HomeMy WebLinkAbout8/15/2017 Item 16, Teifel
Christian, Kevin
From:John Teifel <johnteifel@gmail.com>
Sent:Monday,
To:E-mail Council Website
Subject:Fwd: Broad Street Bike Blvd - New Idea
Dear City Council Members,
I plan to attend the City Council meeting tomorrow night. I have devised a plan that would divert traffic off of
Chorro and Broad Street onto Santa Rosa Street, making it safer for bicyclists and more pleasant for
residents. The response I received from Jennifer, the traffic engineer, concerned me. It appears that Chorro and
Broad are expected to bear a certain amount of through traffic, as to not overload Santa Rosa and the Santa
Rosa freeway entrances. Also, it appears that Chorro is a main emergency vehicle route. This is concerning,
considering that Chorro is 100% residential, north of US101. It seems that any hopes to reduce traffic on
Chorro street will be rejected, because of these reasons.
I think these two points will be important to bring up during the City Council meeting tomorrow night.
Thank you,
John
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: John Teifel <
Date: Mon, Aug 14, 2017 at 3:47 PM
Subject: Re: Broad Street Bike Blvd - New Idea
To: "Rice, Jennifer" <jrice@slocity.org>
Cc: "Schwartz, Luke" <LSchwartz@slocity.org>
Hi Jennifer,
Thank you for your reply. I will bring it up with City Council tomorrow night.
If I am understanding correctly, here are my two takeaways.
1) Chorro and Broad are expected to take on the load of a significant amount of through traffic, so that Santa
Rosa street and those freeway entrances are not overloaded. Therefore, any alternative that reduces vehicle
traffic on Chorro and Broad by diverting it to Santa Rosa will not be accepted.
2) The fire department and emergency services use Chorro as a response route. If the diversion could still allow
emergency vehicles to cut through, would it be considered? Also, have they studied how many emergency calls
per day require that route and the difference in response time if they used Santa Rosa?
Thank you,
John
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On Mon, Aug 14, 2017 at 1:17 PM, Rice, Jennifer <jrice@slocity.org> wrote:
Hello John,
Thank you for taking the time to put a lot of thought into this. Overall, you are absolutely right that there are
measures that could be taken to divert vehicles off of both Broad and Chorro Streets, which would lead to
ideal conditions for a bicycle boulevard on either of those streets and make the neighborhood a very
comfortable place. This is something I have heard from others throughout this project as well as during the
initial meetings.
While Santa Rosa is a major arterial and is expected to carry a large amount of vehicles, diverting this amount
of traffic from Chorro and Broad Street would increase volumes on Santa Rosa by about 20%. Unfortunately,
this alternative has similar obstacles as closing the on-off ramps at Broad Street—ultimately, the ramps at
Santa Rosa do not have the capacity for that amount of volume and need to be reconstructed prior to shifting
traffic.
The configuration of diverters you propose would not allow fire/emergency access to Broad or Chorro south of
Meinecke/Murray without using Santa Rosa. This segment of Chorro Street is a primary response route. Fire
and emergency services have been a key partner in developing the plans so that their access can be
maintained.
I agree though that there may be opportunities to incorporate additional elements that would encourage some
shift of drivers to Santa Rosa.
I encourage you to share your plans with the City Council. Others within the neighborhood have done similar
things—developed ideas that they see as potential. All of this will be important for Council to see and review.
By no means are the 3 Alternatives perfect in and of themselves. I’m sure you are aware of the significant
tradeoffs to each one. I wouldn’t be surprised if the ultimate plan has a combination of some of these
elements along with others presented by the public.
Sincerely,
Jennifer Rice
Transportation Planner/Engineer
Public Works
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Transportation Operations
919 Palm Street, San Luis Obispo, CA 93401-3218
E jrice@slocity.org
T 805.781.7058
slocity.org
From: John Teifel \[ ]
Sent: Monday, August 14, 2017 12:24 AM
To: Rice, Jennifer <jrice@slocity.org>; Schwartz, Luke <LSchwartz@slocity.org>
Subject: Broad Street Bike Blvd - New Idea
Hi Jennifer and Luke,
I missed the initial meetings when plans and options were devised, but I really think you should consider this
option. I will be at the City Council meeting on Tuesday and hope to discuss this then.
