got to pursue gap funding that requires
saying a vote of the people, then in that sense our public is ultimately going
to be a decision maker explicitly. I don’t think we can -- you can forget the
fact that at the end of the day, this is all going to come back to the City
Council who’ve got to make some decisions and that seems to me that by
the end of the first quarter at a minimum, 2018, that we’ve got to get to
that point. I would like us to think about this frame work that is – includes
some things that has to unfold in parallel in some ways, even if some
components occur later. Number one, there is a technical issue here which is
what are the – what is the design, what are the impacts of—actually what
we do at these locations? The second one is what is politically feasible? In
other words, what is ultimately acceptable to our community? The third one
is what is financially possible? What are the financial capacity that we have
to have and I think we need to be clear about what we’re – in the process
discussions, what we are designing to because in the end, what is politically
feasible or has community acceptance? The City Council is ultimately going
to have to listen enough and have weighed all that and say this is where we
see this. This can’t be delegated to anybody else. You want to be informed
by it but I think that means that you – we need to be thinking about multiple
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engagement opportunities. We don’t have for example focus groups on here
that very well may be – for example, that you would say in this eight or
nine-month period has some recommendation advance. You would really
want to test our community and public in some very specific practice ways to
be able then again, inform reactions to folks. So, I think those three things,
technical, political, community and financial need to be kept in mind and
clearly, we can’t do those in an expressly linear – let’s do the technical, then
let’s see what happens at the decision-making process and then let’s figure
out how much it’s going to cost because it’s not going to work. So, please
keep that in mind, thanks.
Chair DuBois: Adrian, do you have any comments?
Council Member Fine: A few, so thank you, Josh, for mentioning that one-
time line was not the ultimate public facing timeline. Although I think it’s a
point well made that we do need to better map of this process. Even this one
is a little hard to see but – the one behind. This one certainly, yeah. I just
wonder if there’s something that could be a little more public facing for folk
so they do understand this. Then to Nadia’s point about where the TAC fits
in as well. I mean this does document it so just to be absolutely clear that
the TAC is public, right?
Mr. Mello: Yeah, those meetings would be open to the public.
Council Member Fine: Ok, great. I mean I have some questions around the
time line but I think our question here is more about what process we want,
how many groups we want to involve, what value they add, how they funnel
into each other, and then as the City Manager just mentioning of what is
kind of the contours of the decisions that they are making? I guess I’m
looking to you three what kind of solutions are we going to propose here?
I’m not sold on anything.
Mayor Scharff: I mean, I’m supporting the Staff proposal and I think we
should have focus groups too. (Inaudible) good approach but I think we
have to be flexible on and I’m open to different…
Council Member Fine: I just want to hear from you all.
Chair DuBois: Yeah, I still have some questions to if you are finished?
Council Member Fine: Yeah, I think I’m finished for now.
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Chair DuBois: So, on that time line it says that Sunnyvale still has to go
through design. How long does design typically take?
Mr. Mello: If you look at this chart, you can see Burlingame took a year and
a half to complete the design for Broadway; well, we’ll take a year and a
half. San Mateo took, it looks like a year and a half as well for the design at
25th and Hillsdale.
Chair DuBois: So, I mean it does feel like we’re definitely on track in terms
of timing and if it takes a year and a half for Sunnyvale to complete their
design, we’re kind of right along there. It does make me feel better and I
guess so does the conversations with VTA about funding this corporately
instead of compactivity. That slide you had on time for decision or
recommendation if Council is going to be the decider, I think then what’s
missing here is the assessment of the quality of the decisions. I’ve said it
multi times in this meeting that my fear is that in the rush for timeliness, we
have a decision the community doesn’t except and ended up either restart
and taking a much longer time. Which again, that’s the way the Comp. Plan
started was with workshops and then we had to reset so I just want to make
that point.
Mr. Mello: If I could address that? What’s not shown here is there would be
a fifth piece which is going back to the community after the Council. That’s
what we’re doing with – so with the problem statement, the objectives and
the evaluation criteria, that’s going to Council August 28th. Then the first
part of September 16th public meeting we will be reviewing the Council
decision and getting opinions on that and then we move into the next
decision.
Chair DuBois: Yeah, I think we just want a process that surfaces quality
decisions. I’ll see this PTC input that we should have some kind of deeper
engagement. I appreciate the City Manager’s comments on kind of these
three areas because that’s what I’ve been struggling with. I feel that we’ve
been somewhat linear so far and to Council Member Scharff’s – Mayor
Scharff’s comments about is the trench feasible? What’s the cost? Part of
that is what is the funding capability and I think we need to start to work on
some of these in parallel and really having a more clearly defined process
focusing on these areas of the engineering aspects, the community
acceptance aspects. I mean we’re going to get into that in the next section
but projects that are realistic with the amount of funding we expect but right
now, I don’t really have a good view of how much funding we could expect
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with Measure B. Then Nadia’s point about we’re kind of at a high level
defining roles but we need to I think, get a lot more specific. I did appreciate
the CAARD letter, I thought it was very well written and the detail in here,
the example of this highway project where they had the criteria for
membership, a kind of detailed outline of roles and responsibilities and
criteria. We’re getting there but I think some of that real focus on some of
that work right now is going to get us on a much stronger footing kind of
going forward. I am kind of intrigued about the idea of just adding some
additional stakeholders to the TAC. I think that’s kind of the biggest gap is
we are doing these community meetings, focus groups are pretty qualitative
but really having some ongoing engagement at a deeper level with a few
more stakeholder parties and residents. I don’t think we have PAUSD on the
TAC right now. It just seems like we are missing a few groups and having
this additional viewpoint feed into the recommendations. Hopefully, it’s not
going to add any more time and we’re going to get a much richer set of what
the community is willing to accept built into the recommendation. I think the
other thing that I wanted to say was I actually appreciated making it explicit
about building on the prior work. I thought that was a pretty good letter
from former Mayor Nancy Shephard, about feeling like we were ignoring the
previous work. I think – I heard some of that at the first community meeting
as well and a lot of the people that were involved in those early works were
attending these meetings. So, I think it’s critical that we acknowledge that
work and how we’re building on it. Part of that is the community has said
multiple times that a trench is preferred and so again, I think as we frame
this process – when we start a meeting talking about four separate
separations, it doesn’t really allow for that other approach to be discussed. I
think we need to think about how that is made more explicit. Then again,
my notes are a little bit out of order but I keep coming back to the funding
investigation and the example at the Saint Gabrielle thing. It almost feels
like a parallel track of people focused on the funding. The last thing that I
would like to say is that I do think constraints are a key part to CSS and
they need to be defined up front. Again, it gets back to this documentation
of process and rules and I think constraints is a key part of that, funding is
part of it and where is CSS strong? I think you bring in these community-
based constraints and just an example—but I’m sure there are tons of others
that we aren’t even aware of but yesterday, the Alma/Oregon Expressway
intersection was completely backed up on Alma; it was very dangerous. You
know we’re talking about grade separations but we haven’t – it hasn’t been
explicitly talking about the Alma/Oregon intersection. Those kinds of things
would have surfaced I think with more community involvement in the
process and hopefully, it will be surfaced in the circulation study too. Again,
I would support the recommendation from CARD and that we consider
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adding a few more people to the TAC as recommenders into the process. I
think it’s a good way to get deeper community engagement without setting
up a totally separate Committee and a separate group.
Mayor Scharff: Can we look at that Committee? I actually – I’m fine with
adding some people to the Committee. I think that actually makes some
sense though I think you want to workable Committee and you don’t want it
to be too big. I definitely agree but I don’t think we should be adding ten
community people and I think we want people with technical expertise from
the community. I’m open to what we do but I remember there just being a
long list.
Chair DuBois: I think – so it’s in your hand out here.
Mayor Scharff: It is – right. It was somewhere.
Chair DuBois: Well, it’s page three of the…
Mayor Scharff: Of the CAARD letter?
Chair DuBois: …of the CAARD letter. Again, I think some people could fill
multiple roles.
Mayor Scharff: No, that’s what I was thinking, right?
Mr. Mello: So, a better list to look at would be in the community engagement
plan which is Attachment A. It’s on page 9 of that.
Chair DuBois: Do you also list potential public members?
Mr. Mello: No, no, no, for the current makeup it is identified on page 9 of
the…
Chair DuBois: This just has all of that plus some suggestions.
Mr. Mello: I have not seen that list so I can’t verify whether that matches
the list on Page 9 of the Attachment A.
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Mayor Scharff: So where – Page 9 on Attachment A of the community
engagement, got it.
Mr. Keene: The one that says the Caltrain list at the top and then the
community engagement identifies…
Mr. Mello: That’s from the current letter.
Council Member Filseth: Packet Page 74.
Mr. Mello: The list that Staff provided is Attachment A, Page 9.
Chair DuBois: Yeah, so again I…
Mayor Scharff: Packet Page 74?
Chair DuBois: Again, I think the CAARD letter actually copies all of those and
then it has kind of a working list of potential others.
Mr. Keene: Could I make…
Chair DuBois: Yes.
