Completely screwing up Mountain View. You pack all these new people in Mtn. View and then you charge a HOSPITAL for a turn lane? Who do you think is going to take care of all these people? Yet, you constantly talk about affordable housing but let the big developers pay a fee instead of building affordable housing. I would like a list of what city all the council members live in, then maybe they could go screw up their city.

For Stop who asks "I would like a list of what city all the council members live in,: Mountain View City Council members live in Mountain View":

Easy: Mountain View City Council members live in Mountain View.

The previous City Council was not in favor of High Speed rail which was smart. Why disrupt our city and waste money for something that will probably never happen due to lack of High Speed rail funding.

At any rate let the high Speed Rail project dig a tunnel under Castro street.

Trains speeding from San Jose to San Francisco should never be accommodated by the cities in between. HSR should be opposed and avoided. But there are other reasons to close off Castro. Are those reasons worth the money and what funding sources might be available? Certainly it can't be funded by the federal government which borrows a trillion dollars per year just to pay existing bills. And Silicon Valley corporations are politically immune from paying more than they do.

Closing Castro Street at the tracks would be a bad decision. Spending $40,000,000.00 to close a functioning intersection is a waste of scarce resources. Millions were already spent on the Evelyn Street "road diet" and now more millions will be spent to re-widen Evelyn for diverted traffic just for Evelyn Street? Has the diverted traffic on Bryant, Franklin, Hope, View, Bush, Villa and Dana been considered? Traffic is already bad, it can only become worse with a truncated Castro Street. Handing out "almost" free parking permits to single family homeowners while ignoring renters, condo dwellers and PUD residents will only make traffic and parking more horrific and somewhat unfair to the other 70% of the population that visit downtown. Businesses will suffer as a result with less available parking. Visitors staying at our new (soon to be built) hotel on Hope Street will need the "patience of a saint" and a quality GPS to find their way from the airport to their hotel while navigating closed streets, underground passages and circuitous routes. Then, we will have to spend more money to add more roundabouts, more signs, speed humps and bumps to "calm" (keep out) the increased traffic in new areas while drivers weave and navigate to their destinations. Not a great idea the first time around. Please take the time to re-think. Might be a better decision to make Mountain View a gated community with one way in and one way out.

Spend the $40,000,000.00 on helping the under served in our community rather than closing a working intersection. We need fewer expensive road diets, roundabouts and underground passages. Our caring community should care more about the under served, the homeless, those teens and adults with mental health needs than designing a world class closed street.

If we are considering closing Castro at Central Expressway, why are we not doing the same for streets like Mary and Rengstorff? I would understand if all track cross traffic were being eliminated. Just to block this one makes no sense to me.

I use the crossing at Castro and Central to get to and from work everyday. There's no problem getting across between 6-6:30am and little problem crossing between 3-3:30pm so it's really not necessary or desirable to close it off 24 hours a day, especially considering all the construction on the other side of Central. Directing more traffic to the already crowded Shoreline is a poor decision, making access to the east side of Mountain View more difficult with increased driving time. There should be no closure of Castro until Evelyn is reconfigured with an entrance to Shoreline.

I am for leaving leaving Castro Street open to vehicle traffic. If you must make a change, leave one lane of vehicle traffic coming into the downtown from Moffet and Central Expressway open and close off Castro from El Camino. This option would make it less confusing for visitors entering our City from the Bayshore/Moffet entrance and Central Expressway. Those entering the downtown from the other direction can use the side streets, Shoreline and Calderon.

But then again this means that there will be more vehicle traffic filtering into the residential neighborhoods which is not safe for bikes or pedestrians either.

I would think that the City council would have learned from their poor decisions in the past. All you have to do is look to the overflow of traffic in the Jackson Park area between Moffet and Stierlin Rd.

Now they want to create more traffic and make it less safe in the residences near Shorline and surrounding neighborhood streets between Castro and Calderon. All this to make it a more pleasant experience to walk downtown.
What a waste.
It's not fair to the communities not the businesses downtown

Having moved here from Europe, I sorely miss the prevalent pedestrian zones that span most European downtown cities. I am really confused as to why Americans disapprove of it so much - especially since the American Manhattan structure of cities makes it all the more feasible.

Every time I return to Europe, I feel invigorated when I walk down the wide pedestrian streets bustling with people and children that can play and bike on their own without having to worry about traffic. Public transportation makes it easy to get there and back home again.

To me, closing down Castro and increasing public transportation options is a hugely important step in the right direction.

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