I recently married and moved into a house on Chorro St. near Foothill Blvd. There is constant vehicle
traffic in front of our house, which takes away peace and quiet that anyone would want in their home.
I drive to downtown and other places in SLO, and I also ride my bike along Chorro St. to downtown.
It seems that the biggest deterrent to riding bikes on Chorro St. is the volume of traffic. Although I
haven’t studied the numbers in detail, based on the traffic counts, it is clear that a high volume of
cars travel from downtown SLO to Foothill Blvd via Chorro
St: http://www.slocity.org/government/department-directory/public-works/programs-and-
services/transportation-planning-and-engineering/traffic-data
The traffic volume also contributes to a lot of disturbance for residents. From what I understand from
reading about the 3 Bike Blvd options, the maximum neighborhood traffic volume along Chorro St is
already exceeded and will remain exceeded no matter which option is chosen. This is something that
must be addressed both for bike safety and residential peace.
I designed an alternative that would deflect vehicle traffic to use Santa Rosa Street to get to and
from Downtown and US101. It is simple, low cost, and leaves residents with close to the same
convenience that they have today. This reduced vehicle traffic will provide for safer bike riding along
Chorro and Broad Street. No bike lanes or expensive, fancy freeway overpasses are needed. The
premise of this approach is to make it less convenient for non-residents to use Chorro and Broad to
connect from downtown and US101 to Foothill Blvd. If it is more convenient to go on Santa Rosa,
people will start using that route rather than cutting though the neighborhood.
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Here are the only changes to the streets that need to be made:
Chorro at Murray
Create a diversion that prevents cars from going straight or turning left heading north or south along
Chorro St. through Murray St. (Right Turn Only heading North/South along Chorro.) Cars heading
East/West along Murray may go straight or Turn right. (No left turn) Bicycle and pedestrians may go
any direction.
This may be accomplished by connecting the center side walk that goes along Murray St. to stretch
across Chorro, while leaving a wide enough gap in both directions for Bicycles to pass through.
Broad at Meinecke
Heading South along broad street, left turn only.
Heading North along Broad St, Right turn only.
Heading West along Meinecke, right turn only.
Bicycles and pedestrians may go any direction.
Meinecke at Benton
Heading east along Meinecke, no right turn.
Heading west along Meinecke, no left turn.
Bicycles and pedestrians may go any direction.
This is to prevent people from using Benton as a cut through street, because of the inconveniences
added by the above 2 diversions.
What this does
These simple changes make it slightly less convenient for cars to use Chorro and Broad St. to get to
downtown. With these changes, it will make it more convenient for cars to use Santa Rosa St.
Google Maps Results
For simplicity sake, I will use the starting and ending points that best demonstrate how these
changes affect driver choice of routes. Any other starting and ending points would simply be
expansions of these routes and thus produce the same result.
Chorro at Walnut to Chorro at Foothill
Current State
https://ibb.co/mpFa4v
At 3 minutes, using Chorro St is the fastest route, so drivers choose it.
Potential routes after changes are made
https://ibb.co/mBrtra
https://ibb.co/dynYra
If the above changes are made, it will take drivers 5 minutes to use Chorro and Broad Street to get
from Chorro at Walnut to Chorro at Foothill. Thus, it will be faster for them to take Santa Rosa St. (4
minutes). People tend to take the faster route, diverting traffic out of the Chorro/Broad
NEIGHBORHOODS, onto the main road (Santa Rosa).
I ran out of time, but still need to do a similar comparison for these other routes; however, I expect
the result to be similar, based on the new traffic flow with the proposed changes.
Chorro/Foothill to Chorro/Walnut
Broad/Foothill to US 101S
US 101S to Broad/Foothill
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Chorro/Foothill to US 101S
US 101S to Chorro/Foothill
Best,
John Teifel
johnteifel@gmail.com
(925)451-8401
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