Mr. Keene: …comment here, like a real-world comment? No, I mean I think
the tendency to get into the beautiful minds solution that just ties everything
together is a little risky. I mean I actually like the idea of thinking about
adding some folks to the TAC. I do think we need to get clear about even the
TAC’s role because there are lots of important conversations that have to
take place with other peer agencies that some may benefit from being really
open and public. I’m sorry but some may be debilitated by that. I know we
think that everybody wants to listen to us in Palo Alto but other folks don’t
necessarily see that. I can guarantee you that if we did every conversation
we did on the San Francisquito Creek and the JPA project on getting that
project built, we would still not have some things done because we’ve got to
be able to get together with some other jurisdictions at times and have
some big arguments without it all being out there. Now, that’s not no
decisions are being made, those are agreements trying to be reached. I
think we need to think about how we’re nimble enough to have these
different technical folks – maybe there’s a plan recession at times but then
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there’s some break out opportunities for us to mix and match in some way
in order to be able to be most effective, so just a caution.
Mayor Scharff: Yeah, so…
Council Member Filseth: The City Manager is very eloquent about this and
I’m going to be less eloquent. Which is usually when you do these things
you’ve got sort of two broad level objectives. One is how do we get the right
answer and the other is how do we make sure there’s buy in from all the
stakeholders? The challenge here is going to be in a perfect world you have
everybody represented on all of the Committees and you would get to the
right answer too. There’s going to be a trade off in here but is that we’re not
going to be able to get a lot of stuff done with thirty people on the
Committee or forty people on the Committee and every group. I think we’re
going to have to judicious about who are represented for the – sort of
getting buy in versus get the right answer part. I think as the City Manager
point out earlier is absolutely correct but ultimately, the responsibility is with
City Council to make the right decision. I think we should weigh very, very
heavily on what it’s going to take to get us to the right decisions and
perimeters of what’s technically possible. Are we going to be able to afford it
and what’s acceptable to the community? I mean that’s sort of the right kind
of stuff and so I don’t think we’re going to be able to represent everybody
who’s interested on the Committee. In fact, we’re going to have to make a
tradeoff for how do we focus on getting the right answer. The best thing that
we can possible to do get everybody to accept this is to get the right answer
in the first place and then it’s going to be a lot easier to – I mean I think
defend is the wrong word. I think it’s – I think people will buy in and I think
we’re in a situation where I don’t think this is going to be the most decisive
issue in our community that has ever faced. I mean we have issues in our
community – there are really people that really feel one way and people feel
vastly different that we try to reach. This one, I think – I mean the general
high-level problem I think you’re going to get most of the community to buy
into which is increase in congestion on the rail and impacts on – we want to
– without – I don’t want to veer into the second part of this discussion but I
think we’re going to find that most people sort of have similar values on this
kind of stuff. Who do we need on the Committee to get the right answer and
let’s try to not grow it too much longer than that? I’ll say for example and
I’m just going to make this up so don’t (inaudible) me but the Water District.
Yes, is the Water District relevant, yes. Is the Water District – may be where
they fall in the trade off of if we make the Committee to big, we’re not going
to get to the right answer versus everybody gets represented. I think we’ve
got to be very judicious on that.
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Chair DuBois: If I could just chime in. The TAC is currently intended to be on
an as needed basis so as we move through the decision-making process, the
(inaudible) will reach points where we need to cross the creek and we’ll need
to consult with the Water District and say you know is this something you
guys can work with? Do you see any red flags? It’s not currently intended to
be a regularly scheduled meeting. It would be convened at key decision
points where we need technical question addressed from the different
stakeholders.
Council Member Filseth: (Inaudible)
Chair DuBois: Just some thoughts again, I think having the TAC does not
stop you guys from having stuff with Caltrain Staff and these kinds of
meetings that the City Manager was talking about. I think those are going to
have to happen; High Speed Rail Authority is on here, right? I mean we only
have I guess seven groups confirmed and we have several invited. The TAC
is not that large right now and I don’t think we’re – (inaudible) representing
everyone, I mean that’s kind of an extreme. I don’t think that just adding a
few would make it a much richer group and I do think that it maybe needs
to be on regular schedule; again, for public participation, transparency, and
also just scheduling some of these groups. Looking at these lists, I can see
adding maybe a neighborhood rep near each crossing. Again, I think Palo
Alto Unified School District (PAUSD), we should invite them. Maybe the
Research Park or I mean we have business representation to the
Transportation Management Association (TMA) but maybe another like I said
the Stanford Research Park or another business representative. Then the
other one that I thought was interesting on here is the hydrologist just
because the water issues keep coming up and you do have the Water
District but that’s like four or five plus the seven. I don’t expect—even the
people currently listed on TAC, I don’t know if we expect them to show up
for every meeting so that’s just my kind of thought.
Mayor Scharff: I think that we need to – I’m fine with adding some people to
the TAC but I think we can’t lose sight of the purpose of the TAC. It’s a
Technical Advisory Committee and you may also need the ability to create
subcommittees if you want too. You also – I’m not necessarily comfortable
with the notion that we should have to have meetings if they don’t need to
have the meetings. They’ve already committed to making the (inaudible) to
the public, which I think is a good thing but I’m not – I don’t want to
basically turn the TAC into the stakeholder group. What I want to do is add
some additional representation so that if the – if there are technical issues
that people think why didn’t you consider this? That’s really what I view the
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neighborhood people saying. You know what about this technical issue over
here, how would that work out so that that comes forth?
Council Member Filseth: Right, how do you get to the right answer?
(Inaudible) make sure the stakeholders are equally represented.
Mayor Scharff: Correct. People who have technical expertise and they are
also in the neighborhoods. I mean – I will just be honest, someone like
Nadia for instance, I think has that combination of being in the neighborhood
and having technical expertise. I’m interested in adding like three people,
that’s what I was thinking. Maybe four but I mean not more than that.
Chair DuBois: Well I think maybe Staff has heard our input and rather than
be that explicit we could have a more general motion to have Staff come
back with a suggestion for adding deeper community input to the TAC and
what the roles and responsibilities would be; even when they would meet
and not meet. I mean I would be…
Mr. Keene: Well, just a second on that Josh. Going back to Nadia’s
comments earlier about flushing out the process and I just think we need to
be doing that here just a little bit so that we have enough direction. I mean I
really appreciate the attempt to sort of morph some of these streams
together but what is the reason for adding say our local citizen voice to the
TAC? Is it technical or is it political community or is it both? I mean I think
we need to get clear about that because again, to the Mayor’s point, I think
clearly, we’d have to have some freedom to spin off subcommittees because
I mean I guarantee a lot of other agencies outside us are not going to
always want to go to a meeting with us with our citizens. Nothing against
them and then they are going to say, wait I guess we better bring our
citizens in to and then all of a sudden it a whole different meeting. We just
need to remember that other agencies in jurisdictions see the world
differently than we do. What are we trying to accomplish? Is it mostly
technical? Would we – or is it representational of the community? It sounds
like at minimum, if anyone that we want to provide representational piece,
also has to be somehow technically proficient. That is what we are saying,
ok?
Chair DuBois: For me, it’s not really technical or community, it’s a deeper
expert engagement through the process versus just a workshop. So, it is
community members who (inaudible) more technical but I think the TAC
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should also be more CSS. In that it’s not purely engineering type decisions,
it is engineering married with some community context.
Mr. Keene: Could I provide an alternative? It’s one that I brought up months
ago and you probably hate it but isn’t the Rail Committee really important? I
mean…(crosstalk)
Mayor Scharff: We’re the community engagement.
Mr. Keene: … is it – ultimately you are the nexus between the Council and
the decision they make. You are going to ultimately try to formulate
whatever it is to recommendations the Council makes because the Rail
Committee can’t even make decisive decisions on its own. Isn’t there some
way to think about is there some more direct connection to the Rail
Committee, rather than the Technical Advisory Committee? You’re going to
have to get this, I mean do you – I’m not saying this is the right but do you
have ex-officio members of the Rail Committee from the community
somehow involved? Not the same (inaudible) but advice – I don’t know or
some...
Mayor Scharff: We do and they are sitting in the audience. (crosstalk)
Mr. Keene: I know, well now we deputize them.
Mayor Scharff: You know, I don’t want to expand the Rail Committee. I think
that’s too complicated.
Chair DuBois: Again, I don’t think that gives us necessarily the expertise in
the different areas that are potentially missing right now.
Mr. Keene: So, could -- I think we need to define those expertise a little bit
if we’re going to come back with some recommendations. Then again, I
think the TAC needs to be thought of as a kind of not static. It kind of
expands, morphs, moves, grows, has a subcommittee as needed. Do you
know what I mean because – there you go, ok.
Mayor Scharff: I mean I don’t view the TAC as the stakeholder group. How I
viewed the TAC is it provides the ability for the City to get technical
questions answered. I actually thought if we added some community
members, what it allows is there are some community people who can say
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why didn’t you think of this? That’s all and then they can then get those
questions answers but you know, the community people come here and ask
us to make sure to ask the technical question and that process. I think it’s a
tough call and I think you – Staff needs to be really clear with us that we’re
not going to mess the TAC up. Yes, there’s no way for instance that – if
you’re going to make progress with VTA on stuff, a lot of those discussions
about what we want in negotiations are not going to be made in a public
forum. VTA is not going to be open to being, shall we say, have a bunch of
our citizens yell at them and say this is what we want. That’s not the way it’s
practically going to occur and I think we have to keep that in mind.
