Good evening, everybody here in the room, and welcome to the folks online.

Uh, the January 20th, 2026 general purpose meeting of the Castro Valley Municipal Advisory Council is now open.

Councilmember, and we're glad you're all here.

Uh Councilmember Thomas, would you please leave us in the pledge?

Yes, sir.

I'm glad you're just to the play of the United States.

Thank you, Councilmember Thomas.

Uh Madam Clerk, can we have the roll call, please?

Council Member Devini.

I'm here.

Councilmember Davis.

Present.

Council Member Fee Vig.

Present.

Councilmember Mota present.

Councilmember Thomas.

I'm here.

Chair Moore excused.

Vice Chair Mulgrew.

Present.

We have a quorum.

Thank you.

Moving on to item number four, Roman numero four in the agenda.

The meeting is now open for public comment or announcements on any subject that is not on tonight's agenda.

So if you have an announcement or an issue you'd like to bring up regarding anything other than bike lanes on Castro Valley Boulevard, um, it'd be nice if you could fill out a speaker card and bring it up here or give it to staff, and you'll have three minutes to uh state state your issue or your announcement.

Gary Wolf.

Is it on?

No.

No.

It is okay.

Great.

So I'm Gary Wolf.

Hello.

I'm running for the position of director at the East Bay Municipal Utility District because there are many issues of concern to the community.

My skills and experience will help.

Those issues include, but aren't limited to affordability of water, truck traffic, and other work in our streets, getting more revenue from solar and wind and in-pipe hydroelectric, keeping parks and schools green during drought, and how to use water more efficiently or more than once.

These are issues that members of the community have brought to my attention.

I have uh 40 years of experience as a civil engineer and resource economist working on water-related issues and problems.

I hope that you will all take a look at my website, Wolf4Water.org.

That's Wolf with two Fs, number four water.org.

Feel free to email or call me with any questions about water.

I'm happy to help with any issue that anyone has.

I want to support the community in this way.

Several members of the committee have already endorsed me.

Thank you for that.

I promise to listen and effectively represent you and the entire community on water-related issues.

I'm gonna hand out some business cards that also contain contact information.

Of course, I'm happy to answer any brief questions if there are any.

And of course, I'll stay for the full meeting in order to better understand the community and the issues it faces.

Thank you very much.

Madam Clerk, do we have anybody online that wishes to speak?

No, we have no online speakers at this time.

Officer passed, I'll try to look more professional at this meeting.

The last meeting, I just held it up, so raised it nicely.

Uh happy new year.

It's good to see everybody.

I hope you are all uh doing well and driving very safe out there.

I have some stats for December for CHP.

We issued 214 traffic citations in the Castro Valley area, arrested 10 DUI drivers.

We had three other misdemeanor arrests, 28 injury crashes and 39 non-injury crashes, which is about the same uh from the previous month of November.

We recovered two stolen vehicles and toad and stored 23 vehicles.

Some past events that occurred.

Uh, we had our Christmas holiday enforcement period and our new year's maximum enforcement period.

And during that time, we had a lot of officers out on patrol.

Our focus was in view patrol, making sure that people were getting to their destination safely.

And through our proactive approach, we did not have any fatal traffic collisions during those two enforcement periods, which we are happy to announce.

Uh some ongoing enforcement that we have going on.

I haven't received a lot of traffic, new traffic complaints at the beginning of January, but we're focusing on Crow Canyon Road, Redwood Road.

The school zones are still an issue that we recognize and we're continuing to patrol during drop-offs and pickups.

And we're continuing our regional side show enforcement task force again throughout the entire year of 2026.

And those details occur on the weekends, typically Saturday nights, unless we hear of a large-scale event that could possibly occur within our area.

Some upcoming education that we have planned on February 10th at 12 30 p.m.

here at the Castor Valley Library.

We have our age well drive smart.

So if you'd like to sign up, you can contact the Castor Valley Library, and that's for our senior drivers.

And that same day in the evening at 6 o'clock p.m.

at our CHB Hayward office, we have our Start Smart driving program, and that's for our youth between the ages of 15 and 21.

If you'd like to sign up, please call our office during normal business hours to get on the list.

January 19th through 23rd is National Passenger Safety Week, which is a week to promote safe driving practices and prevent unsafe ones by empowering passengers to speak up when lives are in danger due to a reckless driver.

And as always, I'm taking traffic complaints.

You can email me at 345 reckless driving at chp.ca.gov or call our office during normal business hours at 510 489 1500 to talk to the watch officer.

Thank you and have a good meeting.

Thank you, Officer Pabs.

It's always good to see you.

Take care.

Matt Turner.

I'm not gonna succeed as well as she did in adjusting this thing.

All right, I'm just gonna hold it.

Uh good evening, everybody.

Uh, my name is Matt Turner, a longtime resident of Castor Valley.

Uh, a recent thing has come to my attention uh that I was a little late on picking up, and that uh Caltrans is undergoing an uh a serious study into the possibility of opening up 580, uh, the portion of scenic freeway, one of the few scenic crewways in the United States, to uh big rig traffic, which would functionally add about 76 miles of of uh freeway truck lane to uh northern Alameda County, um, which according to uh UC Davis' traffic inducement uh calculator would add about five and a half million extra truck miles in our area uh over the over a given year.

Um, I don't need to tell those of you who have to deal with 880 uh what a problem that might be for all of us, and that uh the throughput increase would back up and uh affect us here.

Uh, particularly Crow Canyon uh would likely uh get a lot more cut-through traffic because people would be much more incentivized to reduce it in even more crowded 580 uh across the Dublin grade.

Um I am uh engaged with folks who are working on this issue as a professional consultant, and would be more than happy to provide uh in a future general purpose meeting a uh a short but uh professional uh presentation on what faces us and uh as uh my friend Nate Miley likes to say if you're not at the table, you're on the menu.

Um, no one from the unincorporated area uh in representing our interests is on the technical advisory committee meeting that that is putting together uh this study, which we presented to the legislature towards the end of this year, and uh I think that it's it's about to be in uh its third of seven meetings in the series this year, and uh we should do everything we can to get involved with that so that they can hear from the people who will be impacted.

Thanks.

Thank you, Matt.

I have no other speakers for public comment.

And we have no one online with a raised hand if you're online and you wish to speak um on a matter that's not on tonight's agenda, please hit the raise hand button at the bottom of the screen.

No speakers.

All right.

Uh, anybody else in the room wish to speak on an item not on tonight's agenda?

Okay, we'll close public comment, public announcements, and we will move on to item five, which is the approval of minutes.

We have two in November and December.

We'll consider them separately.

Um, I would like to remind everybody that audio and video of every Castro Valley Mac meeting is also available through the Board of Supervisors web page and is usually posted just a few days after the meeting.

Um has council read the minutes for November, and are there any edits or changes?

I move approval of the minutes of uh November 17th, 2025.

I'll second it.

Okay, we have a motion to approve the minutes of November 17th and a second.

Adam Clerk.

For approval of November 17th, Councilmember Devini.

Aye.

Councilmember Davis.

Aye.

Councilmember Febig.

Aye.

Council Member Moda.

Aye.

Council Member Thomas.

Aye.

Vice Chair Mulgrew.

Aye.

Minutes approved.

Thank you.

And moving on to the December 15th, 2025 minutes.

Same questions.

Everybody had a chance to read it and I mean that we approve the minutes.

Second.

I think we have a motion and a second.

Um the chair.

Uh do we have any discussion?

I do.

I would like to uh suggest an amendment to the minutes to reflect that because of noticing concerns that um on that meeting agenda this the decision of this body regarding the agenda item for bike lanes was not forwarded to the transportation and planning committee of the board of supervisors.

Um, does the motion maker accept that?

I accept the friendly amendment.

Thank you.

And a second second.

Okay.

For approval of December 15th, as amended.

Councilmember Deviney.

Aye.

Councilmember Davis.

Aye.

Council Member Fiebig.

Councilmember Mota.

Aye.

Councilmember Thomas.

Aye.

Vice Chair Mulgar.

Aye.

Approved as amended.

Thank you.

All right, moving on to item number six.

Um, this item was originally heard by this by this council on December 15th, 2025, under slightly different auspices in the spirit of transparency regarding noticing concerns.

Um, it has been brought back tonight for a fresh hearing.

Uh the agenda item tonight states that we are to discuss and develop recommendations to the Alameda County Board of Supervisors Transportation and Planning Committee regarding bike lanes and parking impacts in response to the public works agencies report, Castro Valley Bike Lane Utilization, a report on average bike lane counts.

And again, it was presented in December 15th, 2025 at this MAC meeting.

And tonight, this is an action item.

