Can Palo Alto eliminate all road fatalities over the next decade?
That’s the vision of its newest plan, which proposes a host of strategies and projects to make driving, biking and walking through the city safer. A draft of the plan was released to the public this month.
Known as the Safety Action Plan, the document aims to change how the city plans for transportation improvements, with a greater focus on road segments with a documented history of collisions and greater urgency in areas where collisions tend to be associated with serious injuries or fatalities.
Created by Fehr & Peers, the master plan has three goals: prioritizing projects in the high-injury network, reducing the likelihood of crashes citywide for vulnerable users and removing barriers to using proven safety tools, according to the document.
It pays particular attention to the city’s “high-injury network,” which includes major arteries such as Embarcadero Road, Middlefield Road, Oregon Expressway and El Camino Real. It also includes segments of Meadow Drive, San Antonio Road, Charleston Road, all just east of El Camino, as well as a segment of Foothill Expressway between Arastradero Road and Page Mill Road.
To compile its list of projects, consultants leaned on collision data and results from an interactive survey that residents were invited to fill out earlier this year.
The master plan found that between 2019 and 2022, Palo Alto was the scene of 1,132 crashes that involved injuries on its roadways. The goal, according to the document, is to “fundamentally shift the way the City of Palo Alto addresses safety risks and concerns, by reflecting on systemic changes needed to institutionalize safety,”
Reducing the speed of cars is a key component. The plan points to U.S. Department of Transportation data showing that when a person is hit by a car that is going 20 mph, the collision has a 10% chance of resulting in a fatality. The odds go up to 40% when the car is going 30 mph and to 80% when the car is at 40 mph.
The city’s crash data between 2018 and 2022 showed a significant drop in road collisions over that four-year span, thanks in large part to declining vehicle traffic during the pandemic. The data, which came from the Transportation Injury Mapping System developed by University of California, Berkeley, showed 384 collisions in 2018 and 332 in 2019. These included the nine collisions in 2018 and 15 in 2019 that involved fatalities of serious injuries. The number of total collisions dropped to 164 in 2020, when car volumes dropped precipitously because of the pandemic, with 13 serious or fatal collisions reported that year. After rebounding to 192 collisions in 2021, with eight serious or fatal collisions, the number fell to 87 in 2022, with two involving fatalities or serious injuries.
Many of the injuries from these crashes over the five-year time span were borne by pedestrian and bicyclists, who made up 32% of all crashes but 51% of those that involved fatalities or serious injuries.
“This highlights the vulnerability of pedestrians and bicyclists among road users,” the plan states.
Data shows that the most common types of crashes in Palo Alto are broadside collisions, where the front of one vehicle hits the side of another vehicle that is going in a different direction and rear-end collisions. Broadside collisions made up 37% of all crashes and 23% of all collisions that involved fatalities and serious injuries. Rear-end collisions made up 28% of the total crashes and 9% of those that involved serious injuries and fatalities. Head-on collisions, while relatively rare (making up 7% of the total) were particularly dangerous, resulting in 15% of all those that involved serious injuries and fatalities. Similarly, collisions between a vehicle and a pedestrian made up 7% of the city’s total but 17% of those that involved serious injuries or fatality.
According to police data, unsafe speed, improper turning and vehicle right-of-way violations were the most commonly cited factors in overall crashes, with each contributing to more than 15% of the total crash numbers. When it comes to fatalities and serious injuries, improper turning and driving under the influence were the most common factors, the report states.
While dedicated bike lanes have often proven contentious in Palo Alto, the roughly 760 respondents who filled out the survey as part of the planning process strongly back such a measure. Results showed 92% of the respondents agreed that pedestrian and bike safety should be prioritized over on-street parking and 86% suggested they would favor reducing the number of lanes or parking to enhance safety for pedestrians and bicyclists, according to the consultants.
Some of the priority projects in this network are already rolling out. These include the ongoing effort by the state Department of Transportation to replace parking spaces all along El Camino Real with bike lanes.
After initial resistance from local business owners and city officials, the City Council voted in June to endorse a revised plan for El Camino that featured turn restrictions in school corridors, wider bike lanes and other safety measures along the state highway. The plan also prioritizes pedestrian, bike and transit improvements through the intersection of Quarry Road and El Camino Real, near El Camino Park. Stanford University has already committed to extending the transit road through the park and improving bike paths, a project that received a lift when voters overwhelmingly approved Measure D.
Other projects would be relatively new and potentially contentious. The plan calls for upgrading bicycle infrastructure on East Meadow Drive, an area where the city had once pursued dedicated bike lanes using a $919,000 grant from the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority. The city ultimately abandoned the project in 2021 after an outcry from area residents about loss of parking and the council’s concerns about staff resources and the tight grant timeline. Council members also doubted that the existing bike traffic on the segment east of Middlefield Road justifies the loss of parking.