Ed Shikada, Assistant City Manager: If I could perhaps chime on – in on to
that from the perspective – I think maybe in the dynamic here from Staff, I’ll
play the engineer here and someone who’s spent a career dealing with other
agencies on projects like this. I think in terms of motivation, one of the
things to remember in terms of the other agencies participation with us as
we go forward is that they are here by choice or they will be here and
engage by choice. The typically bureaucratic response to a situation that
they are not entirely comfortable with will one be either to not show up,
which is really possible in terms of the TAC Committees or more likely will
delegate it to junior Staff that will not really be able to contribute at the level
that we need in order to have effective input into the decision making. That
group dynamic is one to keep in mind, especially if you take as perhaps a
given that to a certain extent, VTA, a Caltrain, a High Speed Rail institutional
interest is not necessarily to help Palo Alto define the grade separations. In
fact, it could be to just go along for the process, rather than necessarily see
an immediate solution come out of that. I think that dynamic is important
and perhaps to Council Member Filseth’s point, the right decision – the term
I might use in terms of going from the technical to ultimately the political
decision is a sustainable one – sustainable decisions. One that the
technicians and the engineers will say that’s the right answer but then it
comes to the Rail Committee, much less to the Council, and the Committee
and the Council says the wrong answer, go back and figure it out.
Ultimately, I think Staff is looking for a decision that can be made at a Staff
level that will be sustained through a policy process and that it involves a
more deliberation of discussion that obviously goes way beyond the
engineering considerations so one that can be carried forward. I think quite
frankly, weighing down the technical discussions too much will ensure that –
as I said, you’re not going to get the really honest feedback from the other
agencies that will help make a decision that will both be sustainable, as well
as actionable at the Council. So, I think there are some conflicting goals
there. To a certain extent I suspect that with identifying the right people in
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the technical, it gives Staff the flexibility for how that interaction actually
happens. It would be able to help bring that forward with the recognition of
the issues that are important to the Council along with the way.
Mayor Scharff: So what decision do you need us to make today under this
item? I mean do you want us to just endorse the Staff plan plus anything
else. Is that what you’re looking for? I mean or are you looking for just the
discussion or what – I mean how do we bring this item to a conclusion?
Mr. Keene: So, Number 1, we need some direction from you so we can start
to move ahead. Two we’ve – for the most part, what we’re really talking
about is what sort of local citizen involvement we’re going to have and into
inject formally into our process right now? What I am hearing is that you
want us to look at some way to use the TAC as a forum that can allow us to
bring some of those perspectives or voices into the process. The Chair
suggested that you give us that direction and we go to work and come back
on that. Now I don’t think this is just – and Josh is freaking out thinking
about how does he stay on schedule and all the twenty other things and
what does he do on the shuttle; he's going to come back on that and all
those things. I think there’s a lot of work that we just need to do at our level
too, even talking with the City Attorney about how we could bring a
recommendation forward pretty quickly on how to make this thing work. I
think we would have to diagram and map it out that there will be some
situations where the TAC is some subset of it and is just some Staff at some
level. Then there are others that were engaged and it may be that we use
our own citizen advisories to sit down and even on our Staff levels, to give
us feedback or tell us what to do and then sometimes participate. I mean I
think we could design that if that’s what you are interested in. What I am
also hearing is we would formally all be agreeing that we can let go of this
concept of this independent stakeholder group. I think we need to be clear
about that.
Mayor Scharff: That’s correct.
Council Member Filseth: The way I say this is actually a way to avoid the
scenario that Ed talked about. Just enough to avoid that scenario, right?
Mr. Keene: I (inaudible) we’re not in any sort of chamber business team
bureaucrat thing like gosh, let’s keep our citizens out of here. As a matter of
fact, to the extent that we can ever be more effective, we will always do
that. At the same time, his thing with the – we’re inviting people to a dinner
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party here from other places and if they really don’t like what we’re eating or
what wine we’re serving, they are going to not come. We just need to be
sensitive to that, that to some extent we really need their input. In other
situations, we really need our own communities input to the technical
recommendations that we’re going to make.
Mr. Mello: I just want to say that this whole exercise today and PTC last
week is CSS in process. We’re talking at length about decision making and
how we’re going to do it and that is one of the core tenants of CSS; is
establishing the decision-making process early on. So, I just want to
commend everyone for – we are – this is the CSS process in action and
we’re experiencing it right now.
Mr. Keene: With that, let me just put a schedule thing on. Right now, we are
scheduled to come back from the Rail Committee to the Council on
September 5th on a tentative agenda. I mean it would be open to thinking
whether or not the Rail Committee directions would be enough that we could
put this together for an item – for the item that would go to the Council.
Chair DuBois: I don’t think this is what Ed meant and I appreciate the
comments about engineers and having a dinner party that people what to
come too but I also think that we don’t want to go back to this old method of
the technical decision driving the solution. If we get into this mode of
deciding and defending and if the TAC makes a decision and you come to the
Rail Committee and we don’t like it, that’s basically the old method. They are
going to defend it and we would have to object to it versus a more
collaborative approach. I just don’t – I think some public speakers said this
too, I don’t want to call it CSS if it’s not CSS. I would like to figure out a way
that we add like I said deeper community engagement at even what the TAC
– being on the TAC doesn’t mean if there are subcommittees that again,
there’s an engineering discussion and maybe it’s open to the public but
doesn’t mean that all participants are at the table as part of that particular
discussion. I don’t know how we would work that out but again, the pieces
that I see missing right now are the neighborhood, the schools, we have
some business and the environmental expertise.
Mr. Keene: I think that’s really important but I just again think that – I
mean the TAC itself isn’t necessarily how we solve that or – I mean I don’t
think we have ever felt that stakeholder engagement is not central and
representative. Stakeholder engagement that allows for the pollical
community by in on technical decisions; that’s what we’re after. I don’t know
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that we can specify all of those right now but we could give more definition
to that even when we come back to the Council. Even the idea of just some
static representatives rather than free flowing, I mean we could have
hundreds – forget the group meeting, we would have 200 people involved in
a much more hands on way over the next eight months than we would with
even just say one single Committee with ten people on it. You would get
more representative voices so let’s just take PAUSD, I can’t imagine that we
could get them to hang in there with us at the level that we would but
episodically or appropriately engaging them, we could be sure that we do
that.
Mayor Scharff: I also wanted to say that I don’t view the TAC as making
decisions on anything. I view them as purely advisory – frankly advisory to
Staff and then Staff makes the recommendation to PTC and the Rail
Committees and then eventually to Council. That’s – I think that’s an
important point that we’ve got to keep in mind and then I think Staff needs
to be able to use the TAC to get good information and I think that’s what
Staff is pushing back on. I think that’s – we’ve got to make sure that
happens. I also think that it's more than TAC, I think if we’re going to give
this direction, I also wanted to give direction to go back and I like the City
Manager’s idea of focus groups. I think some focus groups actually can really
get good citizen engagement by going through that process. Then I also, on
a third thing, wanted to give direction to Staff that we really focus on
starting now starting to work out what a trench would look like and the cost
associated and the constraints and how that would work because the sooner
that we start around that process, the better the information everyone will
have. I view that as the stumbling block in all of this, I think because those
technical issues regarding the trench are going -- what delays this process. I
don’t want to wait for people to say it’s – I don’t want to go through a whole
process where we say let’s get to this point where we then decide that the
trench is the preferred alternative. I want to do it in parallel and we may
choose the trench as not being the preferred alternative but I want to take
the risk that we spent all that time understanding the trench because I don’t
think anyone can make the choice without having the information.
Mr. Mello: I might suggest that similar to how we’re working on the
circulation study in parallel to the Context Sensitive Solution Alternatives
Analysis, maybe we start work on a white paper that looks at the trench…
Mayor Scharff: That’s all I’m suggesting.
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Mr. Mello: … and starts to take the work that Mott McDonald did a little bit
further and we could provide that as information as part of the decision-
making process through the CSS.
Mr. Keene: This is another aside, I mean I haven’t even talked with Josh
about this but not everything just directly has to be in Transportation's
wheel house. So, I mean I think we’re going to do some financial scenario
planning what ifs on – under different possibilities. Whether it’s how we
could look at what the appropriate numbers are, what does it mean on bond
financing versus other things, so we start – again, these are high level but
we start to put some meat on the bone about these things.
Council Member Filseth: He’s really only talking about accelerating the
existing process, not sort of getting into the decision of Alma crossing
versus…
Ms. Stump: Chair DuBois, can I make one comment?
Chair DuBois: Yes.
Ms. Stump: So perhaps one tool that would be a component of enriching
citizen involvement which we could talk about off line, this would be legal
and permissible for this Committee to enhance and loosen and supplement
the public participation practices that we usually use. I know sometimes
people feel that public comment is kind of narrow and constraining and if
this Committee was interested in enhancing the public dialog process in this
Committee, we can talk about ways to do that.
Mayor Scharff: I actually think that would be a great idea. You know we’ve
done that on some of the airplane noise stuff and I was actually thinking
about engaged people are on the airplane noise stuff. I mean if I – if we
scheduled a meeting on airplane noise right now, there would be one
hundred people in this room. Two hundred people in this room and I got to
say that we don’t have a formal stakeholder group but the airplane noise
people understand that stuff than the FAA half the time I think. I mean it’s
really amazing the expertise they bring to it. I’m open to us doing some of
that stuff.