Um so before the presentation by public works, I would like to ask those who wish to speak on this item to please uh drop a speaker card off it uh with madam clerk.

Um after the presentation, we will give time for the council to ask questions, and then we will have public comment and then come back to the council for comments, discussions, and likely a motion.

Um so tonight, Daniel.

Will you be presenting?

All right, good evening, Daniel Desenberg Director of Public Works uh for Alameda County.

Uh the vice chair indicated, this item was presented last time.

I'm just gonna give you a summary of just a refresher of what was presented.

Uh and and I would say uh for those of you who haven't read the memo, I would suggest you read it because after the last meeting I went home and I got confused a little bit because I I don't recall putting any recommendation or anything else in my memo that generated a lot of uh discussion, but uh in any case, all discussions are healthy.

So just to summarize, this uh study, this report reflects uh Castro Valley Boulevard Class II bike lane evaluation in terms of bike bike utilization study after we installed the bike, the class two bike lane uh the standard practice.

We usually try to evaluate all infrastructure based on data, and we established for the first time uh a baseline bike count data, and that's what was presented uh last time.

The background is basically that Castro Valley Boulevard is designated as a class two bike facility uh in the Alameda County bike paid master plan uh that was developed in 2019 through extensive public process, and we went ahead and followed that master plan to implement the uh the class two bike lane when we were out there to do the actual street resurfacing as a standard street maintenance program.

Uh, and in terms of uh, you know, several factors were considered uh as presented last time, uh, in terms of determining uh what how we evaluated the efficacy of putting this uh bike lane.

One is you know, is the roadway width adequate?

Does it conform in that way it allows for bicycles?

Uh compliance with daylighting requirement under ABAV 43 413 uh was reviewed.

Uh existing red zones, uh fire hydrant access, bus shot bus stop accesses, all of those things were considered and prioritized accordingly.

So, like I said, the purpose of this uh utilization study is to really establish a baseline data, data collected so that it offers some insight into actual bicycle activities uh along the corridor.

Kind of helps contextualize uh discussions that we have uh as a community uh so that you know uh in the past it's always been I've never seen a bicycle on that roadway to there's so many bicycles out there, you need to do something.

So there was a lot of uh uh not data-driven discussions that were taking place.

The whole idea of utilization studies to show how how the bike lane operating at the current time.

That's what this thing did.

The methodology is basically using those counter tubes at eight different locations.

Uh, and I think in the report you see attachments B showing you where the various locations are uh along the bike lane.

Uh these counters recorded the presence of bikes, the speed uh of uh these bikes uh as they pass over these counters.

Uh it was done 24 hours a day for about 1.5 uh weeks or 16 days, approximately 16 days uh in October.

Then after the data collection, we use the appropriate application or software to go ahead and do an analysis uh of the finding which is included in one of the attachments at the table.

Just to give you a broader summary, uh what we found on a daily basis was depending on the location on average, between 22 to 51 bicycles uh were counted uh along that corridor with a maximum daily counts ranging between 38 and as high as 89.

Uh so you can look at the location as well as the numbers in the attachment uh provided.

So for us, these numbers reflect a consistent use throughout the study period.

Uh, you know, while the ridership numbers, as you can see, them are very modest, uh, and as you know, the facility has not been there for too long.

So it is our belief that this data will provide us a baseline number that we can continue to do the studies so that we could actually evaluate how the system operates uh as time goes on.

We expect as a general expectation that uh safe and continuous bike uh infrastructure tends to kind of encourage increased utilization over time.

Uh, and we can validate that in future studies.

Uh one of the things I did in this uh uh memo that I gave you is to kind of recognize the contentious, the contentious nature of these kind of decisions.

Whenever you go out there to kind of utilize a right of way for various use, it's a limited space, you have cars, you have pedestrians, motorcycles, bikes.

So you have to kind of share these things, parking.

So these things generally have somehow a little bit of uh you know competition for the same space.

So uh we went through a process of saying, you know, is this really the appropriate decision process uh to implement the class two bike lane, which uh was explained a couple of times in the past, and I think we believe we still believe that it was done in a more uh uh measured way so that we can actually implement uh this.

And I know this body here has always stood for safety for pedestrians, for vehicles, for bikes.

You guys have always every time I've been here or here, you guys have always emphasize the need for safety and mobility.

So there's no question in my mind uh that no one here wants to create an unsafe condition.

That's not that's not a question.

So what we have is the reason we need to kind of collaborate is these competitive uses for the same right-of-way require some decision making, and that's why this kind of uh discussions come to your body as well as other decision-making bodies.

So, from our point of view, uh, you know, continued monitoring and monitoring of the bike lane is essential.

It will help us determine whether demand is increasing or or not.

How parking dynamics in the future is changing, is it, you know, in collaboration with businesses and private properties and others, there might be changes in the way parking structures are done.

And that those things need to be looked at sometime down the line in comparison with uh the uh the uh utilization rate whether it's gone up or down.

So, like I said, currently modest, but I think for the for anybody who was doubting or saying there are no bikes, clearly we've seen as high as 89 bikes in one day at the highest count.

So there are people using these things, and consistent with your desires and the county's desire for making sure that safety is paramount.

I think we believe that the class two bike lane is a good safety measure for bicyclists uh uh riding along Castro Valley Boulevard, which has about 21,000 cars on a daily basis.

So that separation I think is a legitimate uh action uh to take.

So, uh I would say in this report, the same report that I presented last time, there's no direct recommendation other than to kind of advise you as a form of next steps that we believe we need to continue to operate uh with a new bike lane in place, monitor bicycle uh activities, parking availability, safety, performance, and business access, you know, all those things, important measures, somehow we need to be able to measure them down the line over time and kind of make the decision uh as to any kind of improvement that needs to be done uh as we move forward.

Uh so uh the conclusion is in my from our point of view that uh the you know the post-installation bicycle utilization study offers a clear look at how Castro Valley Boulevard bike lane is performing during its early period of operation.

While using, you know, usage is modest, it is ready, it is steady, and the facility aligns with the long-term planning goal and improving multimodal safety and access.

So ongoing evaluation and community engagement will continue to guide the decision making as we move forward to make sure that the corridor remains safe, accessible, and functional for all users.

So uh that's uh the conclusion is written there right there.

You can you can I'm I'm reading it direct verbatim.

So uh that's where we are.

Uh if you have any questions, I'd be happy to answer uh uh any question you may have, but I think this item is gonna be an ongoing item that we'll be looking at forward in the future to see what can we do to kind of enhance all users, including parking, access to businesses, safety for bicyclists, uh, and and ensure multimodal facilities are uh operating in a safe manner uh for Castro Valley.

So I'd be happy to answer any question you may have.

Thank you, Daniel.

Um let's take advantage of you being at the podium, and we'll come to the council for just questions of of Daniel on this item.

So we'll start with uh Councilmember Davis.

Uh thank you, Daniel, for your presentation.

Um, you know, one of the things that hasn't been discussed in all this is what was the cost to do this project, the the Castro Valley bike lanes.

We couldn't look at that, but it was part of the since we put it as part of the resurfacing project, including all the other striping that was done.

Yeah, line item striping thing.

Well, I guess the point I'm making is that uh there was a cost associated with putting in the bike lanes to any thought of removing the the bike lanes would be an additional cost, and removal of striping.

If I recall back the day when I was doing this sort of thing, it's about one and a half times greater than putting in striping.

So we're talking about a fairly significant capital expenditure as as um has the public works agency received any uh direct complaints from businesses since the bike lanes have been installed.

We've got it through third parties, not directly from the businesses ourselves.

Oh, through parties, so that someone coalesced petition or something of that nature, and yeah, and presented it as okay.

Um, those are my only questions.

I'll have some comments later.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Thomas.

Thank you for being here again, Daniel.

I appreciate you.

So uh my question is you know, we approved KB homes.

One of the conditions we're parking, right?

Parking on the street.

So how do we take those parking off, you know, and then tell them hey, we don't have parking once it was approved for parking.

So, as I presented last time, KB homes was approved, not including the on-street parking.

So uh just keep in mind just for your own future discussions, uh, as a general policy matters.

We do not include on-street parking in the approval process of private development.

These are public assets that you're not gonna generally give out to a private development.

So uh, you know, sometimes that kind of broader policy that could encourages maybe appropriate, but in this case, as I presented last time specifically, the on-street parking was not part of the approval uh equation.

Oh, I understand.

But no, in our discussion, one of the when we told KB Home, say we're we're looking at parking.

I specifically remember we're going back and forth.

There was parking here, where's parking there?

And it wasn't me, some of the other members.

So that's one of the conditions that was added on there.