The new plan recommends resurrecting that effort. One of its proposals is protected bike lanes on East Meadow Drive.
The master plan also proposes various modifications to Middlefield Road in the Midtown area, including sidewalk enhancements and improvements to transit stops and traffic signals between Oregon Expressway and Loma Verde.
In the northern half of the city, the new plan prioritizes pedestrian improvements along Alma Street, between Embarcadero Road and Lytton Avenue. These include the busy intersection of Alma and Churchill, which is frequently used by Palo Alto High School students, and which is already seeing some upgrades as part of a collaboration between the city and Caltrain.
Another Paly-adjacent project calls for modifying traffic signals, realigning the sidewalks and adding high-visibility crosswalks and traffic calming measures on Embarcadero Road, west of Emerson Street. The plan states that future construction would also include “a stairway on the north side of the undercrossing with a bike tunnel and implementation of bike facilities west of the Embarcadero Road underpass.”
In addition to specific projects, the plan advocates for a broader commitment to a “safe systems” approach, which it called a significant evolution in how roadway safety is conceptualized.”
“This is a shift in thinking on how to improve roadway safety; instead of a primary focus on shifting behavior through education campaigns or enforcement, it encourages roads, vehicles, and policies that are intentionally designed to prioritize safety,” the plan states. “It involves building layers of redundancy that function as safety nets for users – even if someone makes a mistake on the roadway, the system as a whole minimizes the likelihood of serious injury or death through measures such as decreased speeds, advanced vehicle safety technologies, separation among roadway users in time and space, and better post-crash care in the case of injuries.
“Some crashes will still happen, but under the Safe System Approach, they won’t be nearly as devastating,” the plan states.
The document will be vetted over the next two months, with the Planning and Transportation Commission scheduled to consider it in late January before it goes to the City Council for review in February. Residents have until Feb. 14 to submit comments on the draft plan.
In discussing the effort earlier this year, planning commissioners lauded the goals of the project but warned about the unintended consequences that may come from some of the projects floated in the plan. Commissioner Allen Akin argued at the Feb. 28 meeting that new traffic calming measures should not push traffic to neighboring streets.
This is already happening in the downtown area, where neighborhoods such as Crescent Park, Community Center and Professorville have been experiencing traffic increase from drivers avoiding University Avenue.
“We don’t want to, by adopting traffic measures that cause traffic to be moved rather than be reduced, to create a perverse increase in the number of hazards,” Akin said.
With regard to East Meadow, can we please bulldoze the failed roundabout at Meadow and Ross and replace it with a normal intersection. There is an excellent video of an analysis done by a local resident of the dangers inherent in the existing configuration. Notwithstanding the signage that by itself is ineffective, cars approaching the intersection believe that it’s around about. They don’t see the stop sign. They don’t see the sign indicating of the Cross traffic doesn’t stop. I have on three occasions been on Ross and had vehicles from East Meadow essentially cut me off, one almost hitting me, because they expected me to give them the right of way. I’ve also seen a bicycles drive right in front of me and another bicyclist almost hit by another car. This roundabout was built with good intentions, but it fails for many reasons. And the current attempts to make it work just add more confusion. Let’s just get rid of it.
Site lines are dreadful at the non roundabout. If you are stopped at the stop sign before the crossing there is no way you can see approaching vehicles on Ross from either direction. The fact that they don’t stop makes it worse when I have already committed myself to enter the non roundabout.
Drivers need to slow down. Excess speed is our main problem. But with no traffic enforcement, no one is going to slow down.
And an aside: The article says, “After inicial resistance from local business owners and local officials,” the city went ahead and eliminated parking on ECR (or, as the article states, “widened bike lanes.” ) The resistance still very much exists, FYI.
To say that the major problem is speed is wrong. It is undoubtedly a problem but not the main problem. We do have a traffic flow problem and with the new fastrack lanes on 101 causing slowdowns, many drivers are opting to stay on surface streets long as a faster way to travel. People have changed their commute routes to avoid 101 and that has put pressure on nearby residential streets. We also have many choke points that slow traffic causing more than one light sequence at many of our intersections. Moving traffic efficiently should be a priority and that means getting rid of choke points.
My suggestions would include getting school buses back and bringing back the shuttle and better transportation. We should also have bicycle traffic signals which can be used at school commute times in various points around town.
Bike riders and pedestrians could also do a lot to keep themselves safe when sharing the road with motorized vehicles. Stop signs are ignored by many on bikes and when a bike and a pedestrian both need to cross each other’s path there is often a “dance” or “race” to avoid collisions. Bikes must give way to pedestrians and pedestrians must be more alert to other road users. Their best protection measure is to pay attention when crossing the street and if it isn’t safe then stay on the sidewalk!
