I couldn't agree more with the argument that dedicating one third of ECR's lanes to a bus that runs once every ten minutes is poor utilization of our public roadways.

I think that whomever suggested this from the VTA should drive down El Camino between 2 and 5 pm any week day when there is roadwork or anything occurring that narrows it down to 1 lane. They would realize what a very poor idea this is. Any slight disruption on Mtn Views current 2 lane on each side of the median creates havoc. I cannot imagine what would happen if it was everyday. No matter how hard VTA wishes for it, people who drive in this area are not going to take the bus to their jobs, errands etc. or they would already be doing it. City council please shelve this terrible idea ! Thank you

This is nuts. No one wants to spend 52 traveling on a bus from Palo Alto to San Jose on El Camino any more than they want to spend 60 minutes driving down El Camino. They woud just drive down 101 to 87 in 15-20 minutes.

Look, either connect BART or Light Rail, or forget it. But leave the three lanes each way.

The people proposing this have obviously never traveled through El Camino and Grant/Castro/Shoreline at 8AM or 5PM.

Hm. Give up 1/3 of the lanes for a bus that goes 23% faster than the current express bus.

The BRT would take 52 minutes and a car would take 60 minutes because the cars would have 1/3 fewer lanes than today.

We already have dedicated lanes for public transit: Caltrain. We already have dedicated lanes just for cars: Central Expressway. We already have bike boulevards running in that direction. All of this within a few blocks from El Camino, the Caltrain stops in Mountain View are even identical to the ones VTA proposes for BRT.

If VTA has so much money to spend, invest it in improving CalTrain, Central Expressway and the bike boulevards that run parallel to El Camino.

"VTA staff said a trip from Palo Alto to HP Pavilion on the line would take BRT 52 minutes, while it could take 60 minutes by car and 67 minutes by the current express bus line 522, which would be replaced by BRT."

Well THERE is your answer right there! You're only saving us 8 minutes? That is not near worth the pain of reducing 2 lanes on ECR. Traffic would be a nightmare. Business would suffer. You'd punish those that have to drive their cars to work.

A miniscule impact on helping the environment and no impact on saving time. Horrible idea.

This will happen because people with common sense sit back and assume rational thinking will prevail while special interests staff all the city committees and continue with the displacement of our quality lifestyle with a high density city. These Fascists believe they are saving the planet by overpopulating the area through subsidized housing, and reduction of car viability. Welcome Nanny goverment.
Wasted Money nailed it above.

How about just running BART up and down El Camino Real? But that "should have" happened 50 years ago...ready for the population and car growth...

Another wasteful idea by VTA. Made up stats without any benefit cost analysis and do you really think they can afford to run bus's every 10 minutes. Could you imagine a private bus's run by Google requesting exclusive use of a lane.

Thae last thing we need is more traffic on Central Expressway. Maybe after they get rid of the mess caused by the Caltrain grade crossings, this might be acceptable. In other words, never ...

I would enjoy better if either BART or VTA light rail would run along the middle of El Camino instead. I would prefer BART since they already have the necessary infrastructure to sustain such a development. All our county would be doing is running lines up to SFO and badabim badabom our bay area will get a whole lot efficient at commuting.

The whole high speed train im still undecided. I honestly would love if we could somehow make trains run down the middle of 101. Obviously we would also need to expand freeway lanes and i would support such an idea. Lets think down the road about our future transportation problems, not just alleviating immediate effects.

We have too many council members that don't WORK in our community. They simply don't understand what it is like to be a commuter. El Camino is a CRUCIAL commute corridor and is already badly impacted. This boondoggle will not significantly reduce the number of cars on that road, just slow down the commute for everyone.

Other "features" of this proposal include fewer crosswalks for pedestrians and cyclists, and reduced ability to make left turns into neighborhoods.

I think very highly of Margaret Abe-Koga in particular, but I believe that she is a stay-at-home mom with absolutely no clue about what its like to be a commuter in our town.

To add to what Daniel wrote: Dedicated flow ( preferred by VTA staff ) along El Camino is designed in a linear traffic mode-- how fast to get the bus from point A to C. This means that also proposed are elimination of left turn lanes on Clark, Ortega, and Escuela. The first iteration that I saw on the BRT VTA subcommittee that I serve on, also limits cross bike and ped traffic across El Camino. It is hard to see the benefits. VTA's own traffic projection showed worse traffic grades on all but 2 of 16 Mtn View intersections with the ded implementation.
Mixed flow BRT as VTA calls it, is using the BRT and regular bus svc shared with regular traffic lanes That is doable. We can and should see about installing bike lanes. VTA has stated that there will be no bike lane funding without ded flow BRT.