So I guess we're wrong that you know it's it shouldn't be a part of it, right?

Well, I've shared the conditions last time with you guys uh and read the conditions out and the document was shared.

It should be in one of the meetings, and uh it was very specific on-street parking was not included.

They built their own on on Norbridge side, they built their own uh parking bay along the street.

That was part of it, but uh as a standard practice, just for just for your future, I don't believe on-street parking or public parking facilities should be uh taken into accounting when you approve private development or private investment.

Got it.

And uh my second question um do we have plans for a parking facility in Castro Valley?

That's what we need because parking is hard to find here, and that is one of the concerns that's gonna come up.

Do we have a plan for a parking facility that like they have in uh Pleasant and Livermore?

You know, do we have plans or no?

Uh I am not aware of any, but uh that would that should be part of the discussion.

I think as you do your specific plans, uh, you know, including how do you how do you fund it?

You know, some jurisdictions will include these are shared parking, so businesses will contribute long-term payment plan uh toward these shared parking structures.

I think that's the most appropriate thing if if uh Castro Valley downtown wants to prosper and grow, uh you're gonna have to take things like that into consideration.

Yeah, that's all I have.

Thank you, Daniel.

Thank you, Councilmember Thomas.

Councilmember Mota.

There you go.

Can you hear me?

Um thank you for reiterating your presentation again.

Um I do have a few questions.

I just want to kind of understand.

I broke down your report, reread it and kind of have some levels of understanding.

I want to make sure I got it correct.

Um, as far as the um the bicycle counts established a baseline and demonstrated consistent use of all new facilities, right?

Based on your report, and I acknowledge that the value of the baseline data.

Um however, the CEQA requires analysis of responsibly foreseeable impacts.

Um not resilient solely on early post-implementation observations, and what I want to know is over the what is it a week and a half data collection period.

Um it looked like it does not capture, you know, the seasonal variations, economic impacts in long-term safety trends.

Um I definitely recommend data continued data collection before finalizing a permanent um operational changes for that.

Um the other thing that I wanted to clear is that the buffer buffered class two bike lane are consistent with Caltrans guidance and improved safety.

Um Caltrans guidance identifies buffer lanes, uh class two lanes as optional, right?

Not mandatory.

Is that correct?

Well, they it's not a all bike lanes have different variations depending on the conditions, availability of space.

Some some allows you without a buffer, some with buffer, and some go as high as a class four where you have to put an actual barriers, right?

So, uh, so those designs are done by the engineers to make sure that it meets current standards, design standards, uh, whether Caltrans or uh FHWA, all standards are met by the design engineers.

Okay, so it's a it's a recommendation guidance on there.

What options you might have to consider.

Got it.

Okay.

Um is there is there a reason why an unbuffered class two was not selected?

Did we I don't know I think you I don't know if you covered that the last time.

I know you came several times, but I wasn't sure if you so think of think of it this way the preferences, you start from the lowest unsafe one, no bike lane, to uh a share of share the road.

Yeah, and you move up to a class two, no buffer.

Class two was buffer, okay, and then you go to the class four.

So these are all degree of different bike lanes, and depending on availability of space and accommodating different things and all that stuff.

We try to pick the safest bike lane uh design uh that also accommodates other needs.

Okay.

Was the um the other options were they objective, or we just considered the the one that was selected?

There wasn't an option, right?

There wasn't like all options were looked at.

Okay.

And we picked the one that's reasonably safest for these conditions.

Okay.

Like I said, you have 21,000 cars on Castro Valley Boulevard.

That was counted, I think 2013 or something like that.

Probably now about 30,000.

Um parking impacts were um minimized, were feasible and will continue to be monitored, as you mentioned, and um recognized monitoring alone does not constitute constitute mitigation, right?

So what I want to understand is um there's a clear measurable requirement that's clearly defined or like enforceable or time bound.

Is there um a plan in place for those things to be monitored?

I think parking needs to be looked at, like starting from uh like what Tojo indicated, having a centralized parking structure.

Yeah, working with businesses to see if they can redesign their parking field so that they can accommodate more more vehicles.

Uh and when we implemented this, like I said in my report, we take serious considerations, for example, in areas where we uh have removed uh bike uh parking on street parking, there was a substantial amount of off-street parking, even though the parking, for example, by the by the restaurant up here, uh is very busy and full.

Uh at the time, you know, we removed about five or six of those spaces, and there were 300 and 350 spaces on uh on the on the lot.

So uh, and the other thing I want you to take into consideration as you think about this thing is when you have a 340 parking space and that thing is busy, full uh you added another four or five spaces along the street is not gonna make or break that business, but it will make a big difference for the safety of the bike, the bikers.

You have anything else, Councilmember Moda?

Um trying to think.

Uh no, I think that's it for now.

Thank you, appreciate it.

Thank you very much, Councilmember Fiebig.

Thanks for being here again.

Seems like we've been seeing a lot of you lately.

Like we should have a chair maybe.

Yeah, so um I was just curious how many spots were gonna be lost.

I I know we talked about that last time.

I think we lost 12 on the north side.

Let me see.

Yeah, 12 on the north side and 23 on the south side, each of them about a half a mile stretch.

Okay, you know, I I made a comment, you know, kind of just joked a little bit about you being here, but I I like you being here.

I think I think it would probably be really healthy if we had this conversation before the bike lanes were installed.

You know, we could get community involvement and things like that.

I I personally would love to see it more often in advance of projects, so just kind of a side note.

Um, you know, I know there's a lot of discussion between whether the bike lane should stay, should they go?

Should, you know, what what should we do here?

Um, you know, and the KB businesses, you know.

I think we're we're here to support the community.

We're here to support the businesses, and we're here to support safety, which includes you know, bikes and how they get from point A to point B.

So um I I know you were just talking about the different types of bike lanes.

Is there a different type of bike lane that might be better for some kind of compromise between the two businesses and bicyclists?

Well, I think what we have right now is the best compromise to tell you the truth, because anything less will uh diminish the value of the bike lane uh because you effectively will have to eliminate the the class two bike lane uh but uh you know uh I think I don't know if uh who I talked to but one of the things that we also looked at is prior to the installation of the bike lane for example all along the stretch up here where the restaurant is they were in excess of at least 15 cars illegally parked cars for sale all those things so there were more cars that were taking space that were not gonna be available for any businesses uh if had you left it so uh we we took the parking impact very seriously so anything from uh I think forest all the way down to uh Redwood Road on the uh other side we didn't we kept the bike lanes I mean in the parking yeah uh so when we go further down you know by the bank and all that stuff when we look in the in in the private property area there's a lot of parking spaces out there maybe signages telling people there's parking available might might help I think those are the kind of solution we need to look at uh if we continue with your uh you know uh belief that we need to make sure that bicyclists are safe so that to me right now we have a uh win-win uh project uh in place uh uh relative to the amount of parking spaces uh removed okay and what was the bike lane called the number of the class two class two yeah so if we were to go down a level what what would that bike lane look like well we could eliminate the we looked at eliminate if we eliminate the buffer uh and the buffer is the two lanes I mean the two two lines yeah basically that's only about a couple of feet I think that does not give you a lot of uh space to add a seven foot parking so that we looked at it so we could what what I'm saying is we could always look forward to see what other venues exist to kind of make another compromise or another enhancements uh for example uh there are there's a median along the the roadway concrete media uh so some some future project could look at maybe narrowing down those medians or replacing them with just double yellow lines kind of scenario and and then look at uh the space that could be available you know right now I cannot tell you because we haven't we haven't looked at them because when you look at some of these things not just merely a space calculation you know there are utilities utility poles and there's all kind of stuff ADA requirements so we have to look at all of those things.

But the commitment that we can make is that we will continue to look for ways to enhance and create a balanced uh utilization of the public space.

What's the speed limit on Castrale Boulevard?

I think 25 or 35 35 yeah okay yeah I think that's an excellent idea maybe getting rid of them at some future project yeah and I like the idea of getting um rid of all the spaces right there in front of the new you know the old ride aid because yeah a bunch of trash was parked there and things so um good job with that so if we got if we went down a level and we didn't have the buffer what would that lane look like?

Uh right now you don't know you don't do we eliminate safety or do we do we gain parking spots I mean what's that do you that's it you will not get any parking space parking spots.

So there's no reason to reduce the safety standard by if you're not getting anything right so uh as of right now that's why I said the current design is the uh the optimal design.

Okay.

Any problems with emergency vehicles or delivery trucks?

No.

No impact.

Okay.

I mean, thank you so much.

That's all the questions I have.

Thank you uh council member DeVinny.

You have questions?

