Around Town Around Town (March 23, 2005)

LIFE HAS UPS AND DOWNS, BUT ... Two longtime Palo Altans, architect John Northway and planning consultant Carol Jansen, had visions of permanent entombment in an aged elevator in early March. The two were inspecting a mostly vacant apartment building for a client in Belmont in early March and decided to take the elevator to the second floor. The door opened. They stepped inside the smallish space, and pushed the button. The door closed. Nothing. After a few seconds they looked at each other. They tried pushing the door-open button, other buttons, banging on the door, attempting to force it open. Nothing. And no one seemed to be anywhere around. Visions of entombment, of missing-persons reports ... Finally, fully alert but "not panicked," yet, Northway decided to try to remove the small trap door in the ceiling. Jansen, summoning up her best Yoda-esque willpower, managed to give him an interlaced-fingers stirrup boost and he was able to get up through the small square. The second-floor elevator door was within reach, and Northway banged on it. That did something, perhaps to a sticky switch, and the elevator jarred into action, cables rattling above Northway's head as Jansen shouted at him from below to "get down." No panic, just extreme urgency. "My first thought was that building codes require three feet of headroom above an elevator," Northway recalled. "Then I wondered whether the building codes were in force when the elevator was built." He started down but got stuck part way. With Jansen tugging from below, he managed to drop down just as the elevator stopped. The door opened onto the second floor, and they dashed into the hallway, hearts pounding and breathing hard. They took the stairway down.

OLD HERITAGE OAK SAGS ... City tree experts rushed to provide emergency care for a huge old "heritage" oak tree that started sagging during last weekend's heavy rains until it was leaning heavily on the Red Cross building at 400 Mitchell Lane, near the Caltrain station in downtown Palo Alto. Some strategic major pruning lightened the tree's tons of weight, grown over about two centuries, according to city Arborist Dave Dockter. Red Cross officials had to enter the building Monday morning under a large limb, and happily found no interior damage. Red Cross Director Trish Bubenik late Sunday night had sent an urgent e-mail to Dockter, notifying him that police dispatchers had notified the Red Cross's Disaster Action Team to notify them of the downed tree. A large limb prevent it from landing fully on the building, and smaller branches damaged a metal screen of a rooftop air conditioner. Bubenik asked if there is "any way to trim and resettle our gorgeous old tree -- our old friend and roost of our resident hawk, and golden eagle." She said it is obvious the roots loosed "right next to the new handicapped parking lane."

WOMAN OF THE YEAR ... Longtime Palo Alto environmentalist Nonette Hanko was among 80 women honored in Sacramento last week, for being named "Woman of the Year" in new Assemblyman Ira Ruskin's district. Each legislator gets to name a woman of the year from their district. The women were feted in the Capitol building. Maria Shriver -- wife of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger -- exhorting them to keep up the good work to better society. Hanko is best known for being a principal founder of the Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District a third of a century ago. She still serves on the board. "Without her visionary leadership, the Midpeninsula area today would not have nearly 50,000 acres of permanently protected open space," Ruskin said of her efforts. " I accept this honor for the thousands who voted the Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District into existence in Santa Clara County in 1972, in San Mateo County in l976, and to the coast of San Mateo County in 2004," Hanko said of the award, acknowledging her children and grandchildren in attendance. But, she added, "This award is really for the earth's wild creatures and forests and fields, who have no voice and have no vote to protect the wonderful creation they call home."

LIBRARY REOPENING ... The College Terrace branch of the Palo Alto library system was scheduled to reopen on Tuesdays this week. The library had closed one-day-per-week last fall due to a librarian's emergency illness.

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