pages: PlanningBoard/2008-08-25.pdf, 4
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PlanningBoard | 2008-08-25 | 4 | President Kohlstrand noted that the Transportation Commissioners' intent was trying to draft these documents so they would be more in sync regarding the movement of vehicles, as well as recognizing the need for buses circulating in the City and the need for every street to be pedestrian- and bicycle-friendly. Board member Lynch noted that on his street, parking was allowed right up to the intersection. He noted that children walked across the street from Lydecker Park are not visible because of that parking arrangement, and that it was a quality of life issue. He inquired whether such issues should be included in the plan. Board member Ezzy Ashcraft commended the authors of this report, as well as the public for their comments. She noted that Alameda was growing like every other Bay Area city, and that it cannot remain frozen in time, but she did not believe the small-town character and quality of life should be sacrificed. She noted that the roads did not belong to one particular transportation mode. She had some concerns about significant decreasing levels of service at some intersections. She noted that when an accident occurred in the Tube heading out of town, traffic throughout Alameda backed up. She noted that on page 4 of the Transportation Element Update, Objective 4.1.4 addressed proactive citizen involvement, particularly maintaining a public forum such as the Transportation Commission to facilitate public involvement. She suggested creating a citizen input website so they would not have to wait for the next public meeting. She noted that more off-street bicycle parking was needed, and parking lots should be striped to allow that. Commissioner Krueger expressed concern with page 2.0-3 of the EIR summary, regarding Impact 4.2.1, which discussed traffic delay and the level of service. It stated that there was no feasible mitigation available, thus the resulting level of significance was significant and unavoidable. He was very surprised by that statement, and that the Transportation Commission discussed using transportation systems management and transportation demand management to reduce the number of trips generated and mitigated in that way. He was surprised that was not considered as a mitigation, and would like that to be addressed in the EIR. Similarly, page 2.0-4, for Impact 4.2.5, the claim was that it was significant and unavoidable because there was no mitigation available for the intersection impacts in a cumulative sense. He did not see why Transportation Demand Management (TDM)/Transportation Systems Management (TSM) was considered, which he could understand if it concluded the mitigation was not sufficient; however, it seemed to him that it was not considered at all. He noted that pages 4.2-20 through 4.2-22 indicated mitigation measures TDM/TSM were mentioned, but the conclusion was that the impact would be significant and unavoidable. He did not see how it could be known in advance that the mitigation would fail, and that it could be potentially significant. He inquired what would happen if the traffic on Park Street were given priority, which would preserve the level of service for traffic on Park Street and using the Park Street Bridge, which he believed was the primary objective. He believed that at peak times, there would be a backup on Clement, and people would take alternate routes. He believed that would preserve the Island access, and while people may need to take alternate routes several times during the day. He noted that when the intersection was not at overflow capacity, there would still be there benefits of the Clement Extension. He believed that some of the analysis was somewhat simplistic in examining the Level of Service (LOS) for the entire intersection, rather than prioritizing one direction over another. Page 4 of 9 | PlanningBoard/2008-08-25.pdf |