I do uh I'll be real brief uh I thank you, Daniel um uh right now, as a council, we're kind of force, we're in an unfortunate situation because it seems like the two most viable alternatives right now are zero sum.

And so for purposes of uh simplicity, I'm gonna call zero sum the parking crowd and the bike crowd.

Uh so to best uh promote the bike crowd, we'd leave exactly what's in there right now.

We'd make no modifications, but we'd thank you for your design, and we would lose all the parking uh to accommodate the parking crowd.

Uh, we'd just revert it back to where it was before we did the restriping.

And so we'd get rid of the bike lanes uh and restore all the parking.

Zero sum solution.

I want to vote for both uh bikes and parking.

Um when Tim asked about other designs, your your first comment was no, there really aren't any other designs.

Um, and then you did go on later to say that you're looking on a forward basis.

Uh you talked potentially about medians, uh, and that you you stated that you'd continue to look at other designs.

So my question is is can I vote?

Does do I have to have a zero-sum vote?

Can I vote for parking and bicycles?

Is there any other design that this council can consider immediately?

When I say immediately, I mean within a month or two, uh or you know, in short term, rather than weigh down the five-year project of replacing the median.

Are there any other design options out there, or am I truly faced with a zero sum analysis?

Well, uh I beg to differ in terms of the zero sum analogy.

That's my words.

From your point of view, it sounds like a zero sum, but rather from our point of view, it's a balanced solution.

Okay.

Uh otherwise, if I was to ask the bicycle folks, they would prefer to have a class four.

Which means we might even have to eliminate one of the lanes.

You know what I'm saying?

So, uh so the thing to kind of look at is everything we do is a balancing act whenever you do work in within the public right-of-way.

Okay, how wide the sidewalk is going to be, how narrow the sidewalk is going to be, all of those things.

So uh, so the question is these facilities, this these spaces are available for all users.

So that's one of the reasons, by the way, these public spaces are not calculated into the approval process of private development, generally speaking, as a matter of policy.

So, so my suggestion to you is uh as I presented in my report.

Let's look at the data as we move forward.

Let's see if these businesses that are experiencing these challenges cannot come up with a uh a reasonable solution themselves, because if you go down further, the Castro Valley Marketplace, there's a four and a half million dollars shared parking space that was built by a collaboration between county government and private sector.

Things like that will emerge when the needs are real and when businesses see that there's a uh viable uh solution that can be implemented.

And I think along this corridor right now, you have a bike lane that is offering a safety net for a lot of bikers.

I think we need to maintain that.

And you guys have always like I said, I've always been pro-safety.

So there's no question about it.

This is the new bike lane.

Let's give it some time for that it can develop a form of clientele, if you want to call it.

Uh, and that way we can go back and measure if there are any safety enhancements and measurement.

Uh, you know, and some bicyclists will argue that bicyclists could become good patrons of businesses.

You know, there's some areas that I'm personally familiar with where you see a lot more bikers than you see cars sometimes.

So, so I would say uh at this time, don't look at your decision as a zero sum, but rather we have a facility that has been implemented uh that needs to be uh reviewed, studied, and moving forward.

Continue to look for if there is any other win-win solution that can be implemented that could actually enhance uh the parking uh challenges, if there are any, because right now the parking challenges are not just like people are saying no no bikers out there, the bike land proved to be uh proved them to be wrong.

Right now we keep saying the businesses are impacted by parking and all that stuff, but you know what?

Maybe the businesses might identify a better solution uh through their own mechanism.

So I would say uh I would you know I would make it easier for you.

I would just suggest to you that we need to study the bike lane as of right now, and as we move forward, if we come up with any kind of enhancements along along this corridor to add uh additional spaces or anything like that, then we come back to you and have a better discussion.

I I appreciate that answer, and I appreciate the fact that uh you know you feel that the current design is a win-win.

I framed my question from my vantage point, and I framed it as a zero sum game as I'm seeing it as I have to cast a vote.

And I see two alternatives either retain the bike lanes and lose the parking, or restore the parking and lose the bike lanes.

And I think Daniel, yeah, and and again, I totally respect your design abilities, but I think you're telling me no other design comes to mind for you.

Am I wrong?

Uh waiting seems like a long game.

Waiting for considering removing a concrete median is is a long game.

Uh waiting to see if the business is adjust is a long game.

Uh is there anything in the short term?

Because I have to make a vote on this.

Uh so are there any other design alternatives?

Uh I mean, if we were to restore the parking um and get rid of the current class two bike lanes, we could put a shareow, but as you said, that's that's the lowest level of of bicycle transport.

Uh, we have it as part of this current design.

Part of it is a shareau.

Um, you know, from uh from Center Street to Marshall Street.

Um, but uh again, last time, should we postpone this decision for two months pending another design review, or are those are two alternatives?

Well, you know, uh I don't see any reason to postpone them if you you can, but I would say uh let's give us some time.

Let's do a recount, see how the the facilities being used, and then uh as part of maybe the chamber of commerce, your body the body here and any other engagement you have with the businesses, encourage them to see what can they do to enhance their own parking needs out there.

Uh so uh I think the argument that that uh uh we need to give up bike safety so that a business could have an on-street parking.

Uh I I think there is a there's a moral dilemma on that argument.

That's all the questions I have.

Thank you.

Thank you, Dan.

Uh just a couple of questions, Daniel.

And I I want to echo the sentiments that uh have been said about you spending as much time as you have on this project um with this body.

It's much appreciated, and uh I'm I'm quite sure your family um is is not as happy about it as we are, but thank you for being here.

Um first question.

Um none of us, I don't believe, were on this council when the bike ped master plan was approved uh by the Castor Valley Mac.

But I have I have table 7.3, which is page 70 of the of that master plan, which lists projects um Castor Valley Boulevard from Redwood Road to Center Street is identified as project number 44.

Um the recommendation is class two bike lane, the recommended action is further study, and the prioritization tier is high.

Um I spoke to some previous or some council members who were seating um when the bike pasture plan was was approved, and and they said that further study meant um to all concerned that these projects, these individual projects that were rated for further study, would be brought to the municipal advisory councils prior to implementation.

Is that your understanding what further study means?

Uh no, actually the further study language was put in personally requested those things so that we make sure that we design them so that they meet they meet the conditions when we are out there actually putting these uh these recommendations in place.

The class two recommendation was an agreed upon recommendation by everyone, but there are times where the planning discussion says class two, but you go out there, there's no space.

I insisted that the language that just about on all of those things, unless we are sure we have a clear idea that there is adequate information to validate it at the time, needs to say further study uh other uh recommended action.

So, but that does not negate or question the recommendation that it needs to be a class two.

It didn't say shareholes, it didn't say class four.

Right.

It said class two with action to be studied, and that study is uh what we've done before we implemented this uh this class two.

So the if I if I'm understanding the class two was recommended pending going out to look at the project, pending design, whether we pending design.

Somebody, for example, let's let's put it this way.

For those of you who haven't been here, there was a recommendation to make right there in front of the Cassero Valley village and all that stuff from Red Road down.

They wanted to make it a class four, which would have eliminated all on-street parking and it would have created a lot of chaos.

So we we said uh at the time we have enough information because we designed that project uh recently then.

Uh we told them no.

So so whenever we have information, we negated the recommendation if it didn't make sense at the time.

If we did not have the information, we said additional study required.

So, okay.

Looks like about 15 uh further studies required for high uh high prioritization projects.

That's okay.

I'll leave that alone.

Um I want to take a follow-on to council member Davinny's question.

Um, on design.

What what is the current width of the street uh one direction, eastbound or westbound, um Castro Valley Boulevard, including the bike lanes?

40.

34.

34 feet from center line to the curve.

Okay.

Medium curve.

Okay, from median curve, okay.

What would be calculated?

I think we have two 10 and a half foot or 11 foot lanes.

Okay.

Thank you.

What about a seven-foot area where you have parking, you have about a seven-foot parking space, and another four or five feet of uh bike lane, for example, if you look further down.

Uh so uh I think the last time since the last meeting, uh sorry, I guess I'm getting old or some I don't remember these numbers anymore.

Uh but I wanted to see whether anything we can do at this time.

I think that's what uh Dan was suggesting.

Uh what can we do at this present time under the current right-away uh width uh to do uh to modify, including, for example, eliminating the buffer, and see if a class four uh class two without buffer would work.

We looked at those things and we were uh short by a couple of feet, not much.

So that's why I'm saying maybe there's a possibility of looking at uh the median, see modification to the medians if that helps, I don't know.

So it theoretically, needing more research, it would be possible to shrink the traffic lanes, uh narrow the traffic lanes so that both parking and a class two bike lane could be accommodated.

Uh this uh uh we didn't find it to be the case.