@Laura Macias

The loss of all these left turns is reason enough to tell VTA to not waste another dollar studying dedicated bus lanes.

A very large number of Mountain View residents and kids (all the high schools and all the Los Altos School District elementary schools are South of El Camnino) need to cross El Camino EVERY day.

Re: bike lanes. Improve the existing bike boulevard instead. Biking along El Camino will never be safe unless you build dedicated and separated bike lanes (not proposed, not likely and redundant if you build up the existing bike boulevards).

re: mixed flow BRT. How would it be different from what we have now?

VTA is the Bernie Madoff of public services.

They can never make ends meet. So they always try to come up with something bigger in order to get funds to cover the ever increasing financial holes.

We appreciate all the comments from interested community members and ask that people take the time to understand this issue completely before making any judgements. Please look for future community meetings and visit the project web site at valleyrapid.org to read up on project studies for yourself.

In the interest of accurate information, we'd like to make some clarificiations and corrections. Some posts have stated that the project will close left turns -- it will not. The project is able and willing to preserve all left turn movements and even add new ones if that is the community desire. Also, the project would improve pedestrian crossings by adding signals, crosswalks and sidewalk bulbouts where currently they do not exist. Finally, the VTA traffic analysis states that Level of Service would remain the same or actually improve at 12 of 14 intersections on El Camino with the dedicated lane scenario, not the other way around.

The BRT project is prepared to invest more than $200 million in El Camino communities such as Mountain View and VTA wants to hear from residents and stakeholders on the best form for this investment.

VTA Staff-

We are not interested in your internal studies that seek to justify your continued funding.

El Camino is an important commute corridor for DRIVERS. It is absolutely inconceivable that this project would even make a dent in car traffic. Reducing available lanes by a third for a nominal increase in bus ridership is a bad deal.

I have heard independently of Ms Macias that left turn lanes and pedestrian crossings are at risk. In the same paragraph you first say the project "will not" impact these important access features and then that you "are willing" to preserve "left turn movement"-- these are conflicting statements (and the use of the phrase 'left turn movement' is suspicious) and it conflicts with what our cities elected official has seen first hand-- she also provided very specific left turn closures-- is she lying? Can she not read? Unlikely.

$200M "investment"-- how will that money be "invested" in Mtn View? Please be specific


Laura, please maintain steadfast in your opposition to this boondoggle!

We need to create and plan for future transit needs that can carry as many fast and cheap. Transit must be faster then the car, be able to handle the needs, ever changing landscape. It must be for all ages, blue and white collars, students and seniors.

@ VTA Staff:

Hello, welcome to our community. Thank you for going out on a virtual limb and posting to the comments here. I hope we MVers remain civil hosts to our guests.

I have pored over the information at valleyrapid.org, but thus far have been unable to find any information about the federal dollars that I believe I heard are available for projects like BRT. At the study session, VTA staff mentioned that the BRT project had to be under the $250m threshhold in order to quality for some type of funds. Could you (or anyone reading this who's in-the-know) please provide a URL with which I can educate myself about that aspect of the BRT project?

Thank you

@Laura Macias:

Dear Ms. Macias, I too would like to see bike lanes on ECR. You mention that VTA isn't interested in setting up bike lanes unless it is part of a package including dedicated BRT lanes. I am under the impression that replacing ECR street parking with bike lanes is primarily a matter of repainting the lines on the street, which I would expect to be quite inexpensive. Am I off base? If it's relatively inexpensive to convert street parking spots to a bike lane, perhaps MV should just pay for it itself rather than considering a way to get the VTA to pay for it as part of a BRT deal.

@gcoladon

I'm an avid cyclist and I simply can't see how biking along ECR will ever be safe without dedicated and separated bike lanes.

Simply painting a bike lane in between 3 car lanes and parking/bus stops won't make biking along ECR any safer. To the contrary, it will give a false sense of safety to the bikers and aggravate the car/bus drivers who will have to constantly cross the bike lanes to park, turn or pick up passengers.

Save that money (VTA or City) and work on improving the existing bike boulevards and crossing ECR.

@ NO to bike lanes on ECR,

I am no transit expert, but wouldn't both a bike lane and space to separate the bike lane from the rightmost lane for auto traffic both fit in the space currently used for parking spots along the right hand side of the roadway?

Your further point to not "aggravate the car/bus drivers who will have to constantly cross the bike lanes to park, turn or pick up passengers." seems to be an argument against have any bike lanes at all, anywhere?

I am also all for improving existing bike boulevards (if they need improving, do they?), and improving ECR crossings (if they need improving).

How much would it cost to buy the additional real estate to widen ECR, to add 2 new dedicated bus lanes to the existing 6 lanes?

