Meeting gives residents chance to help shape Menlo Park traffic Meeting gives residents chance to help shape Menlo Park traffic (April 28, 2004)

By Rebecca Wallace
Almanac Staff Writer

Next door in Palo Alto, there were both protests and hoots of joy as controversial traffic barriers came tumbling down earlier this month.

Here in Menlo Park, the situation isn't so dramatic -- at present. But the topic is the same: How much traffic is too much? And if it's too much, what should be done about it?

Some residents want barriers on their own streets, while others say traffic flow should be made smoother on main thoroughfares to entice vehicles out of the residential areas. All this is being discussed as Menlo Park hammers out a neighborhood traffic management program through a series of public meetings.

The next meeting is planned for Saturday, May 1, at the Menlo Park Senior Center.

At the first one, held March 27 at Hillview School, about 30 residents mulled over a draft program plan prepared by consultants Kimley-Horn and Associates Inc. The plan includes an approved list of features to manage traffic in the city, such as traffic circles, curb extensions and speed humps. It also lays out a process for residents to petition for these features on their streets.

Guiding the plan is a City Council-approved philosophy stating that the main goals are to improve safety on streets and to protect residents from "disproportionate traffic increases."

Transportation Commissioner Reg Rice, who attended the Hillview meeting, said of Kimley-Horn and Associates, "I agree with pretty much everything they said (in the report)."

Mr. Rice added that he agreed with the plan's approach of looking at the whole area of a proposed traffic-calming project, not just particular streets; that way, a project would not just push cars from one street onto another.

But resident Ross Wilson said he thought the plan set an overly high threshold for people trying to get a traffic-calming study or device in their neighborhood. A resident seeking a study would have to submit to the city a petition signed by 60 percent of the area residents.

Instead, Mr. Wilson argued in an e-mail to the City Council, the city should "publicize the call for a traffic-calming study in a factual document distributed to all residents in the study area, and require at least 60 percent of responders to vote affirmatively."

He added, "Non-responders should be assumed to be neutral -- not against the study."

Others at the meeting were less critical of the 60 percent bar, saying the threshold must be high enough to avoid unpopular traffic-calming features, such as the ill-fated devices on Santa Cruz Avenue that were torn out last year after a public outcry.

Officials are using the meetings to help shape a final draft of the program, which will then go through the Transportation Commission and to the City Council. A council hearing is expected around the end of June.

The May 1 meeting runs from 10 a.m. to noon at the senior center, located at 100 Terminal Ave. For more information, call the city's transportation division at 330-6770 or go to www.menlopark.org.

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