Blank4/16/07

From: Don Barnby

To: Menlo Park City Council Members

Subject: City Council Regular Business Agenda for 4/17/07

To help keep the Council meeting brief, I’d like to summarize here the issues related to the proposal made in the citizens’ petition signed by 50 residents (representing 100% of the homes with drivers).

The proposal was made to resolve two significant traffic safety matters:

            1) Because of cars, SUV’s and trucks parked along El Camino Real in front of Celia’s restaurant, it is difficult to see onrushing El Camino traffic

                 in order to make a safe left turn from Spruce Ave. onto El Camino.

            2) When the parking lane in front of Celia’s restaurant is empty, many northbound drivers on El Camino mistake it for a driving lane because

                 a third driving lane does indeed commence just north of Spruce Ave. Consequently they move to the right prematurely and sometimes pass on

                 the right of cars in the proper driving lane as they seek to turn right into Spruce; other northbound drivers mistakenly think that drivers making a right

                 turn onto Spruce from the rightmost driving lane are turning from a center lane and shout, honk, or give the “finger” in anger. It’s truly hazardous.

The citizens’ proposal addresses both of these hazards, and it does so at very low cost as follows:

            1) Eliminate all parking in front of Celia’s restaurant (red curb (and signage if needed).

            2) Paint white diagonal stripes in the no-park lane in front of Celia’s.

This proposal may not be ideal (an automatic stop light would be ideal) but it would greatly reduce the two hazards.

Staff has recommended removing all but one parking space, which helps with item 1 but still leaves blocked vision at this truly unusual and difficult intersection; and it has recommended against the proposed striping solution to the second hazard. Their reasons against the striping are two-fold: first, such striping is not “typical;” second, striping requires maintenance. Lost in these arguments is the acknowledged fact that the street, curb, and sidewalk at that point in El Camino are under the jurisdiction of Atherton.

Two other points worth mentioning: First, more than one resident of Spruce Ave., as they signed the petition, commented that eliminating five parking spaced in front of Celia’s would perhaps add five vehicle to Spruce Ave’s. parking burden, but they also said that they felt the safety at the intersection was far more important.

Second, the owner of Celia’s has objected. I would point out, however, that virtually 50% of his customers (those going south on El Camino) must also negotiate the hazards of the intersection because Spruce Ave. is the only exit for southbound customers who park in his own parking lot or on Spruce Ave. I understand his desire to promote his business, but I doubt that he would want to indemnify his customers against the hazards they face at that intersection, to say nothing of the risk to the general traffic along El Camino and Spruce.

The Spruce-El Camino intersection is a unique situation – there is none other like it along El Camino in Menlo Park or Atherton. The low-cost solution proposed may not be “typical,” but that’s OK if it does the job.

What the citizens respectfully ask of the Council is that they approve a resolution requiring that a letter be sent to Atherton, and that such letter: 1) favor elimination of all parking spaces in front of Celia’s, 2) favor the diagonal striping in the no-parking lane, and 3) make such request enthusiastically and forcefully for the good of all citizens who drive on El Camino and Spruce Ave. and who frequent Celia’s. I assume that such letter would include a copy of the original petition, signatures, and cover letter.

Please do not water down the citizens’ requested solution. It is not uncommon for deliberative bodies to change things and incorporate their own imprimatur, but keep in mind that we still have to run the gauntlet at Atherton’s deliberative body, which may have temptations along those lines.

Thank you.