|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
A preview of Palo Alto government meetings for the week of July 27.
CITY COUNCIL … The council is not scheduled to meet this week.
COUNCIL APPOINTED OFFICERS COMMITTEE … The committee will evaluate four proposals for auditing services. The virtual meeting will begin at 9 a.m. on Tuesday, July 28. View the full agenda here. Those wishing to participate by Zoom can do so by dialing 669-900-6833 and using Meeting ID: 950 2446 5768.
BOARD OF EDUCATION … The school board will hold a special meeting to discuss collective bargaining in closed session and fall opening plans in open session. The virtual meeting will begin at 6:30 p.m. on Tuesday, July 28. The meeting will be broadcast on Cable TV Channel 28 and midpenmedia.org. View the full agenda here. Those wishing to participate by Zoom can do so by going to pausd.zoom.us/j/97888498129 or dialing 669-900-6833 and using Meeting ID: 949 9734 6242.
PARKS AND RECREATION COMMISSION … The commission will hold a special meeting to discuss the residents-only policy for Foothills Park. The virtual meeting will begin at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, July 28. View the full agenda here. The meeting will be broadcast at midpenmieda.org. Those wishing to participate by Zoom can do so by dialing 669-900-6833 and using Meeting ID: 979 3073 5263.
EXPANDED COMMUNITY ADVISORY PANEL …The citizens panel charged with analyzing and recommending plans for reconfiguring Palo Alto’s railroad intersections will hold a special meeting to review the layouts for the underpass options and fact sheets for the Meadow-Charleston crossing and Churchill Avenue crossing. The group will also discuss the summary matrix of all of the grade-separation options. The virtual meeting will begin at 3 p.m. on Wednesday, July 29. View the full agenda here. Those wishing to participate by Zoom can do so by going to Zoom.us or by calling 1-669-900-6833 and using meeting ID 957 5603 637
It would be crazy to even consider opening Foothills Park to the general public during the covid-19 pandemic. It is just the wrong time to even discuss opening Foothills Park to the public and putting our Palo Alto residents at greater risk of infection.
Posted by Harry, a resident of Charleston Gardens
>> It would be crazy to even consider opening Foothills Park to the general public during the covid-19 pandemic.
FHP is at capacity already; we don’t need any more vehicles in the park. And, many trails are getting surprisingly busy– it isn’t all parents of small kids at the lake (although there are huge numbers there also).
They really need to start limiting the number of cars they let in at busy times.
> They really need to start limiting the number of cars they let in at busy times.
Why do you say that?
I think the designers of the Foothill Park facilities did a really great job or limiting the car exposure and building areas to an in/park/out linear footprint that barely interferes or has any effect on the rest of the park.
I am not sure it is a persuasive or definitive argument that there are too many visitors, because some ratio of Palo Alto residents to non-Palo Alto residents could be devised to manage that problem.
The problem would then become, is it fair to Palo Altans for some of us to not be able to go to the park because there are so many allotted spaces for parking and they are going to allow non-Palo Altans in.
Maybe in simple market terms the value of open-space has been overlooked.
I occasionally go to Rancho San Antonio to hike and I notice it is so dry and dusty and the traffic seems ( my uneducated guess ) to be too much. Maybe at all levels we need to raise the amount of money in order to expand our open space instead of quibbling over things that should already be settled.
Posted by CrescentParkAnon., a resident of Crescent Park
>> > They really need to start limiting the number of cars they let in at busy times.
>> Why do you say that?
Specifically, because cars are parked wrong way most of the way from the entrance area down to the curve before the lake/viewpoint Y. (For some reason, the overflow lot between the Y and firestation is ignored. FWIW.)
Anon, thanks for explaining. Sounds like rangers need to ticket people who do not know how to park or where to park.
Posted by CrescentParkAnon., a resident of Crescent Park
>> rangers need to ticket people who do not know how to park or where to park.
TBH, the rangers seem pretty overwhelmed by the massive traffic. I’m sure that they are hoping that the COVID-19 boil will simmer down, but, the virus is not going away, and, the crowds don’t seem to be either.
One thing I haven’t been able to figure out is why the pro-office-space-development folks and the “open it up” folks seem to be so correlated. I’m wondering if there is a hidden agenda, but, I can’t figure out what’s in it for the money-money-money crowd to make the reserve into a “vibrant” urban park. Page Mill is pretty limiting, not to mention all the other barriers. Perhaps a Portland-Oregon style aerial tram from SRP to the Foothill vista point? Probably not cost-effective, but, it could become Palo Alto’s urban “signature”.