Right now, a lot of areas have a 10 and a half feet uh lane width.

Uh my preference uh minimum is eleven because we have buses uh and uh you know trucks that go right around there.

Uh so we have historically going down from a 12-foot lane to 11 foot lane.

I don't think we should go to I mean, uh for example, AC Transit and their routes do not uh recommend or or support anything less than 11 foot lanes, but we do have 10 and a half feet turn lanes, for example, uh along there.

Uh and in some areas we have 10 and a half foot lanes.

Uh so at this time, I don't think uh I'm not aware of let's put it this way.

I'm not aware of uh any kind of land modification we can make in a safe manner to gain additional space for uh for parking.

Okay, thank you, Daniel.

I appreciate it.

Um that's all the questions I have.

Um let us now give the public a chance to weigh in.

Um Madam Clerk, how many uh how many attendees do we have online and how many speaker cards do you have from the room?

Okay.

And I have one one speaker card for the room also.

So um we will go with the two-minute um two-minute opportunity for speakers both in the room and online, and after that speaker after the public uh public comment portion, we'll come back to the council for comments and uh and emotion.

So, madam clerk, please call your first.

Lawrence Hatchins.

Hello, can you hear me?

Thank you.

Um, yes.

Um, I'm taking some time to go up and down Casper Valley Boulevard to see what we're talking about here because it sounds pretty dramatic dramatic.

We're removing 23 parking spaces on the south side, 12 on the north side.

So I took a look at that.

And presumably in your mind, you're thinking, wow, all those retail shops losing 23 spaces.

How can they operate like that?

Well, if I go up and down Castro Valley Board, virtually every every retail business has their own off-street parking.

I asked Public Works.

Did you look and see what those parking spaces were used for before you decided the bike lane?

I doubt they were used for much.

There's no homes there.

All there are is CBS, Kentucky Fried Chicken and a couple strip malls.

They all have off street parking of their own.

What were those spaces used for before?

Can I answer?

And I'm also asking, are there retail owners here that are so outraged that losing their space?

Here's one right there.

Is that one?

Is that it?

I mean, there's 25 retail businesses there.

Are they complaining?

I don't hear them.

So I don't know what's this what I actually was curious how this all got initiated.

I would like to take, I have some time left.

Talk about the new condo development, which they have a serious problem.

I I see that.

They have four new retail spaces and they have six parking spaces in front of that.

And they did a favorite of Chaster Valley.

They made that very attractive.

They could have put parking there, and thank God they did what they did.

It's beautiful.

And they're losing there.

Well, the eight spaces I could count that could be impacting a real tail retail business, six of them are in front of the poor condo people.

And so why can't we do the little hopscotch you talked about?

50 feet of shared shared parking or shared shared driving around the condo people because they did us a favor by making it as attractive as they did.

Outside of them, I don't see how those spaces were ever used.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Jim Robeson.

Jim Robes Robson.

Thank you.

Okay.

I've uh been here in Castro Valley for since uh 1973 or thereabouts.

Um I do want to get uh give you a disclaimer is I'm a member of the uh uh general managers accessibility committee at AC Transit.

Uh just so that uh everybody is aware of that and uh and of course we're all constantly reminded that we are an advisory committee.

Uh don't always agree.

Uh but my I want to keep the bike lane.

My concern is I see it all the time.

Multi-generational families here in Cashville Valley, increasing number, and I see grannies, you know, you know, or grandparents riding these little mini bikes with their grandkids on it.

And they need to be in a safe place, a place to ride.

That's a bike lane, preferably not a sidewalk, a bike lane.

They should not be out in traffic.

I see them in traffic a lot.

Uh and with the increase of all these electric uh uh mobility devices from one wheel to four wheels, where those counted in the in the count in the bicycle count, these are a lot uh big potential of riders and uh to get from here to uh up the hill to you know the 580 market.

Uh it's not easy on a regular bicycle, but with electric bikes and these mobility devices, you can expect a lot of people to start using it, and we need to uh get the count over a longer period of time uh to make this safe for everybody.

The only way to go is non-sharo designated bike lanes.

Thank you.

Amen.

Sharab.

Hello everybody, my name is Ahmed Shorab.

Uh, I'm a homeowner uh nearby in Hayward, so lucky to be a part of this community.

Um I work as an automotive engineer, a mechanical engineer, so you're probably wondering what's an automotive engineer doing out here advocating for bike lanes.

Um, my personal experience started maybe six months ago.

I started bike commuting every day to work and taking Bart.

Um I'm expecting my our first child in about a month that we, if all goes well, expect to deliver right here down the street at Sutter Health.

Um and really I I looked into this uh because of a personal finance uh consideration.

So we have a mortgage, and my wife, you know, would like to take a break from work to focus on raising our kid, which is it's sad to say is really a luxury these days.

Um it's it's tough to make it on a single income.

Um and looking at uh an e-bike, uh, because you know these these hills don't don't mess around, um, it pays itself off in less than a year, which if you're your business minded is is a no-brainer in terms of investment.

And that's that's a few thousand dollars a year that I can save that stays in our pocket.

I can uh you know take my growing family out to the to the local businesses and keep the money circulating within the community.

So instead of making chevron investors rich, um we can we can increase the uh economic resiliency of of our local uh community.

So please do not remove these bike lanes uh and uh guarantee the safety of folks just trying to uh to make it thank you, Bruce King.

Hi, I'm Bruce King.

I've uh lived in Castor Valley for 40 years.

Um, the installed bike lane should remain.

I'm really disappointed in how the Mac has been handling this issue.

I came to the December meeting to listen to a presentation about bike counts, and I suspected there was some other issue, but there was no documentation, none, no analysis of some concern about parking, no documentation.

Okay, and for tonight's meeting, there's still no public documentation.

I don't even know what you guys know, okay.

But the public did do a public records request and that and and uh public works provided some documentation.

We we saw letters from from um from bicyclists complaining about the HL restaurant patrons parking in the bike lanes, even though they have 350 parking spots on site.

Okay, and then we also saw a generic letter written by the the property owner of the pet adoption property, and that and the the owner of the pet adoption signed a letter.

The the and uh the HL restaurant signed a letter, a generic letter, uh, along with May May restaurant, and then the May May and the and the HL restaurant showed up at the December meeting to say they didn't have enough parking spots because they got deleted from the street, even though they got 3540 parking spots on site, and supposedly they could have added more had they just reconfigured their light poles.

So, brand new businesses complaining they don't have enough parking.

Okay.

Uh the KB Homes wrote a letter, uh generic letter, and came to the meeting and complained.

I kind of understand that they're they're going, gee, we bought this property from somebody else.

We thought we had parking spots on the street.

What happened to them?

Uh, I kind of understand that dilemma.

Thank you.

Sorry, I was going over.

Matt Turner.

Good evening again, everybody.

Um to uh borrow a phrase from Thomas Sowell, there are no perfect solutions, only trade-offs.

And uh in this case, you know, the trade-off is a pretty good one.

Uh not getting killed on your bike is pretty important.

And I I find the comments of of uh our public works director to be very good uh you know tonight.

Uh he presented a pretty reasonable and rational uh and and uh evidence-based approach to this.

Um one of the biggest infrastructure problems we have in our town, if you pull people, is not just parking.

Yeah, that's that's comes up there, but it's the uh the school pickup drop-off zone problem.

It's enormous, uh, and it also poses the greatest safety risk to our kids.

The only solution to that is to have a serious bike network.

We don't have one yet, but this project went a long way to getting us there.

Mostly bike infrastructure is islands of safety and oceans of danger.

And unless we do something about that, we're failing to address the fundamental public works infrastructure problem that we have in this town, and that no parents feel it's safe to get send their kids across town to school.

Now, if you're gonna say, well, parking is more important than the lives of children, I got some real questions for your more, you know, moral take on things.

Um, we we have to look out for that if we're gonna actually solve this problem.

Because we have a very serious problem in not being able to get across this town safely unless you're driving.

And we've got to address that.

And this project has gone a long way to address that.

As someone who's biked up and down that hill many times, I can tell you right now that because of the the great success of May May Marketplace and HL Peninsula, which I am very grateful for.

That's a fantastic addition to our town.

And now we also have the fire station on Marshall Street temporarily.

That's big extra traffic.

We need these bike lanes desperately.

Michael Solas.

Hello, my name is Michael Solis, resident of Castor Valley for about 15 years, coach of the Hayward Composite Mountain Bike Team that's also local.

And I do oppose the removal of the bike lanes on Castor Valley Boulevard.

At the last meeting, I spoke about the number of children on bikes in our area, how our team started off with less than 10 riders.

Now we're um we're almost triple that.