As for bikes we now have the added nuisance of Ebikes which travel at much faster speeds and often by children too young for drivers licenses. The likelihood of more of these on the school commutes after the holidays is high. We still have dark evenings and children are still riding bikes without lights after 5 pm and they are almost invisible. Dog walkers often light up their dogs better than parents light up their children.
So let’s put the blame in the correct places. Collisions happen for many reasons, one being speed, but also visibility issues and unpredictability from bikes and pedestrians is high up there.
It didn’t take long for the “those darn cyclists and pedestrians” folks to come out. May I add the red light runners, morning fogged windshielders, stop sign blindeys, phone jockeys, speeders, ignorers of the three foot rulers? All those folks are in a steel cage with thousands of pounds of mass, and their insurance protects them if they hurt someone, the prosecutors find reasons to under-charge, so impunity reigns with SOME folks. Not all folks. We all know there’s little actual political will around true enforcement of traffic laws. “A ticket for ME?!? No no no. Enforcement is for THEM.”
None of this will help if there is no enforcement. I bet if the city consistently enforced traffic laws it would save us a ton of money instead of wasting it on these projects.
When CalTran held a meeting on Feb. 29th at PALY to give a presentation on intent to have bike lanes installed on the highway El Camino Real never did Nick Saleh mention that this was a done deal. He said CalTran wanted buy in from Palo Alto’s city council. The council was in fact lobbied hard by SVBicycleCoalition and others including nonresidents who desired the commuter corridor.
The public was never informed of the truth that the council’s vote was immaterial just a cosmetic gesture. CalTran had decided to have bikelanes with or without approval from the council. It would ‘look better’ if the council agreed to bikelanes in their view. So Burt and Stump told the council and the public that the decision to have bikelanes rested solely with CalTran. Then why were residents and businesses led to believethat the council had the authority to block bikelanes on the El Camino Real?
If we want safety then keep cyclists, ev scooters, ev cyclists and skakeboarders off the El Camino Real.
The city of Palo Alto led residents and businesses astray by agreeing to go along with CalTrans. NOW you talk about safety?
“While dedicated bike lanes have often proven contentious in Palo Alto, the roughly 760 respondents who filled out the survey as part of the planning process strongly back such a measure. Results showed 92% of the respondents agreed that pedestrian and bike safety should be prioritized over on-street parking and 86% suggested they would favor reducing the number of lanes or parking to enhance safety for pedestrians and bicyclists, according to the consultants.”
We need additional data. Which respondents favored bike lanes? Businesses? Employees of those businesses? Customers of those businesses? Car commuters? Or members of the bicycle coalition? Or didn’t the consultant bother to ask?
Does CalTrans know how many driveways there are along El Camino, which will present dangers to cyclists in the new bike lanes — and to cars pulling in and out? I tried to find out and they did not have the answer!!
I know many cyclists. Two of the most avid — who own $15,000 bikes! and one of them rode 20 miles to work before he retired — say they would never ride on El Camino regardless of the type of bike lane. None of the parents I know would allow their kids to ride bikes on El Camino even if the bike lanes have bollards.
Governments have lost sight of reality. It’s all about virtue signaling. People are not going to get out of their cars to ride bikes or take public transit.
Drivers aren’t the bad guys. Bicyclists will continue to ride no-hands while looking at their phones. Pedestrians will cross streets glued to their phones. Drivers will look at their phones and giant screen displays. Vision Zero is wishful thinking, but very profitable for consultants.
“Vision Zero is wishful thinking, but very profitable for consultants.”
Indeed. And we’re paying for these fairy tales in soaring utility rates, delusional spending of $43.000,000 to widen University Ave sidewalks while eliminating parking spaces AND pretending that it will be quicker and easier for people to parallel park instead of using angled parking, ridiculously flawed surveys with unbelievable results …
PA just LOVES to destroy businesses in the hopes of reducing car travel and removing parking and then they pay more consultants to study why retail is so bad.
Solution: hire more consultants, reduce the number of lanes, shove more vehicles into the reduced lanes, wonder why accidents continue — hire more consultants who recommend more of the same.
It is about time that Palo Alto updated their policies to bring them into line with state and federal policies in this regard. I enjoyed a quote from Pete Buttigieg in the document. Some of the comments above display the defeatist thinking and acceptance of hazards to which he refers:
“We need a national change in mentality. It is time for a transformation in how people think about road safety. Together, we can act to change the culture and expectations. We are so accustomed to hazards on our roads that we
sometimes behave as if the risks of today’s roadways are inevitable. But they’re not. People should leave the house and know they’re going to get to
their destination safely. Once we believe that, and believe in our ability to collectively make progress, once we demand better, we will see more positive
changes cascading across governments and industry.”
I believe Americans are not held to a serious standard when it comes to the drivers license test compared to England and France. Safety is a priority in those countries.