Council Member Fine: So just a few things, I think it would be helpful to
potentially expand this group but I also want to remind us all we do have
comment periods at PTC and this meeting every single time, right? So,
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there’s that level of community engagement. I’m a little worried about just
putting community engagement within the TAC because it seems like
something we’re going to turn off and turn off when we don’t want it and if
we’re having other agencies come, we’re just going to turn off the public
engagement piece there so that seems a little shallow to me. Then also I do
think Tom, your comments on finance are well taken. I don’t think we have
that piece exactly. It could be the trench study that you’re looking at but
maybe that’s separate and done more at the Staff level. Then just a last
thing, Eric, I think you said it pretty well; we’re trying to make the right
decision, we’re trying to get agreement on it and I think we, as Council,
pushed more on getting the right decision, we’re taking on more of a
political risk on the back side. I also kind of agree with you that the values
around this aren’t as fraught as some other issues that we’ve faced in the
City. So, I guess we should just be clear with ourselves about that, right?
Chair DuBois: I’ll attempt a Motion, so my Motion would be to have Staff
propose adding some additional members to the TAC, to add additional
expertise in areas that aren’t represented, to define those roles and
responsibilities, and potentially sub-committees. To consider adding focus
groups and to start to develop a trench scenario.
Mayor Scharff: Ok, I second.
MOTION: Chair DuBois moved, seconded by Mayor Scharff to recommend
Staff propose adding members to the Technical Advisory Committee (TAC)
to provide additional expertise in areas not currently represented, to define
those roles and responsibilities, suggest potential subcommittees and to
consider adding focus groups.
Council Member Fine: Is the trench scenario – it’s just the trench itself. Do
we want anything on financial scenarios and directing Staff there?
Chair DuBois: I don’t know if that needs to be a part of this Motion.
Ms. Stump: Can we move – can we actually move that second part, the
trench and the finances, to the second item and just deal with the process
issues here?
Mr. Keene: Just to be clear, I may leave during that part of it in some way
but I’m assuming that the – whatever motion comes out of the Committee is
not prescriptive. I mean it’s trying to clarify some particular directions but
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when we write the report to the Council, we may touch on some areas that
are unspoken and the Council (inaudible).
Mayor Scharff: It’s not prescriptive.
Chair DuBois: So, do you want to read that Motion again? Did you guys get
it?
Council Member Filseth: (Inaudible)
Mr. Mello: I mean I – well so
Mr. Keene: That was good, that was classic. Let the record know (inaudible)
Mr. Mello: Well I think without any kind of Motion, we’re going to put
together a white paper on the trench.
Chair DuBois: We’ll talk about that in the next section. Alright so, all those in
favor of the Motion? Great, alright.
MOTION PASSED: 4-0
Council Member Filseth left the meeting at 10:08 AM
Mayor Scharff: Ok, so I have a hard stop at 11 so hopefully we can wrap this
up.
Council Member Filseth: (Inaudible)
Mayor Scharff: So now we are on Item Number 2, right?
Mr. Mello: It’s still the same item, it’s 2B.
Mayor Scharff: Oh, it’s 2B, right.
Mr. Mello: So, it’s still the same item but we’ve broken it into two parts and
this is the second part which will cover the problem, the objectives, and the
evaluation criteria. Just to give you a background on how we arrived at the
problem statement, the objectives and the evaluation criteria. This process
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started with fifteen community stakeholder interviews, which my Staff and I
conducted across the street at the Downtown Library. These interviews
included neighborhood leaders, advocates, former elected officials and local
rail experts. The key takes away from those interviews were that the prior
Rail Corridor Studies are important. There’s a confusion around the trench
study, a lot of folks misinterpret the trenching study to be some type of
alternative selection, when in fact it was just a feasibility analysis of what it
would take to do a trench. There were also differing opinions on the CSS
process, which we are pretty familiar with. Concerns about a pre-supposing
solution so we – one particular interview we talked about how the trench
could be more expensive than a traditional grade crossing and there was a
disagreement. So, folks want us to be very deliberate about how we talk
about the cost of each of the different alternatives and pre-suppose that one
of them maybe more expensive or less impactful than others. Then we
reaffirmed – there was reaffirmed that safety and visual impacts are very
important. So, visual impacts around the potential to raise the rail road and
there was a lot of concern around the impacts that would happen in
surrounding neighborhoods. Following the stakeholder interviews, we hosted
our community workshop. You are very familiar with what occurred then,
that was May 20th; we had 130 attendees, 39 written comments. The
afternoon of that Saturday we talked about the problem definition,
objections and evaluation criteria and that were the – that session is where
we got the most valuable input on these three topics. Over the summer we
did a survey monkey community questionnaire. We emailed it out to 444
recipients, that’s the number of people we have on Gov. Delivery email list
for the Connecting Palo Alto Rail Program. They sent it out via email trees to
their neighborhoods and other groups. We also promoted it on social media
and as a result, we had 791 unique responses within the two-week period.
Nine-eight percent of those who started the questionnaire completed it,
which is a pretty good completion rate given the complexity of the questions
and the amount of information we were asking people for. The purposes of
the questionnaire were to maintain community involvement, so you
remember one of the key tenants of CSS is continuing engagement. We
didn’t have the May 20th workshop and then disappear for three months and
leave community member feeling as though we had forgotten them. We also
wanted – didn’t want to bring anything forward to PTC, Rail Committee or
Council without first going back and check with the community as part of the
continuing engagement process. The questionnaire shared the draft problem
statement, objectives and evaluation criteria and then solicited input from
the respondents on those three topics. After the questionnaire, we made
some edits to the draft problem statement and I can read this if you want
but it’s included in your packet. This is our suggested problem statement
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today and it’s – this is how we will frame this process going forward in this
program. Instead of Staff or someone else deciding what we think the
problem is, this is a community driven problem statement that attempts to
clarify how the community sees the current issues out there and where we
should – what we should use to developed solutions to the problem. We also
developed a list of suggested objectives, it’s a pretty long and lengthy list
and I’ll talk a little bit about PTC recommendation in a little bit but we may
want to think about shortening this and being more pointed about where we
want to focus our efforts on this. Then the evaluation criteria, we have three
tiers and the tiers are based on the questionnaire and the input that we got
during the community workshop. The ones in Tier 1 are what the community
thought were the more important so facilitate movement across the corridor
for all modes, reduce delay and congestion for automobile traffic at rail
crossings, provide clear and safe routes for pedestrians and bicyclist, and
support continued rail operations and Caltrain service improvements. That
was something that a couple of our interviewees touched on as whatever we
develop, we should – it should support Caltrain service not detract from
Caltrain service or planned Caltrain service expansions. Then the tier two
criteria and the tier three criteria are still important but they were judged to
be less important than the tier one criteria. The PTC last week reviewed
these materials and their two recommendations in regard to this portion of
the presentation is to reconsider the inclusion of noise and vibration and
other common issues near railroads in the problem statement. They felt that
safety and circulation are really a primary issue and that noise and vibration
are something that’s fairly common when you live near a rail corridor and to
expect us to solve those problems a little bit of a stretch with our Rail
Program. Then their second recommendation was to reduce the number of
objectives to the top four. So, this is the current list of objectives and they
felt that a lot of the ones at the end are just best practices and we would be
doing those anyway; like maximizing Palo Alto’s fair share of available
funding sources. They didn’t necessarily feel like they were worth while
putting in the objectives for this program because it dilutes the other – the
top four objectives, which are to improve safety along the rail corridor,
reduce traffic congestion, improve circulation and access for all modes and
then deliver grade separations in a timely manner. So, with that, I conclude
the presentation.
Mayor Scharff: The evaluation criteria and the suggested objectives, why
wouldn’t you just have one?
Mr. Mello: The objectives are a refinement of the problem statement – I’m
sorry, I just got a…
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Mayor Scharff: But isn’t – what’s the relationship between the suggested
objectives and the evaluation criteria?
Mr. Mello: The objectives are a refinement of the problem statement and the
evaluation criteria, when we start to develop our alternatives, we’ll create an
evaluation matrix which will rate each of the alternatives on how they meet
the evaluation criteria.
Chair DuBois: Like have specific metrics?
Mr. Mello: Yes, we’ll develop specific metrics on how do we measure the
reduction of delay and we’ll have a matrix that basically compares all of our
alternatives using the evaluation criteria. So, the objectives are more policy,
the evaluation criteria are technical in nature. Then just next steps, we’re
going to City Council on September 5th; it’s no longer August 28th. We are
hoping to convene the Technical Advisory Committee sometime in
September, just to give them an update on where we are and not string
them along too much; you know bring them into the fold and know that we
will be consulting them throughout this process. Then we are hosting a
community workshop on September 16th and then did pencil in a tentative
community workshop on August – October 21st but we’ve been thinking
more about that lately and we think there could be a potential to use polling
and/or focus groups in lieu of having community workshop three because
that work shop is going to be where we start to talk about what alternatives
are acceptable and applying to the community. So, a focus group might be a
better way to get more intensive involvement from the community and allow
for more prolonged discussion about the pros and cons of different
alternatives than a community workshop. With that, our Staff
recommendation today in regards to this section of the presentation is to
review the attached summary of community workshop one and the summary
of the questionnaire responses and then provide a recommendation to the
City Council on the draft problem statement, project objectives and an
evaluation criterion for discussion of community workshop two and to inform
the development in screening of grade separation alternatives.
Chair DuBois: Alright, we do have some members of the public. Where did I
stick these? Alright for Item 2B we have Nadia Naik, followed by Elizabeth
Alexis.