One thing that wasn't mentioned was the visibility problems on Castor Valley Boulevard with it running in the east-west direction.

That means the sun is in the eyes of cars heading eastbound in the morning, westbound in the evening.

Anyone who's come over the Dublin grade towards Castor Valley in the evening knows how blinding that can be, and it just brings traffic to a stop at one point.

I don't do it very often, but recently, yeah, this is bad.

And that's um, you know, you add bicycles to the mix, which are already very difficult to see, and that makes those um the lanes we have on Castor Valley Boulevard even more important.

And until the addition of the lanes, I would avoid that area by taking lower speed, um lighter traffic side streets through neighborhoods with shareholders, and I've been passed very aggressively in those neighborhoods because cars don't want to be behind us on bikes, you know, going 10 miles per hour.

Um, I would rather be you know on the boulevard where there's a safe defined lane where we're not impeding traffic.

Um please don't remove the bike lanes on Castor Valley Boulevard.

Thank you, Kelly Abreu.

One of the uh sacred cows in uh American culture is uh parking.

And uh somebody said, Oh, yeah, it would be great if the county would build us some parking.

Well, the county did build parking, it's called the General Services A GSA built the parking in downtown uh downtown Dublin, and it costs 35 million dollars, 550 parking spaces uh opened several years ago, and uh they promised that this was very needed, and if you build it, they will come.

And uh, you know, that thing is mostly empty now.

It's uh useless because half of the Bart ridership has disappeared, you know.

Uh BART depends on uh employment in downtown San Francisco.

BART is suffering, and uh this parking uh fiasco was uh, you know, uh sponsored by the uh former mayor of Dublin.

What a what a coincidence.

Now a county supervisor.

And do you we want parking?

Um, you know, paid parking can be more valuable than free parking.

You don't question every parking spot out there is free.

You think that free parking is good for downtowns?

It's not.

You need to uh put in paid parking because it manages demand and it can encourage turnover and can generate revenue for local services, it can reduce car dependency and promote more efficient use of urban space.

You are wasting your space.

If you look at those, if you take a look at the satellite views on Google, take a look at how much of your downtown is parking lots.

You've heard it over and over again.

335 at uh at the new giant Chinese restaurant.

By the way, I live in Fremont and I'm very jealous of your giant Chinese restaurant.

I I'm very that's a great thing.

And uh with with uh, so yes, uh you need to start managing your parking and valuing it, not just building more and building more and building more.

There has to be a rational and uh and management of free parking.

Stop it.

Thank you, Kelly.

Julia Golden.

Hi, my name is Julia Golden.

Um, I've been a resident of Kashler Valley for over 10 years.

Um, I'm also a nurse and midwife at Eden Medical Center, and I have three kids.

Um I moved to Castro Valley for the safe neighborhoods and for the schools.

I did not move here for parking.

And what I have found is that there are no safe routes for my children to get to Canyon Middle School from this side of Redwood.

My son will speak in a minute and he will tell you his experience trying to bike down Somerset on his way to Canyon.

If these lanes had been in place on Castro Valley Boulevard, that would have been an alternative safe route for him.

I think it is incredibly short-sighted for our community to focus on parking instead of safety and bicycle ridership.

If you build it, the bikers will come.

And if you build it, the school children will start taking those routes, and the traffic that's seen around schools will be less impacted, which I think is a concern for anybody that has a child in Kashir Valley Valley or anybody that lives anywhere near the schools in Castro Valley.

Um the future of our cities involves safe bike routes around.

That is just the reality.

When you look at moving to Castro Valley, it is a compromise compared to living in places like Berkeley, Pleasanton, San Ramon, where they do have bike routes, and that is something that people look at.

It's something that we looked at and we said we're willing to make this compromise because other things worked for us, and eventually these bike lanes will come.

Well, the thought of taking away this infrastructure that's being put in that, frankly, as a bike rider, feels like a compromise.

When you are riding in a bike lane and there are cars going 35 miles an hour next to you while you're going 15 miles an hour, if you're lucky, you need that buffer to feel safe, and children need even more of a buffer for their parents to feel safe with their kids riding those routes.

Clinton Blackburn.

I'm Clinton Blackburn.

Um I'm a coach in the uh Castro Valley or the uh sorry, Hayward Composite Mountain Team Mountain Bike Team with uh with Mike, also an avid road cyclist in the area.

Um I think we need to keep these bike lanes, and I and I wanted to point out how insufficient they are.

It's a it's a great starting point, but but we're nowhere near the safety that we need.

And um the lack of safety today really for me, it centers around the Cherow areas.

We need like the full, I'm not familiar with all the the class designations for the bike lanes, but the at least the class two bike lanes, um, the Sherrows, they force you into traffic.

Uh and the traffic's going much faster behind you.

Um, and there's not always a clean way to enter, safe way to enter.

You can end up like looking back, smashing into the end of a of a car or coming past uh a parked driver that opens their door on you if you're if you're coming right because you're basically just forced to squeeze in there, and the share of not give you right of way, it's just a visual indicator to drivers that they need to share the road with you.

There's nothing legal about them.

So I just wanted I wanted to point that out.

Uh obviously, a lot of people pointed out the big the difference between uh inconvenience of not being able to find parking versus a life and death situation, like getting hit by a car, uh cyclists and also the electric scooter users, the uh uh especially children are much more vulnerable.

This is a life and death situation for those for a lot of or can be for some people, whereas parking is never anywhere near that.

Um let's see.

Yeah, and I also wanted to to echo what Mike said about you know, drivers are not willing to follow you uh at whatever speed you're going on a bicycle.

They're gonna get aggressive, they're gonna pass you, they're gonna shout at you, they'll threaten you sometimes.

Um, and so I want to just that's time, please.

Uh yeah.

That's a wrap up if you could.

So, Emory Blackburn.

Hello, I'm Emheris Blackburn and I am a high schooler at Cash Valley High School.

Um, I am also part of the Hayward uh competition and mountain bike team.

Um I used to bike to Canyon when I went there in middle school, and I had to take higher road because there were no other um there were no bike lanes anywhere.

Um if I was biking to school at the time of these bike lanes, uh Cash Valley Boulevard would have been a way better option because there were many scenarios I was in, which the cars were very erratic around me.

I was almost hit by many cars on the higher intersection right before the canyon.

Um there's just so much traffic there that the cars are just erratic trying to get their kids to school in time, and they're like almost hitting me, they're a few inches away from me, and there's no bike lanes for me.

So if I was able to go around to Cash Valley Boulevard with those bike lanes, that would have been way um easier for me.

It would make me feel way more safe.

Um there are many things that uh the Cash Valley, um, I'm really grateful for the bike lanes in Cash Valley Boulevard now because I see so many uh people using them, and I agree it's compromise for the parking, but there are so many, it's such a good compromise.

There are so many parking spots everywhere around, and it's only taking up it's very it's taking up very little amounts of parking spots, and I think that it shouldn't be a problem in whatsoever.

Brian Foster.

Thank you.

Uh Chair and members of the council.

Um hopefully I'll get to to three points within my two minutes.

Uh the first thing again is one of scale.

We're talking about uh according to Mr.

Woldes and bet about 50 bike riders who built these who who use the bike lanes which have been built.

They built them and the bike riders did not come compared against 20,000, although he said tonight 30,000 vehicle drivers using trying to use the same roadways.

It's a matter of scale.

You know, do you want one person maybe a mile from here who wants to put anchovies on their pizza to require all of us to have anchovies on our pizza?

It's a matter of scale.

Second, just a reminder the bike riders do not contribute one penny to the provision of bike lanes, right?

That comes from gas taxes, according to Mr.

Woldest and Bet.

Gas taxes are paid by people who buy gasoline.

So, you know, it's again, it's not a matter of right or demand.

It's a matter of how can we thankfully share the spaces that we have.

You know, when I was a kid, I also did not have bike lanes.

Didn't have bike lanes when I was a kid.

Yes, there was there were some dangers.

Yes, there were some close calls.

I survived.

You developed those survival skills.

Finally, and the point that I want to make, uh, this is long before the before the development of these bike lanes.

Let's say that I wanted to go to the burrito shop, and sometimes I did.

More than half the time, there was no parking spaces.

More than half the time, I would then drive down um onto the the uh residential block down the road.

Those are usually, of course, well, parking there would what I imagine I imagine would upset the neighbors.

Most of the time those slot those spots were full.

Most of the time, I would eventually go either someplace else or make a dinner from home.

So, yes, there are businesses that are hurting and even and are hurting even more now.

Thank you.

Linda Willis.

Hi, I'm Linda Willis.

Can you hear me okay?

All right.

