Traffic safety is just an important priority as traffic capacity and speed

Where are the electronic signage on our garages that indicate vacant spots?

Where are the simplified methods of paying for parking, apps on phones and parking meters?

Where are the increased shuttle services? Where are the increases in public transport particularly ones that cross city and county borders and the Bay.

Where are parking lots and dedicated shuttles from highway off ramps? Or bus services to airports and the Coast?

There are lots of very practical ways in which to improve parking and traffic, but none are being done. Telling people who have no alternatives to not drive is not a practical solution. Finding alternative means (other than telling them to use bikes or rental scooters) is not providing alternatives.

"Kniss cited her recent trip to Santa Monica, where there is now an abundance of electric scooters on city streets."

The problem I have seen is that most of the rented electric scooters do not ride on city streets but on SIDEWALKS where they have no place among pedestrians. I am all for having the scooter companies come in but only if police commit to enforcing and ticketing those who ride on the sidewalk. I can't see the police ever doing this though as hardly anything seems to rise to the bar of necessary enforcement by the PA police theses days.

I am not sure what the appropriate place is for the scooters to travel but I would guess bike lanes?

NO to preposterous shared, taxpayer sponsored scooters. NO to politicians who favor such nonsense over real-life situations we are in daily here.

As far as I know, the rental scooters that I see in other cities are all owned and operated private for-profit companies. The only assistance from the cities is allowing them to ride in public bike lanes and park at public bike racks.

Liz Kniss is Chairing the transportation Committee! !!!!!! Are you kidding? This is the council person who said traffic congestion isn’t a problem in Palo Alto, you just need to know the back routes. No wonder this town can’t find any solutions when people on the city council have this kind of mindset

Liz Kniss is Chairing the transportation Committee! !!!!!! Are you kidding? This is the council person who said traffic congestion isn’t a problem in Palo Alto, you just need to know the back routes. No wonder this town can’t find any solutions when people on the city council have this kind of mindset

Posted by parent, a resident of Midtown

>> Traffic safety is just an important priority as traffic capacity and speed

One way to improve safety and capacity while limiting top speed, and, reducing -delay- and end-to-end elapsed time, is by implementing synchronized lights. In its simplest form, at rush hour, with block/section-long congestions, all lights in a given direction are green at the same time, allowing the entire mass of cars to move forward at the same time. At quiet times, lights turn green in sequence at the speed limit, allowing cars to maintain a steady speed, and, not "rewarding" speeders. Reduced acceleration and braking saves energy and reduces pollution. Synchronized lights reduce end-to-end travel times while limiting top vehicle speeds. It has more-or-less worked in Los Angeles-- since the demand is basically unlimited there, the effect has been mostly to increase throughput.Web Link

Portland, OR, also has synchronized lights, and is testing smarter implementations that will provide much more adaptive levels of optimization at all times. Web Link

I know there was a plan to implement synchronized lights on University-- was that implemented? -- but, it should be done citywide, AND, coordinated with EPA, MP, and Mtn View as well.

Hey @Anon: All of the traffic signals operated by the City of Palo Alto are synchronized (i.e. coordinated) during peak hours. Coordinated traffic signals cannot fix overloaded streets. They only work when traffic is flowing, which is often not the case on University Avenue.

Posted by Reality Check, a resident of University South

>> Hey @Anon: All of the traffic signals operated by the City of Palo Alto are synchronized

-All- of them? Really? Reference? If that is true, then, why did they make a special announcement about University Ave.?

"I think some of our reports of traffic are really exaggerated," Palo Alto Mayor Liz Kniss said during Monday night's City Council meeting.

Web Link

If Kniss is behind an effort to speed up transportation projects it is not to relieve traffic, it is to remove a roadblock interfering with the continued mad orgy of real-estate development. Any expansion of transportation capacity will simply be used to justify more real-estate development.

According to this report, it sounds like synchronization is a work-in-progress.

Web Link

It sounds like all or virtually all of the signals have been upgraded so that fully synchronized control can be done. It looks like certain corridors and segments have been done.

Even if it means removing a row of houses through eminent domain, University Avenue should be converted into a an 8 lane expressway with a diversion at Middlefield Road whereby Lytton and Hamilton are converted to one-way streets.

I reside near University Avenue and could care less if this were to happen as we are moving from PA to Ketchum, ID. A nice Chinese family made a CASH offer on our home and we couldn't refuse. Palo Alto has now become a residential haven for wealthy overseas expatriates and more will be arriving.

Will send you a postcard from Sun Valley!

Posted by Open Up University Avenue, a resident of Downtown North

>> Even if it means removing a row of houses through eminent domain, University Avenue should be converted into a an 8 lane expressway

"Should"? Why? What moral principle dictates that?

>> "Should"? Why? What moral principle dictates that?

It's not a matter of morality but rather one of practicality.

Either that or place a moratorium on traffic.

Turning University into an express way doesn't help. As they said above, there's no where for the traffic to go. All you're doing is creating an 8 lane parking lot.

University Avenue lights sit on green except during rush hour when they are synced for 20mph. Given the speeding traffic on University, there is a prime opportunity here to make the lights timed permanently. Unfortunately the planning department is, yet again, choosing cars over residents.

There is one city that got traffic right - California City. The secret to their success was building a huge town with no residents.