Nadia Naik: Hello again, so I’m kind of actually still mentally on the last
section but when you’re looking for better ways to maybe have some of
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these meetings be a little bit more engaging with the public. Some of the
things that we did in the last Rail Committee meetings in the past was that
when there were lengthy discussions like what you guys just had, they
would actually go around for a second round of comments because often
times folks like us are like oh, but there is a mistake. So, for example, the
two percent grade is absolutely a technical thing that Caltrain can do; it’s on
their tech specs but it leaves the rest of us biting our finger tips because
we’ve got lots of more things we could say so that’s an easy way to kind of
get more engagement. The other thing that was done in previous Rail
Committee iteration was there were a lot more working group sessions. So
often times the Chair would have different sets of groups who might come
up. So, you might have CAARD come and present what we know, you might
have Clem Tillier come and talk, you might have Adina come talk but it
allows you, Council Members, in an open forum to ask specific questions and
get data. It also presents a way publicly for all of us to also help Staff get
some of the things that they need. So those would be some suggestions on
maybe how to – while you guys still figuring out where your stakeholders
belong in this process, how to actually start to have a wider conversation. I
think what I hear you struggling with at your – at its core is that you don’t
want to make anything to official but you agree that the citizens have
something to add and in the end, we all just want to have a really good
conversation and make sure that we’re having it openly. So, I think there’s a
way to figure this stuff out. I will say that I sent my comments and I warned
you not to print because I was thinking of you guys that might be printing it
at home and reading them last minute last night. It – the packet does not
include the rest of my attachment which is – which would be page 10-36
which include excerpts from the Pennsylvania project. They have very
specific examples in there of community criteria that they used to kind of
measure their alternatives. Obviously, that’s a finished report so it’s much
more advanced than what we have but some of the specific things are for
example if you were looking at the Churchill crossing, including criteria that
would say you know really maximizing how to get bikes across or whatever.
They just had very geographically specific criteria so I would highly
recommend that we continue to look at models of other projects to see how
we can build on those and look at those things. I think that’s all I have for
the criteria right now. I just – again, it’s going to be hard to continue to
widdle that down unless there’s a kind of spelled out the process of where
we’re going with all this stuff. Thank you.
Chair DuBois: Thank you.
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Elizabeth Alexis: Yes, it would be nice to talk more about the – I think there
are some interesting things that were brought up about what is the role,
why do you want normal people in a room with the technical experts? That’s
sort of the magic of CSS is you’re asking technical people to think a little
differently than they did before because on the technical side you get sort of
stuck on standards and the book and what it says. What you are asking
people to do is can you think of another way to achieve your objectives? Like
if you’re trying – like for the Water District; I mean it really is a big project.
We all the creeks that we’re crossing, we have a lot of water flow issues, and
we have a lot of stuff there. So, I just – ten people going really deep is not
the same as two hundred people going shallow. I mean it’s different, you
want both actually because there are certain things that the two hundred
people will give you feedback on but ten people thinking really deeply about
the problem and that lead into the problem statement. I think -- and this is
one thing to think about with Eric and some other people, I think you’ve got
a problem statement on sort of a global level. That we have the Caltrain
expanded in 2025 and that we have – we’ve always had limited capacity on
an east/west and that’s already taxed in. That will just be – it will be a non –
I mean nonviable but then we start to look – and this is where we can use
the experience that we’ve learned from the previous studies and why we’re a
little different than the problems that we’re looking at in Sunnyvale or
Mountain View. I mean I think you can divide it up, I think there is a South
Palo Alto project that starts at San Antonio Road and includes the station
area because one of the things – the 2025 Caltrain thing is not just about
the crossings but it’s going to be about as people who do not work in San
Francisco because it’s a pain in the butt to get there, they will work in San
Francisco. People who live in Palo Alto, who live in Los Altos, who live in – all
of these things are going to create a demand to get to the stations and we
need to be thinking about that when we’re solving these other problems. We
have more issues with bicyclist than other Cities do because of our reliance
and that for the high schools where you get in a half an hour period you get,
I don’t know, five hundred people moving across the crossing; they have to
be a different kind of width. I would look at – and as I think Staff said, you
said oh, there are just two alternatives. No, there’s actually – I mean the
permutations and combinations you get because we know – this is things
that we already know. It’s expensive to maintain all the current turning
movements so the question is, can you find a way because we do have a
couple of crossings and the San Antonio Road is – we haven’t even talked
about sort of looking at that area and what that can use or not use or the
limits on what’s going to happen there. Looking across those South Palo Alto
as a general problem, I think is one issue. Then looking at North of Oregon
Expressway, including the California Avenue area because there are issues
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which are people getting into the station there and people getting onto
Alma. Up to, let’s call it Town and Country, that’s one area because some of
the solutions may include looking at the Embarcadero Crossing as part –
taking up some capacity and then the – as the Alma Street one is really – it
is a Palo Alto station area plan which we will need to do and thinking of
those as three different distinct things.
Chair DuBois: Great, thank you. Richard Brand.
Richard Brand: Richard Brand, resident and I guess acting as an ex-officio
advisor here, thank you, Mayor Scharff. A couple things on the problem
statement, I think – and this comes back to what I outlined at the beginning
of the meeting is that suggestion – let’s see, sorry, suggested problem
statement. Cal – the a – High Speed Rail is going to be probably, I wouldn’t
say possible. I mean as it is right now, High Speed Rail is a probable solution
and we’ve heard them say that as they presented here so right now the
wording is possible. Yes, funding is still up in the air but I think you need to
consider changing that and that brings me to the other issue of the trench,
which I think is a great discussion that’s going on. I think Staff though
cannot come back with a cost issue until we have High Speed Rail tell us
what they are going to do about four tracks versus two. Four tracks will
change us and in fact, what are we going to do? Close down Alma and build
a shoe fly along Alma to get the trains to continue to – shoe fly is an
alternative rail solution. A four-track trench is going – where are you going
to put the tracks? So once again, this all depends, I’m defending Staff here,
on what the High Speed Rail people do. We need a solution – we need an
answer from them on that proposal. Thank you.
Chair DuBois: Next speaker is Herb Borock.
Herb Borock: Yeah, I just want to talk a little bit about the problem
statement. The – how you frame the problem statement gets into what
Council Member Filseth said on the previous part of this agenda item, which
is making a decision and having by in on the decision. In previous meetings
and I guess at this one, it seems that the no project alternative, that is not
doing any kind of grade separation; whether it’s a trench or clover leaf or
anything else. That’s already been made, even though not in a formal way
so, in some sense, that’s part of the problem statement in that you have
already decided not to do that. Another part of the problem statement is the
relationship to feature development. I mean if Caltrain is the only rail line
and is not High Speed Rail, just to simplify it and their ridership is going to
double, does that mean that half the people who drive – an equal number of
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the people who are driving now ride on the train now. Well, it’s just going to
come from those people so we’re going to decrease the number of people
who are driving cars in Palo Alto by an amount equal to the commuters who
come into Palo Alto and the commuters who leave Palo Alto. If the real
situation is related to the Comprehensive Plan, that land developers and
large corporations, who among themselves could pay for all of this and not
have a sales tax and bonds (inaudible) the public, it they want that relieving
that traffic congestion to be able to develop more and have more employees
come in by vehicles so that you are back to the same congestion. What’s
missing from the problem statement is the land use decision that is being
made in the future when you make a Comprehensive Plan decision and those
have to be weaved into that. Otherwise it just becomes an issue that you’ve
already made a decision, for example, to do a trench or maybe the problem
statement is (inaudible) by the City Manager, which is there’s this pot of
money available within a short period of time and our problem statement
really at the top is how do we do this so quickly and come to a decision that
people buy in to get that money. Thank you.
Chair DuBois: Ok and our last speaker is Adina Levin.
Adina Levin: A few different points in terms of the problem statement and
objectives and criteria is – as well as the process is that I think funding
strategies really need to be a first-class consideration here because if a
trench is a preferred alternative, the order of magnitude cost here is a billion
dollars. Think about the heartache about the Adobe Creek Bridge in the ten
to the $20 million range and that was difficult. We’re talking two orders of
magnitude greater than that; a billion dollars is a little bit of money and the
strategies whether they are bonding, whether they are taxing, whether they
be land value capture, those will make a really big difference in terms of the
burden on community members. The change in the community being
envisioned in order to make some of this possible and building in the time to
get the expert advice on the financial options and then the community input
on what seems like desirable strategies and undesirable strategies. I think
that needs to be pretty heavily weighted in the analysis and in the decision
making, so that’s one point. Another point with regards to taking things into
the account but not pre-judging. You may be familiar with a process that
Burlingame went through where they had earlier phase and they said we
want a trench. The Council Members were persuaded they wanted a trench,
the community members were perused they wanted a trench, then they
looked at the details and what – where they came to was they saw
visualizations of the amount of fencing you need to protect electric poles and
wire from people fallings on top of them. They concluded for themselves that
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the aesthetic impact, they thought that was uglier than the other
alternatives that they were looking at. That was the decision that they made
and the other thing is that they looked at the water issues where they were
located and realized that it would be extremely difficult at that location to
keep it dry. They came up with, at the end, a split alternative that was
different from where they thought they started. I do not have a personal
opinion, Friends of Caltrain has no position on this topic so this is not to say
Palo Alto should do one or the other. It’s to say that when those options are
considered and people look at the visual impacts and the data, they may
come to a different place than when they started. Then two more things
more quickly if I might. One is about how separable Alma is and one of the
things that I’ve heard from community members is around on the
permeability topic, it might be possible to make additional through
connections in that area but that would have timing and funding
interrelationships. Even in the current value capture legislation where things
don’t need to be in the exact same location, they could intertwingle. I know
that has like some consequences that people don’t want in terms of process
but that might be on the – be considered sooner rather than later. Oh, and
just the long middle three only goes through Cal. Ave.