So I'm on a commission, and I know it's really a lot of tough decisions that you have to make, and a lot of times are not very popular.

But this decision shouldn't be that hard.

Look at the bigger picture.

What's good for the entire community of Castor Valley versus one business owner who didn't have the foresight to get enough parking for his condo development?

At the last meeting, some of you referred to the speakers here as quote the bike people.

Well, I will tell you that.

Huh?

Let me try this again.

So I'm looking, give me another second here.

Okay.

Okay.

So the majority uh I'll tell you who the bike people are.

The majority of cyclists are just community residents who also ride bikes.

They are parents who ride their kids to school on their bikes.

They're teens who ride their bikes to school or to go fishing at Lake Shibeau.

There's seniors who ride scooters because they can't walk so well.

Their kids who ride for fun and exercise with their parents.

The bike people also pay taxes.

They buy their food and their goods in Castor Valley.

And they also wish there were more parking places when they do drive their cars.

And they need a parking spot.

So think this one through.

For one business owner, you're neglecting the health and safety and recreation needs of a whole lot of bike people who need safe bike lanes to ride their bikes on.

The county paid a lot of money to put these lanes in.

They're going to pay a lot of money to take them out, and that's a waste of your taxpayer, our taxpayer money.

Secondly, finally, you will be partially liable, you may be partially liable for the first person who's injured or killed on this bike lane that you decided to take out of its place.

So please make the smart decision and keep these bike lanes in here.

Thank you.

Tim Fritz.

So we built the bike lanes, but we don't know if they came or not yet.

We haven't had enough time to study it.

So I would say we need to leave the bike lanes in place until we've had further study.

It was one 16-day period that they conducted counts.

We don't know what I well, maybe it was said before, but I don't know what time of year it was, but it was one 16-day count.

And I don't think that's enough time to determine whether or not it's being used enough or not.

I think the longer we the longer we have them, the more people are going to use them.

And uh I think that if uh businesses are being negatively affected, they need to come and show us that they're being negatively affected before we make any decisions regarding taking them away.

So uh I didn't even use a minute.

I think we need to keep the bike lanes.

Thank you.

Nicholas Bessie.

Sorry, I haven't gone to one of these since I was like six.

So uh I'm Nick Bess.

You may recognize me actually riding around town in my holy cow kit.

I ride my bicycle about five and a half thousand miles a year, so roughly sixty-five thousand miles since I started riding at the age of eighteen.

I also drive 15,000 miles a year.

Uh these additional bike lanes have had zero impact on my driving Castor Valley Boulevard.

Additionally, when I attend one of these businesses, I don't think it is there street parking.

I merely go and try to find parking when it's available, and I've never had an issue.

However, they have made me feel far safer on my bike.

Uh I actually distinctly remember riding over those public works pneumatic uh strips and thinking, what the hell are those?

So now I know.

So thank you for that.

Um roughly once a month, maybe even twice a month.

I find myself in a situation where I need to react to a car or I will wind up in the hospital.

Uh I have it on video if anybody's interested.

Uh cyclic is a great thing.

And more often than not, this is in an area without a bike lane.

Typically, what this is is there's parked cars, no bike lane, and a car turning right in front of me into a business.

I have to hit the brakes.

I use my big boy voice, I yell.

Uh seems to happen.

The federal highway administration notes that most car bicycle crashes happen when a car overtakes a cyclist.

And painted bike lanes can reduce these incidents by up to 50%.

So I think it kind of goes without saying that I think we should keep the bike lanes.

I caution the council against other designs, in particular when putting parked cars next to bike lanes.

If you want a particularly bad example, check out Huntwood Avenue in Union City.

I ride my bike to Mountain View, and that's the most dangerous part of my commute.

With increasing demand for return to office and reduced EV carpool lane benefits, I would expect that more people are gonna be using BART.

Sorry, I know I'm over time.

And I think that we should give people the freedom to make a safe alternative choice to driving.

Thank you.

Thank you for your time.

All right, uh good evening.

Um last time we were here, I had submitted letters from all the property owners along this stretch.

We're not no one's against bike lanes.

And I mean, let's just be perfectly clear.

This has gone two different directions here.

This is part of these part of these areas is in the business district.

Even um the guidance from Caltrans says do not remove parking from the business districts where you're putting these bike lanes.

Okay, and that makes absolutely no sense.

What was what we've done?

We're not talking about route removing the class three, uh class two buffered bike lanes all the way up to the five canyons as far as they go.

We're talking about a section of Castor Valley that businesses um uh that let's just say, you know, it's always it's been brought up a couple of times tonight.

Just the um the KB Home section, you had to change the zoning because they couldn't even sell the property that they were designed for.

The businesses couldn't even be utilized for this.

These people also, these businesses are also what make our community our community, and if we can't get to them, they will not exist.

And the the comment regarding how many parking spaces somebody has, and basing the decision on a parking lot that could have more parking or not, and we should be taking it away.

I don't think any of those things should even be considered here.

We should be looking at the business district, the Caltrans guidance recommendations, which are not a buffered bike lane, and go through there.

Also, those parking spots that we've taken away.

Where did the ADA requirements go for now businesses that don't have parking or ADA where they were able to park against a curb and get out of the car?

Where are some of these things?

Deliveries, how do they do it?

You you want them to park like two miles away so they can go deliver it?

None of this stuff makes sense.

Now, in certain areas, these buffered bike lanes work and they are designed, but one size does not fit all.

And we need to be considering that for our community.

And also, it's more than one building.

There is a building that basically lost um a new business that was going to come to town when the put when the parking disappeared.

So did they.

All right.

Well, anyways, yes.

Caller, you're on the line.

You have two minutes, Rebecca.

Great, thank you.

Good evening, everyone.

Um I want to um ask the Mac tonight to be responsive to our community.

Um, you know, going back, hundreds of voices from Castor Valley went into that bicycle pedestrian master plan.

Um, hundreds of residents signed a petition um to support keeping bike lanes on Castor Valley Boulevard.

Um, at every single Mac meeting that I have been to in the last I don't know, 10 years at this point, 12 years, I think, um, that has addressed bike lanes.

Um, a majority of the public speakers have supported bike lanes, and that is true again here tonight.

Um, and again, what's really I want to emphasize is that what you're especially hearing are the youth of our community, the young families of our community, as well as all ages in our community are asking for these bike lanes, but it's particularly our youth and our young families.

And so I'm asking you to listen to the future of Castor Valley and keep the bike lane.

Be responsive to our community.

Keeping these bike lanes is an investment in the future of Castor Valley.

Thank you very much.

Connor, you're on the line.

You have two minutes.

Hi, this is Robert Prince, Advocacy Director with Bike East Bay, a nonprofit advocating for bike safety and access across Almin and Country Costa County since 1972.

I want to start by saying I appreciate concerns about car parking impacts on Castor Valley Boulevard.

However, it's also important to understand the risk and liability associated with potential removal of the bikeway.

Can we ask the speaker to speak up a little bit, please?

You got it.

Castor Valley Boulevard is part of the high injury network identified in the area's bike walk plan.

Plan found that it sees the fourth highest number of uh severe or fatal bicyclist crashes in the entire unincorporated area.

Second most dangerous for pedestrians.

The bike lane as installed was recommended as a high priority in that plan, but it took six years for implementation.

There's no reasonably parallel route to Castor Valley Boulevard, so eliminating a high quality facility on this corridor impacts the entire value of the bike network in Castor Valley.

The public works presentations have highlighted the need for and value of this facility from a bike safety perspective.

So between the county bike plan and the staff statements, it's been made really clear that the curve facility was designed to prioritize safety.

So if this bikeway facility is removed, the county will be held responsible in the case of another tragedy.

Similar bikeway removal actions in other California cities have resulted in lawsuits and jury awards, including an $8 million inflation adjusted award in Indian Wells, California, when a bike rider was hit and killed after the city removed a painted bike lane.

So we're asking you, please don't put the county and individual bike rider safety in a similar position by removing the lane.

Thanks.

Caller, you're on the line.

You have two minutes.

Roy.

Yes, thank you.

Just a couple of comments on the uh feedback given by the Mac members.

Mr.

Thomas brought up KB Homes.

Well, don't forget that additional parking was added on Norbridge as part of that development.

I think about seven spaces.

That involved digging up the existing sidewalk on Norbridge, moving it, and making space for additional parking.

KB Homes is a brand new development, the developer had, you know, could have included more on site parking, entirely 100% within the control.

They chose not to.

I think KB homes have netted out quite well.

They have additional parking spaces given to them on Norbridge.

Um Mr.

DeVini said that this is a kind of a net zero uh decision from his perspective.

