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Pleasanton city officials are scheduled to hold a community meeting Monday evening to receive public input on the draft calming program for Junipero Street and Independence Drive.
The presentation follows 10 steering committee meetings during which the program was developed, according to city traffic engineer Mike Tassano. It is expected to head to the City Council for approval in September or October.
“The plan has a series of speed lumps and a radar speed sign along with added crosswalks,” he said. “In addition we are proposing a major modification to the Bernal at First/Sunol intersection — arterial intersection improvements are not commonly associated with traffic calming programs, but in this case, the majority of the cut through traffic is trying to avoid this intersection.”
Monday’s community meeting is set for 6-7 p.m. in the council chamber at the Pleasanton Civic Center, 200 Old Bernal Ave. For more info, call 931-5669.
Amazing so much money is committed to traffic calming by the City on relatively new streets. Try Valley between Santa Rita and Stanley where all traffic, city vehicles, delivery trucks and big rigs funnel to Stanley and Livermore!!! The curve at Busch has had big trees hit and knocked down. Despite the Iron Horse Trail, I guess the unspoken acknowledgement by city leaders is not enough residents are impacted in this immediate block to make it worth while to evaluate and build traffic calming here. We should not wait for the East Side to develop to make the developers fix it. We needed it years ago.
Build apts at mission park, narrow junipero to 1 lane and 1 direction just like that Brainstorm idea the city allowed on Owens, call it a “test” and re-evaluate in a year.
MAP – i dont disagree with re-evaluating Owens in a year since it will cost taxpayers at this point to change it. I think a neck down at the BART cross walk to the new apartments and Oracle could make sense. If drivers are impatient, go back to Hopyard to get on the freeway or drive Gibraltar to go south.
I would appreciate reader feedback on my initial comment to have traffic calming and ofher improvements on Valley between Santa Rita and Stanley. This stretch of street has no outlets for heavy traffic volume going towards Livermore or coming from I84. Bicycle lanes are also needed under the ACE bridge but traffic flow also needs improvement to lessen backups and occasional Stanley and Valley accident gridlock. Thanks.
LANCE – there are almost 400 residents in Ironwood whose ONLY access is from Busch Road. That includes 200 seniors living in an apartment complex. We share Valley which is a major connector street for the commuters going back and forth to Livermore. Come over and check out our neighborhood during non-summer vacation commute hours so you will understand my comments.
LANCE- there has been a fatal bicycle acident and two or three bad bicyclist mishaps. I know of two street trees being knocked down. Plus several vehicle accidents at the Busch and Valley intersection. I myself was broad-sided at Santa Rita and Valley by someone rushing to make the signal so they did not have to wait for the long cycle. There are improvements that could be made to lengthen turning lanes and obtain bicycle lanes. Again, we have only one way in and out, and that is from Valley when MohrMartin neighbors denanded Mohr Avenue not be extended to El Charro or Busch. Or when Las Positas residents demanded that street not be extended.
If you really wanting calming down on Valley (which I agree it is nuts through there) then you need to organize the neighborhood, you need to pound some pavement, knock on all the doors and get a bunch of signatures from your neighbors. One phone call or just complaining on this thread will not do it. If you do want change then you will have to get involved. It’s what it took to get some calming done on Black Ave and I’m sure someone in the Junipero-Indepence neighborhood took the bull by the horns. Black Ave took 6 steering committee meetings and two council meetings where 6 neighbors volunteered for steering committee and a couple of us also knocked on all the doors on the street to make it happen. It won’t happen by magic, you have to do it yourself. If you don’t like the traffic situation then do something about it.
ERIC – wanting feedback and sharing my concerns in a blog falls way short of getting a diatribe about getting involved . Im sure you meant it constructively but of course posting a single comment wont change things. And I will complain, thank you very much. I love how I share concerns and get a response tantamount to I dont know what Im talking about to being chastised That is what Pleasanton has become. Signing off.
I think a lot of the problems on Valley near Stanley are caused by the city; specifically all the fricken traffic lights there. Try going from Vintage Hills and you have the light at Valley/Vineyard, the new light at the new apartments at Valley/Stanley, Valley/Stanley, Valley/Boulder, Valley/Busch, Valley/Quarry Lane, Valley/Kolln, Valley/Santa Rita.
It is a race track there. When you are at one of the red lights and it turns green, you have to floor it to make the next light before it turns red and keep running to get through another green light as it turns red as you pass through.
There are WAY too many traffic lights in a small stretch with absolutely no priority given to those going straight.
If you want traffic calming on valley and Santa Rita then go with the red light cameras at every intersection and put PPD motorcycle officers back at that intersection to nail those suckers running the left turn red light from southbound Santa Rita to eastbound Valley, PPD used to patrol that spot a lot, guess they are too busy with the uptick in crime at the mall and surrounding neighborhood . Maybe our traffic engineer needs to step up and time our signals better, tired of coming to an intersection and get the red light whenno cross traffic is in sight, what’s up with that?
“I guess the unspoken acknowledgement by city leaders is not enough residents are impacted in this immediate block to make it worth while to evaluate and build traffic calming here.”
Perhaps it is because there are no residents on that road? There are no houses that have an entrance onto that section of road. Ad in the area of Busch, there are no houses anywhere near the road
“I would appreciate reader feedback on my initial comment to have traffic calming and ofher improvements on Valley between Santa Rita and Stanley.
I do not see any need for traffic calming on that section of road. It is a thoroughfare section of road, designed to hold the kind of traffic that it is holding. There’s really not a lot you could do there to change or improve the patterns, although it would seems like there could be improvement to the traffic light during peak times, but I have to assume that they evaluate this on a regular basis.
I would say that our signal timing across the whole city is bad. The lights seem to give priority to pedestrians (meaning that if the light is in a properly timed cycle and a pedestrian hits the button it immediately changes for the pedestrian). This doesn’t happen and some of the bigger intersections (Valley/Santa Rita) but seems to happen at most of the other ones. I drive across Stoneridge a lot and those lights can be miserable.
Bella – I understand you concerns but most of those have nothing to do with “traffic calming”. The intersection at Valley/Santa Rita can not be improved with traffic calming devices. It seems what you want is not traffic calming but a new traffic design.