Chair DuBois: Ok, so back to us for discussion. So, I think there are two
parts, here right? There’s the problem statement criteria, objectives and
then I think we’re also being asked to – well, just (inaudible) (crosstalk)….
Mayor Scharff: The problem statement.
Chair DuBois: … the results, yeah, so that’s it.
Mayor Scharff: Adrian, do you…
Council Member Fine: Sure. I think the problem statement is pretty close,
there are a few things that I want to change and I’ll start with the small
ones. So, one is I actually do appreciate Richard’s comment about High
Speed Rail probable versus possible. Another one that kind of stuck to me is
saying the rail corridor also creates issues in surrounding neighborhoods. It
also creates issues for Stanford and for our commercial areas and I think
that’s worth noting and then the last thing is the biggest comment. I think
it’s important for us to frame this problem as something else we’re
committed to because I mean we could say like gosh, Caltrain is going to
increase service and we should just fight them tooth and nail and not do
grade separations. I think it’s important for us to acknowledge that Caltrain
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is really the backbone of heavy transit on the peninsula. You know many of
our residents use it to get to work, many folks come down here for work,
and so I think it’s worth acknowledging that Caltrain is expanding and it’s
going to provide more service to our region and to our City but there are
these connectivity and physical barrier issues. So, I would just recommend
that we bring that opportunity in benefit of Caltrain to the front and then
kind of do the butt. That’s my comment on the problem statement. I do
have comments on the other things but you want to just stick with…
Chair DuBois: Yeah, why don’t we just talk about the problem statement?
Mayor Scharff: Yeah, I agree.
Council Member Fine: Just stick to that for now, ok.
Mayor Scharff: Do you want us to wordsmith this right now? Would that be
the easiest thing for you to do or do you want general comments like Adrian
just made?
Mr. Mello: I mean so after this meeting we’ll refine it and bring it to Council
on September 5th so I mean just input into the refinements that you’d like to
see would be sufficient I think, as long as there’s general agreement among
the Committee.
Mayor Scharff: I agree with what Adrian said and I’m perfectly good with
that. I actually think you did a good job on the problem statement. I think
the unspoken part of the problem statement and I know you want to just do
the problem statement but I think it bleeds into this, is when you put down
objectives all the way – bottom is cost minimized right of way acquisition.
I’m afraid that we not talking about that when we look at these grade
separations that it’s up to 50 homes that are taken. I think that if we don’t
make that explicit as we go through this process – you know one of the
things may be minimizing eminent domain, which where’s when you talk
about just right of way acquisition, people think it’s a cost. It feels like we’re
hiding the ball so I do think it’s appropriate just to use the term right of way
acquisition. I want us to be explicative so that people talk about it, that
people – that the community has this discussion. I don’t want to get through
this all and then 50 people’s homes might be taken, plus their neighbors and
that they come out on mass and say we had no idea this was going on so I
think that’s really important. I’m not sure that needs to go into the problem
statement but that is my biggest concern with sort of where we are on this.
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Mr. Mello: If I could, we could certainly change right of way acquisition to
property acquisition or acquiring property or something that is more
explicative under the objectives. In the evaluation criteria, I know you want
to talk about that later but currently minimized right of way acquisition is
shown as a tier three criterion so a recommendation the Committee could
make is to move that to tier one.
Chair DuBois: Or two but I guess a question is do we want to explicatively
say emanate domain?
Mayor Scharff: I don’t know, I just don’t want to be ever accused that we
hide the ball so I wanted them said publicly and I mean I don’t know how we
do it, I just want it to be out there in the public and people start talking
about it.
Mr. Mello: Yeah, so there’s generally two types of property acquisition; there
could be a vulnerary sale to the City and then there could be emanate
domain. I think the emanate domain one is the primary concern if I’m
reading you correctly.
Mayor Scharff: Correct.
Chair DuBois: Yes.
Mayor Scharff: So, I’m good with the problem statement with the comments
that Adrian made, go ahead.
Chair DuBois: Yeah, I think I generally support the comments that both of
you guys made. Maybe a few tweaks to something that Adrian had said but
for me, I feel like we're burying the headline on the problem statement. I
think it – we’re really talking about future impacts and that’s really
understated. It doesn’t come out that no project is not really feasible
because of these future impacts. So, I think that needs to be kind of the
headline and so the very last sentence is some of these issues will continue
to get worse in the future’ I think that’s just very weak.
Mayor Scharff: I agree with you Tom, you’re right.
Chair DuBois: I would split the support of Caltrain sentence with the but and
I would actually lead with that the planned increase and frequency and
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length of trains by Caltrain and High Speed Rail will worsen all impacts. Then
maybe follow that up with the City of Palo Alto benefits from Caltrain service
and we support Caltrain. Again, being really clear that why are we spending
all this money that doesn’t even sound like there’s a big problem here.
Hillary Gitelman, Planning and Community Development Director: If I could
just respond to that last comment. Hillary Gitelman the Planning Director, I
just wanted to let the Committee – make the Committee aware that some of
the very strong responses we got to the citizen questionnaire were on this
subject and they challenged us to acknowledge that some of the impacts, for
example, noise, and vibration, may get better with electrification. So, they
didn’t want us to lump like all the impacts are going to get worse. They
wanted us to be more explicitly about our support for Caltrain service and
acknowledge that while congestion may get worse, other impacts may be
improved in the future.
Chair DuBois: Yeah, I don’t know we quantify that they get better if others –
maybe a little less noise but it’s much more frequently right? So again, we’re
talking about I think more trains and potentially longer trains.
Mayor Scharff: Well it’s east/west connectivity that gets worse, congestion
may actually get a lot better because people will hopefully be taking Caltrain
and not driving.
Ms. Gitelman: But the number of times that the gates come down and traffic
gets congestion…
Mayor Scharff: That’s east/west connectivity.
Ms. Gitelman: Yeah, the congestion associated with that is what (inaudible)
(crosstalk)
Chair DuBois: Something else is you need to be realistic about the volumes.
I mean you’re talking ten times the volume in vehicles and 30,000 people on
the train.
Council Member Fine: I mean this is why I do think that we actually want to
lead with the opportunity a little bit saying the City of Palo Alto is supporting
the modernization of Caltrain, which will result in better service but that will
impact our east/west connectivity, noise, vibrations…
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Chair DuBois: So, that’s the one thing that I disagreed with that in terms of
a problem statement…
Mayor Scharff: You think you want to lead with…
Chair DuBois: … we should lead with the problem, right?
Council Member Fine: I just think people don’t see it get and I think you
articulated well like there is something coming towards us and not doing
anything is not an option.
Chair DuBois: Yeah, the other thing that I would say is that I consider
Stanford and businesses to be parts of the neighborhoods so I wasn’t really
clear what you were suggesting. (Inaudible) Again, that’s my main
comment, that we should really be very explicit that these changes are
coming and they are going to have significant impacts. Do you need
anything more explicitly than that feedback?
Mr. Mello: No, I mean I think we can look at ways to emphasize that more
clearly and also, emphasize that Caltrain is a good thing for the community
in general; the Caltrain service that is provided to Palo Alto and will be
provided with electrification.
Chair DuBois: Great, ok, so let’s move on to the objectives. Want to mix it
up or go in the same order?
Council Member Fine: I’ll lead off, I don’t mind. So, I think these are pretty
good. A few of them, (inaudible) the PTC comments and what you said Josh,
we maybe could knock off; like the bottom on maximizing Palo Alto fair
share of available funding sources, I think we’re always going to do that.
Minimize disruption during construction, I hope we do that every time and I
think that’s kind of goes without saying. The one that I didn’t see here is
kind of – I don’t know the exact phrase but leverage these changes that are
happening and kind of coordinate it with our land use planning and other
opportunities that may arise, maybe even doing a new station plan,
particularly for downtown. I think that there may be an objective there in
terms of saying there are big changes coming, we’re doing a lot of physical
work, lots of upgrades and what are the surrounding land use station
impacts. I think that’s all I’ve got on the objectives for now.
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Mayor Scharff: Let me tell you what I’ve got. I’ve got – I actually think we
should change it to minimize emanate domain and local road closures; I
think that would be helpful. I think we should strike to ensure fairness in
terms of the investments, improvements in North and South Palo Alto and
let me tell you why. We as a community may decide we’re going to change –
close Churchill, which would mean a much less investment in North Palo
Alto. We may decide that we’re going to do a trench which is much higher
investment in South Palo Alto and I don’t think it makes any sense to say
the funding needs to be equal for both and so I think we should strike that.
Chair DuBois: Is that it?
Mayor Scharff: Yeah, I also agree with Adrian about getting rid of the last
two. So, I would get rid of the last three to make that one change. Let me
see, (inaudible) something else. Yeah, I think the rest of its fine.