That is the value of the 2 lanes that VTA expects Mountain View to give up. Are dedicated lanes for VTA's proposed "522 on steroids" service worth that much?

@Just thinking out loud --

El Camino is not owned by the City of Mountain View, or any of the other cities along the way, it is owned by Caltrans, i.e., the State of California. So those lanes you are trying to put a $$ value on are not Mountain View's to "give up". VTA is going through this process with Mountain View and the other cities, as it should, to consult with them and try to build consensus for how to improve the road. But Caltrans will have the ultimate say over what happens to El Camino.

Yes, I realize that ECR is a state highway, that MV doesn't own it, and that technically it isn't MV that is giving up the 2 lanes requested by VTA for the BRT system. But regardless, those 2 lanes have a value, and VTA wants us (via Caltrans) to set aside those 2 lanes for the exclusive use of its BRT system.

Is the BRT worth it? Would we (via Caltrans, VTA, and/or the cities along ECR) be willing to pay the cost to expand ECR to add 2 new lanes for the exclusive use of the BRT?

VTA did say they would reduce left turn lanes. They also said they would continue to study the BRT lane even though a clear majority of council did not support this option. VTA is arrogant. They want this to benefit themselves and do not care about hurting the local community. Can you imagine Google with its extensive bus system asking for an exclusive lane on ECR. They would be laughed out of the building.

@ Political Insider

No, I can't imagine Google asking for an exclusive lane on El Camino because they are a private company and provide transportation exclusively to their employees. VTA provides public transit for the county that anyone can use and it's pretty common for transit providers to have dedicated bus lanes in high ridership corridors to maximize transportation choices.

@ Thinking out loud

VTA discussed expanding the right of way to accommodate 6 auto lanes and 2 BRT lanes but they were wary of this because it would require eminent domain which would add expense to the project and create potential conflicts. From a city standpoint, the exclusive lanes give us an opportunity to create a really pleasant boulevard style environment and calm traffic. Remember, much of the city's residential growth is targeted for the El Camino corridor and the General Plan calls for 60-70 units per acre around the BRT stops. All of these new residents need reliable transportation options to mitigate the increased demand for travel. BRT in dedicated lanes is an excellent way to achieve this goal.

@ NO to Bike Lanes

The proposed cross sections for the 4 auto /2 bus configuration leaves enough room for an 8' bike lane with no parking to get in the way. This is more than enough room for a 2' painted buffer between the cycle lane and moving cars. With the reduction in lanes, car speeds will probably be reduced which will make the street much more enjoyable to cycle on. For additional protection, VTA could install soft hit posts between the bike lane and the auto lane.

@ Jarret, "it's pretty common for transit providers to have dedicated bus lanes in high ridership corridors to maximize transportation choices."

You mean maximize VTA's choices. Seems to me, some choices are restricted to some people by giving them exclusive use of a lane. So you are OK with a public monopoly exclusive use of the lane (open to all paying passengers) versus a private monopoly, which I bet would offer free rides to anyone if the city gave them exclusive rights to a lane on ECR.

@Political Insider --
I read your postings on these boards on the Voice and often find that I agree with you and I appreciate the pragmatic perspective you bring amidst lots of often ridiculous NIMBY posts. But in this case I think you're pushing a theoretical argument way out of proportion.

First, how is VTA a monopoly? It does not prevent or seek to prevent others from operating transit in the county - in fact, as far as I can tell it welcomes the help that the Googles and Apples provide in carrying tech workers since VTA can't meet that demand themselves.

Second, if the 'private monopoly' you are referring to is the Google shuttle system, you are sorely mistaken in thinking that they would offer free rides to everyone if given a lane. Google, like most of the Valley's tech companies, is extremely protective of its employees and the info they have in their brains/on their laptops. The last thing they want is to mix their lifeblood in with the masses. Most tech companies feel the same way - that's why they rarely pool together on shuttles - that's why they create separated campuses and don't want their employees mixing with others in the cafeteria, at Starbucks, etc.

@ Try. Let me clarify. Exclusive use of a lane is like a monopoly. VTA would be the only user.

VTA does have monopoly rights as a company though they do compete with other forms of transportation. They have exclusive use of public streets and sidewalks to pick up/drop off passengers. Suppose Google told their employees to go to VTA bus stops to get picked up. Do you think VTA would allow this? If Google or any other company offered to run a public bus system using public streets and setting up their own bus stops, VTA would assert their monopoly rights.

In terms of allowing the public on Google bus's you have a good point. My point was even if they offered free rides on Google, I wouldn't provide them exclusive use of a lane any more than VTA.