LETTERS LETTERS (May 05, 2004)

Fire district needs to provide information

Editor:

It is the height of arrogance for the Menlo Park fire district to push the new sprinkler ordinance on the city of Menlo Park, while at the same time instructing the fire chief not to comply with the City Council's request for more information, as reported in last week's Almanac.

If this ordinance is such a great idea, why is the district intentionally withholding information from the City Council? Perhaps it's because the sprinker ordinance is a solution in search of a problem in this city, and the facts would bear that out. Menlo Park doesn't need yet another law on its already-thick books.

Brian Schar
Laurel Avenue, Menlo Park

Appreciation for Fleishhacker's conservation easement

Editor:

I am writing to acknowledge the generosity of the Fleishhacker family in donating a conservation easement on their magnificent estate, Green Gables, to the Garden Conservancy. Their foresight and thoughtfulness will protect one of America's great homes and gardens and help to preserve Woodside's unique and very special rural character. We who are fortunate to call Woodside our home have a great deal to be thankful for: Our friends and neighbors, our beautiful surroundings, and for people like the Fleishhackers, who demonstrate a commitment to both the past and the future, and who share the value of preserving open space. Thank you Country Almanac, for letting us know about the Fleishhacker family's contribution to our community. It's great to read some good news.

Karie Thomson
Mountain Home Road, Woodside

Council defined values in easing art ordinance

Editor:

Last September I wrote that the Menlo Park City Council would define its values when it decided whether to compel John Conway to beautify his Chevron station or to allow him merely to pay an in-lieu fee.

The council has now acted. By caving in to Conway's obdurate opposition to decorating the barren Oak Grove Avenue frontage of his station, the Council has made it clear that neighborliness is obsolete.

Whether repeal of the beautification ordinance is a quid pro quo for Conway's support of the council majority is secondary. The decision stands with the revised remodeling ordinance as the quintessential embodiment of the new prevailing ethic: whatever I can grab by "objective standards" is mine and too bad for everyone else who might be affected.

If Menlo Park residents react to this latest development by withholding their patronage from the Conway Chevron station, maybe he and the City Council will both learn that civil selfishness doesn't pay.

James R. Madison
Holly Avenue, Menlo Park

Child care site is close to noisy trains

Editor:

The plan to renovate the old Menlo Park Police Department and make it a child care center is within a 660 feet of the Caltrain tracks, a hazardous noise area. Injurious train horns, described as having the same effect as low-flying aircraft and emergency sirens, can result in a severe impact upon the unprotected.

The document "Questions and Answers on Train Horn Noise" is available at the Web site of the Federal Railroad Administration at http://www.fra.dot.gov and a copy has been given to the city staff and reference library. The train noise levels also far exceed the Dept. of Housing and Urban Development standards.

Should millions of dollars be spent along the railroad corridor to house and provide recreation for residents unless and until "quiet zones" are established under the criteria of the Federal Swift Railroad Act? Many other references on the dangers of noise are available at the League for the Hard of Hearing at www.lhh.org/noise. At that site and all over the world April 28 was designated as Noise Awareness Day, but who cared?

Perhaps acoustic violence is what is wrong in our schools and with society in general.

Margaret Petitjean
Waverley Street, Menlo Park

E-mail a friend a link to this story.