Chair DuBois: So, a lot of agreement on this, that’s great. I agree with both
of those comments. My main comment was the third bullet, I think
improving circulation access for Alma is a transportation period is an
objective and that’s separating bicyclist is a separate objective. I think in
your report you said that this was somewhat in priority orders, kind of
clustered, so I think it might be good to make that explicit in the workshops
and things because it is a long list. I don’t necessarily agree that we need to
get it down to four items but I think there is some implied priority in this list.
The other thing in the Staff report, you know there’s a sensitivity about
talking about the trench because we’re potentially proposing a scenario but I
think that’s an opposition to this and kind of recognizing the work of the
past. So, I think it would be great if you could find a way in the objectives to
reference the past Community desire – stated desire and Council’s stated
direction has been a trench. We’re starting to look at this new approach just
to acknowledge that past work so we don’t continue to get feedback that is
why are you ignoring this one from a few years ago? I just wanted to
completely drop it in and work it in somehow.
Mayor Scharff: Yeah, I’m fine with that as long as – if it seems that the
trench is not going to be feasible, I don’t want us to be locking in that as an
objective.
Chair DuBois: Yeah, I’m not saying that it’s an objective, I’m just
acknowledging (crosstalk) (inaudible)…
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Mayor Scharff: (Inaudible)
Chari DuBois: …preference, right?
Ms. Mello: I think we could certainly reference the past work and the
community preference for the trench and then clarify that we’ll be going
through a formal alternatives analysis process and we may end up there, we
may not end up there but we’ll think about how to word that.
Mayor Scharff: But at least that gets us starting on the trench work and I’m
good with that.
Council Member Fine: Just one last piece I’m missing from here, I don’t
know again, if this one that goes without saying but to support the City and
Region sustainability goals. There’s nothing in here about that but it’s not
priority one.
Mayor Scharff: Why would we add that? I mean I understand but I mean
we’re trying to…
Council Member Fine: I’m just wondering as we’ve heard about things like –
as we’ve heard about things of – in terms of one -- like there’s the mass
transit aspect of this too. There’s also like the bike and ped stuff, right? I
agree with you Tom that separating bike and ped is not a first order thing.
Chair DuBois: Well, it’s up there but I’m just saying that it’s not the same
(inaudible) (crosstalk)
Council Member Fine: As improving circulation for all modes. There are the
electrification pieces, there’s kind of our construction management in some
of these sensitive areas, there’s all the creek work. I don’t know, I’m not
totally sold on it but it just seems like as I look through this list, that seems
to be one key term we’re missing but we may not need it here.
Mr. Mello: We could potentially expand the one that says to support Caltrain
Service enhancements…
Council Member Fine: (Inaudible)
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Mr. Mello: …to encourage sustainable transportation or something to that
effect, ok.
Chair DuBois: Alright, let’s get moving here. Criteria?
Mayor Scharff: The draft evaluation criteria, right?
Chair DuBois: Yeah. Why don’t we switch up the order? I’ll jump in and then
we’ll go down the line. I didn’t know if we need to call out rail operations at
a tier one. I don’t think anyone is talking about trying to stop Caltrain or
anything. It just seemed not needed, I mean it was just an impression. On
number two, I do think minimizing right of way acquisition should at least be
a tier two, I’m not sure it should be a tier one but a tier two. On – then tier
three, I think we should separate the – well the other part of that; finance
with available funding sources. I think we should have something like
determine funding sources and take steps to start to get them in place. I
think one of the public speakers said making the funding strategy more
explicit and that’s a class one problem.
Mayor Scharff: Yeah so, I…
Mr. Mello: See if I could just jump in so just to be clear. These are criteria
that will be used to evaluate the different alternatives. So, it would have…
Chair DuBois: Sure, ok so (inaudible) (crosstalk) I guess – well, I guess the
other – yeah, maybe it doesn’t belong here. The other part on the cost that I
forgot to mention is the last time in the workshop we threw in a bunch of
potentially new crossings, which may have different sources of funding and I
said it at the last rail meeting that I think we should be really clear about
separation of costs on current grade seps from funding, potentially new
crossings. I think that adds confusion to the process.
Mayor Scharff: I think what Tom – maybe you were trying to get at it a little
bit and I’m struggling with this too on the cost thing. It’s really not cost, it’s
feasibility; it’s cost feasibility. I mean something may be more expensive
and we may choose to do it but it’s feasible where as something may be
totally unfeasible because of the cost.
Chari DuBois: And know what’s feasible requires some analysis of funding
sources but I’m not sure how we capture that.
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Mr. Mello: So maybe finance with feasible funding sources instead of
available because it may very well be that…
Mayor Scharff: That’s what I would say.
Mr. Mello: …they are not available today.
Mayor Scharff: I would just say cost feasibility quite frankly and leave it at
that and knowing just like you’re going to do the work on the trench stuff in
parallel. Jim said we’d start with finance and doing the financing part for
availability. I actually disagree with Tom on the rail operations, I think
support continued rail options on Caltrain service improvements. I think
making that explicit is really important and I do think that we should move
up to minimize – I actually think it's minimized, do away with the word cost
and just say minimize emanate domain and make that a tier two criterion.
Then I’m not so sure we need a tier three criterion. We may just have tier
one criteria and tier two criteria unless you want to break some of these out.
I mean…
Chair Dubois: Well, I mean disruption of (crosstalk)
Mayor Scharff: Right, so we could make – minimize disruption and duration
of construction activities Tier 3.
Chair DuBois: Well, we still have cost feasibility under Tier 3.
Mayor Scharff: But I mean cost feasibility has to be under Tier 1. I think. I
mean if it’s not feasible – in fact, it should be the number one criteria. I
mean if it’s not feasible to do it, we should drop it. I mean that’s – so, I’d
actually make that Tier 1. You disagree?
Chair DuBois: I just think it’s a fund-raising effort so it happens over time
and knowing up front something that is absolutely feasible – it depends –
well, kind of like the order of magnitude of feasibility versus more accurate.
Mayor Scharff: I realize that the term feasible is squishy, right? I mean what
may be feasible for – but I think at the end of the day, that’s sort of a…
Chair DuBois: But until we’ve done the work, it’s hard to know.
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Mayor Scharff: Yeah but you can’t engage on the fund raising and decide
that you’re going to see if it works and then end up not having any grade
separations. You’ve got to have a plan that’s feasible, right? I mean I don’t
think the plan could be hopefully someone will donate the money for
instance. It’s got to be like what we did with the infrastructure.
Chair DuBois: But the plan could involve private money, business impact
money, and a bunch of other things that we haven’t been talking about.
Mr. Mello: If I could just jump in here. So, the evaluation matrix that will be
created using these evaluation criteria will be used to inform the decision-
making process. The matrix itself is not going to make the decision so the
way this could play out is under rail operations, for example, let’s say we get
into a one percent versus a one and a half percent debate with Caltrain and
they say well, we could accept 1.25 percent but not 1.5 percent. The
alternative that has that 1.5 percent would have a lower score under rail
operations because…
Mayor Scharff: (Inaudible) support passenger rail operations.
Mr. Mello: We could certainly… so it’s – basically this is just going to help
facilitate the decision-making process. So, the feasibility of the funding
would be something that would be if we’re building something that only uses
Measure B funding because it only cost $90 million. Let’s say that would
have a high score under funding feasibility but if we pick something that’s
going to require a local referendum that’s – we haven’t done any polling on
and have no idea, that would have a lower score under funding feasibility
but it’s not going to be automatically dismissed because the decision will
ultimately up to Council.
Mayor Scharff: Getting back to what Tom said, what you just said – I don’t
think we should be scoring that until we did the polling. Do you know what I
mean? I mean I – what I don’t want to have happened in this process is we
make decisions with very limited information when we could get better
information. I would actually give you a hard time if you came here and said
we scored this low because we haven’t done polling yet and I’d say well, let’s
go do the polling.
Mr. Mello: That’s exactly probably how it would – I mean we can leave it
blank until we do polling and not score it but I mean I just wanted to be
clear about how this will be used.
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Mayor Scharff: Ok, I just don’t want to get into a situation with the bridge
where we had the entire community go through this, we choose something,
and then we are really rushed for time and we just basically do what the
opposite of CSS; which is we say ok, we’re just doing this grade separation
just like this because we no more time and we need to do it. We had a 5-
year process and we went down the wrong path.
Council Member Fine: I mostly agree with the Mayor. I do think the rail
operations bullet is important, as is something about the financial feasibility
and I think for Tom’s point, that could be a broad feasibility catch at that
point. If we’re going to move the minimize -- I mean the use of emanate
domain for this project into tier two, I agree. I think we can get rid of tier
three and that the construction criteria, minimizing disruption during the
duration of construction activities at a single location; it’s nice to have. I
think we’re going to do that anyway and it shouldn’t just be the one hanging
out in tier three.
Chair DuBois: So, you’re saying to move it to Tier 2?
Council Member Fine: I think that we could strike it and just move the right
of way acquisition of the emanate domain bullet point into Tier 2 and then…
Chair DuBois: So, I guess the one thing that we would be missing and again
I’m ok leaving rail operations in there. It just struck me as we’re going to do
it anyway; that was my only point. The issue of construction disruptions not
only to vehicle traffic but also rail operations are we – do we suddenly…
Council Member Fine: Impact on current (inaudible)
Chair DuBois: (Inaudible) there. I mean are we going to like not consider an
alternative because it has some construction impacts on operations.
Council Member Fine: I mean that’s fair.
Mayor Scharff: That’s fair but I actually liked keeping minimize disruption of
the durations but I was just going to move it to Tier 2.
Chair DuBois: But yeah, I’m ok with that and just have two tiers.
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Mayor Scharff: But if Staff for some reason wants Tier 3, I mean three tiers,
we could break up Tier 2 into Tier 3 and then we’ll have (inaudible)
Council Member Fine: I guess that’s a little persuasive. Maybe that at any
single location is a little funny then. I guess that was making think…
Mayor Scharff: Why don’t we just say duration of construction (inaudible)
Council Member Fine: Yeah, that was making me think we’re not going to
impact a single household so badly for this but I think Tom, your point about
it could like it could be existing service or another right of ways.
Mayor Scharff: Well, if we take that house it won’t…
Council Member Fine: We’ll we’re not going to take that house that’s why
we’re going to try to minimize that.
Mayor Scharff: Exactly.
Chair DuBois: Ok, so I think this is mainly kind of feedback and I don’t know
if we need a Motion. I did have a couple other comments on – so on the
Council meeting on September 5th, what are we taking to Council?
Mr. Mello: I think a Motion from you directing us to incorporate your
feedback into the problem statement, objectives and evaluation criteria that
we present to City Council on September 5th would be helpful.
Mayor Scharff: So, moved.
Chair DuBois: Second. All in favor? Ok, but is that the only thing we’re
taking to Council?
MOTION: Mayor Scharff moved, seconded by Council Member DuBois to
direct Staff to incorporate the Committee’s feedback regarding the problem
statement objectives and evaluation criteria and to present the new versions
to the City Council in September; and
Mr. Mello: Yeah, well we’ll also probably most likely has a discussion about
the process again and we’ll provide the direction that we were given by PTC
and Rail Committee to Council.
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Chair DuBois: The other thing I would just say is that I am pretty concerned
that on the engagement plan around the alternatives, you were saying that
it may not even have the second workshop. I mean the amount of people
that can participate in a focus group on probably one of the most key steps
is making a little nervous.
Mayor Scharff: So, I thought – I’m with Tom. I think we should have – we
should do – I thought the focus group was an additive to be honest, not a…
Chair DuBois: Well, I heard him say that maybe we (inaudible)(crosstalk)
Mayor Scharff: No, no, that’s why I’m supporting you on that.
Chair DuBois: I think we need to think about that.
Mr. Mello: We can do both, we can do a community workshop and focus
groups. I think focus groups will enable us to get a little deeper in the
discussion and spend more time…
Chair DuBois: Yeah, I’m a little bit concerned about even just two meetings
on alternatives and if that’s going to be sufficient.
Mr. Mello: This whole process is designed to be flexible so I think if after
October 21st, we don’t feel like we have closure on the development of the
alternatives, we could have another discussion with the community.
Chair DuBois: So, do we need to add to the Motion the idea about the trench
white paper?
Mayor Scharff: Yes, just add that in.
Chair Dubois: Is that ok?
Council Member Fine: Yep.
INCORPORATED INTO THE MOTION WITH THE CONSENT OF THE
MAKER AND SECONDER to add to the Motion, “Develop a white paper on
trench scenarios, which will address constraints to a longer trench while
providing a more extensive look at the Charleston Meadow trench.”
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Mr. Mello: I just need a clarity; would you like the white paper to focus on
just the trench under Charleston and Meadow or a trench along the entire
corridor?
Mayor Scharff: No, it doesn’t work on the entire corridor. Why would we
spend the time on that? (Inaudible)…
Mr. Mello: So, the white paper...
Mayor Scharff: … can’t go past Oregon, right? I mean that’s what we’ve
been told.
Chair DuBois: I don’t know. I’d be interested in understanding that.
Council Member Fine: Yeah, I would be interested in seeing the entire
corridor and if there is that issue, spelling it out on the white paper.
Mr. Mello: So, Hillary I think wants to jump in but the complexity of a paper
focused on the entire corridor would have – I think it would lead to a longer
turnaround time for the paper. I think we could deliver something on the
Charleston/Meadow one a little bit quicker and go a little deeper than we
could if we were to look at the entire corridor.
Ms. Gitelman: What I wanted to add is maybe tearing off of the Chair’s
comments earlier about constraints. Instead of a white paper that focuses
solely on the trench, I was wondering if we couldn’t broaden it to just be
more about the constraints that we’re going to face along the corridor with
all of these things; particularly with below grade solutions. I mean we’ve
done some work on that in the past but that needs to be re-looked at and
refreshed and it might be a way to make it a little broader than just the
trench at these two crossings.
Chair DuBois: Yeah, that sounds good. I think constraints and maybe if there
are any mitigations for constraints but I think the other part of it was getting
a ballpark of pricing too at some point and costing…
Ms. Gitelman: Yeah, I mean we have that ballpark pricing in the first Mott
McDonald study. We’ll dust that off, take a look at it, and refine it as we can
at this point.
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Mayor Scharff: I think it’s more than that. I’m not actually ok with that
direction. I think I don’t want to have the $10 parking garage because that’s
the best you can dust off. I mean I’m fine with an iteration on this but I
really do think that we need to start honing in on whether or not that trench
is feasible. When we talked about this previously – and look, if you want to
do a light touch across the entire trench and if it is possibly feasible, I’m
interested in it but all the work that came back to us last time indicated that
trench over the entire corridor was not feasible. Now, if that’s changed,
great but let us know but I…
Ms. Gitelman: If I can clarify, I mean that last study which we linked to in
the report you got today concluded that the longer trench was like a billion-
dollar project and the Charleston/Meadow trench or no it was, I’m sorry. The
one percent trench was a billion-dollar project and part of it is, is it went
farther than just Charleston/Meadow. It had to go and impact at the Caltrain
station and the Caltrain under crossing and all that, as well as the Oregon
Express Way under crossing. So, there were all kinds of costs associated
with the fact that it lengthened the footprint of…
Mayor Scharff: So yeah, put all that in the white paper, I agree but let’s not
just stop with the white paper. I mean I think we need to hone in on what’s
feasible in terms of a trench and what’s not.
Mr. Mello: I think a good format for the white paper would be a look at
constraints to a longer trench but then go a little deeper into the
Charleston/Meadow trench and look at sharpening our pencil on the cost
estimate.
Mayor Scharff: Right, that sounds good.
Chair DuBois: So, I know you have a time constraint…
Mayor Scharff: I do.
Chair DuBois: …but if we could quickly get through Item 3 which is the Union
Pacific letter, was that a re-sent?
Mayor Scharff: Was there a re-sent, what do we do?
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Mr. Mello: This is just an informational item for the Committee to show you
that the letter was sent.
Jessica Brettle, Assistant City Clerk: I’m sorry to interrupt. We had a Motion
on the floor and no vote yet on Item 2.
MOTION AS AMENDED RESTATED: Mayor Scharff moved, seconded by
Council Member DuBois to direct Staff to:
A. Incorporate the Committee’s feedback regarding the problem
statement objectives and evaluation criteria and to present the new
versions to the City Council in September; and
B. Develop a white paper on trench scenarios, which will address
constraints to a longer trench while providing a more extensive look at
the Charleston Meadow trench
Chair DuBois: All in favor?
MOTION AS AMENDED PASSED: 3-0 Filseth absent
Interagency Communications
3. Cities’ Letter to Union Pacific to Inform Short-Haul Freight Operator
Request for Proposals (RFP) Regarding Peninsula Grade Separations
NO ACTION TAKEN
Next Steps and Future Agendas
Chair DuBois: Quickly on upcoming schedules and agendas. So, we have
SamTrans hopefully in the next meeting. What else is on the future agenda?
Mr. Mello: We’ll be bringing you an agenda for the September 16th
community workshop. Assuming – I’m sorry, what’s the next date of the Rail
Committee – do you know?
Chair DuBois: I probably have it.
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Mr. Mello: Yeah, so we will be going over the agenda in the planning for the
community workshop on September 16th. We’ll also be recapping what the
outcome was from the Council meeting.
Chair DuBois: So, I have a Rail Committee meeting on September 13th, is
that incorrect?
Mr. Mello: Yeah, I have September 13th from 8-10 on my calendar as well.
Mayor Scharff: So, we are doing one on the 6th or not?
Jessica Brettle, Assistant City Clerk: Currently on the tentative, it’s for
Wednesday, September 13th at 8 AM.
Chair DuBois: Is there a reason to change it?
Mayor Scharff: Oh, you know what, there is a reason to change it. The
issues are that that’s where the League meeting is.
Ms. Brettle: In Sacramento?
Chair DuBois: Can everyone make the 6th? (crosstalk)
Mayor Scharff: We do have (inaudible) but that’s at 3 in the afternoon.
Chair DuBois: Alright so…
Ms. Brettle: September 6th?
Chair DuBois: Yes.
Ms. Brettle: Ok.
Chair DuBois: Make sure…
Ms. Brettle: No problem.
Chair DuBois: … Eric Filseth knows.
Ms. Brettle: I will.
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Chair DuBois: The other thing that you talked about not starting the
Dumbarton Rail letter. I guess since we moved the meeting up, we’ll have
more time but if it’s possible to even outline a draft letter for that meeting, I
think that would be worthwhile. Alright, anything else? Alright, thank you
guys, long meeting, meeting adjourned.
ADJOURNMENT: Meeting adjourned at 11:03 A.M.