Well, there's another option there.

You don't have to make a decision.

This is listed as an action item.

There's no requirement that there's a motion or any action.

And if there is, you don't have to vote.

So, you know, it is not net zero to force you into making a decision.

Um the striping on Castro Valley Boulevard when the bike lanes were added, the striping was never completed.

And it is very confusing as to know where it's possible to park and where it's not possible to park.

Um hopefully this discussion today kind of concludes.

Um this item, and then I would ask public works to return and please stripe the areas properly to ensure that uh it's very clear where parking is not allowed.

Thank you.

Caller, you're on the line.

You have two minutes, Jesse.

Hi, thank you.

Um I just first want to say thank you, Dan, for having such a comprehensive grasp of this topic and for understanding the proven methods of striving for balance between the public and private interests.

Uh, I, for one, think that the class two decision um was the right call.

So, in the interest of trying to help find that balance, I was just looking at Google Maps and just realized how wide the median on Norbridge is.

Um, you could definitely make up some space there by reconfiguring that and the uh little landscape space next to the sidewalk as well, without actually taking out any of the trees along the Norbridge median.

So I want to throw that out there.

And then the Forest Avenue or 4th Street, whatever it is, right across the way could have some designated spots to help out KB, because I think a lot of us are realizing that HL Peninsula definitely has enough parking.

Um people will find a way in that parking lot.

Um and then the other obvious thing to me about KB Homes is it's uh it's a great walking and biking distance to the heart of Castor Valley, where all the the large businesses are, as well as BART.

So it feels like it's kind of set up for the biking community already on flat ground, which is pretty rare in Castro Valley.

Um so anyway, just want to throw that out as uh uh searching for solutions.

Thank you.

Caller, you're on the line, you have two minutes.

Jeremiah.

Yes, good evening.

My name is Jeremiah Mallor, and I'm chair of Barth's bicycle advisory task force.

I urge you to keep the bike lanes on Castro Valley Boulevard and strengthen them, not remove them.

Research finds protected bikeways reduce crashes and injuries by up to 50%, as uh another uh speaker mentioned.

We have and we have real crash data.

UC Berkeley's safe transportation research and education center wrote a report on Castro Valley analyzing police reported traffic collisions.

Over five years from 2015 to 2019, Castro Valley had 64 reported bicycle crashes, including six serious injury crashes.

Castro Valley Boulevard had the highest concentration of crashes with 22 crashes, and about 40% of the people hit were school-aged youth, many between the ages of 11 and 14.

If you remove these lanes, you increase the risk of serious crashes on a corridor that already has the highest concentration of bicycle crashes.

This is also about access to BART.

For many residents on both sides of the station, Castor Valley Boulevard is the only direct continuous east to west route to reach BART.

These lanes connect to Redwood Road, Norb and Norbridge from the main bike routes to the station.

There is also legal and policy risk in going backwards.

On a high injury network corridor where lots of crashes happen, removing an existing safety feature increases liability exposure if a serious crash occurs.

And it undercuts vision zero and complete streets commitments.

Somebody erroneously stated that Caltrans urges the preservation of parking spots in business districts.

This is unequivocally false.

Take a closer look at the Caltrans statutes.

That is not true.

Caltrans prioritizes safety and the choice is clear.

Thank you.

Caller, you're on the line.

You have two minutes.

Joseph.

Hi, uh thank you to Daniel for this presentation about the memo and the bike lane uh study.

I want to echo that the bike lane study was done in October of last year.

Um we need to continue to evaluate the seasonal impacts on usage since obviously people are gonna be riding their bikes more during the summer.

Um, and in addition to the bike counters were placed out locations where I often see cars parked in the bike lanes, which easily could have prevented uh bikers from being counted.

Um so it's just to be clear the bike lane usage numbers are absolutely only a baseline, and they could almost not be lower in a given year.

Um please keep the bike to class two bike lanes.

Um eventually we should be moving towards class four and or uh grade subrated bike lanes.

Um I live in Castro Valley over 20 years.

I'm fortunate enough to have a car to get across town and go beyond to access food and health care.

Um, and for the record, I've personally never had an issue finding car parking when visiting businesses in Castro Valley.

Uh CV has been on the up and up since I was a kid.

We have a pretty nice downtown with lots of great food and shopping.

And on days with nice weather, I like to ride a scooter to go get shopping, um, to go shopping or get food.

Um and I routinely take the the boulevard uh between center and redwood, uh making use of the bike lanes where they exist.

And not everyone who's using the bike lanes is riding a bike.

It could be people riding scooters and all other kinds of personal mobility.

Um Castro Valley is already really car centric.

Um I was literally grazed by an inattentive driver in a car because there was a car parked in the bike lane, common occurrence.

Um, and also riding on the boulevard, a man in a truck yelled at Sundays and a slur at me for being in the bike lane.

I had the right of way while he was trying to turn, and I guess that didn't run the right way.

Um I see people of all ages and backgrounds using sidewalks and bike lanes.

If you don't bike or ride a scooter or anything, you should still be concerned for the safety of children and elderly.

We should also be thinking about people who are low income and people of color who are more likely to be users of bike lanes, sidewalks, and other non-car transportation methods.

Um not everyone has a car, you know, something that some of us take for granted.

And just weeks after NYC received web praise for working quickly to address a bike lane home.

Thank you.

That's your time.

Caller, you're on the line.

You have two minutes.

Tyler.

Hi.

Um so I have biked in the Castor Valley community for about 36 years.

I went to Marshall Canyon and Castor Valley High School.

Um it is too car centric.

And the study that was counting the bikes, obviously, I agree with the other callers, is a is an undercount.

Um I've never seen public works do such a thorough parking study evaluation for any other project.

So I believe that they took into account the non, you know, the zero sum game um question, and the study was so thorough.

I've never seen a study like it before.

Um you know, when it comes to downtown districts, um, bike lanes should be included in downtown districts, not not disincluded from downtown districts.

And I think just overall, just one comment from um from someone tonight highlighted why we need uh bike lanes.

Um someone said that you know, you know, without bike lanes, maybe bikers just need to develop better survival instincts.

I think that just shows you the mentality of the um the just the overall car mentality, um, the disregard for safety.

I mean, does that is that an argument that could hold up in any place at any time if an injury is um sustained.

Oh, you should just develop better survival instincts.

Like, seriously.

It's it was very disappointing.

Um keep the bike lanes.

Caller, you're on the line.

You have two minutes.

Alec.

Hi, yes, my name is Alec.

Um I've also been biking in and around Castor Valley for 10-15 years.

Went to Creekside Middle School and CVHS.

Um, my friends still frequent me and my friends still frequent, you know, businesses on the boulevard, including the Pad Thai Place and um uh May Mays groceries.

Um I have never had an issue finding parking in Castor Valley.

Um I dread going to places like San Francisco or Berkeley because of um, you know, issues finding parking and stuff like that.

Um, never ever been a problem for me in Castro Valley and along, especially along Castor Valley Boulevard.

Um the bike lanes that have been put in uh have been amazing.

Um and as as many callers say it's a it's a bare minimum, but it is much better than um riding on a share road or or something like that.

Um I guess I'm just kind of a little confused at at the hesitation here.

Um the bike lanes should stay, seems like a no-brainer uh to me.

That's uh that's all I have.

Caller, you're on the line.

You have two minutes, Bruce.

Uh yes, uh Bruce Duggy here.

Um, I would like to uh talk a little bit about the um uh the climate action plan.

You know, uh we never seem to talk about the climate crisis uh supposed to be one of the most existential um uh problems of our time, and yet it's uh uh continuously ignored.

So we know that uh we need to get people out of their cars because 73% of all of our greenhouse gases in the unincorporated area of Castor Valley come from uh driving.

And those are our those are not the cars that drive on the freeway uh through traffic.

That's our own just uh uh emissions.

And so uh we need to get people out of their cars, and the only way to do that is to provide uh decent alternatives to cars.

So that would be you know, buses and BART.

And we're super super lucky in bicycles, and we're super super lucky to have a BART station.

Not everyone has a bar station.

We literally picked uh this community because it had a BART station.

We went through all the BART stations and and looked at what does how the schools performed, and and then we picked um we picked Castor Valley based on that.

So um the first and last mile is uh critical for the success of any kind of um uh public transit, and uh this is a uh part of that first-last mile uh transit uh with bicycles, and more and more people are taking bicycles on bars and uh and going places.

I myself um actually ride to Mountain View frequently um with my combination of uh bike and BART.

Um, so that's kind of a far-flung place.

Uh, and you you can go so many places in a Bay Area with uh the combo of transit and um and uh uh bicycle.

So yes, please uh maintain the bike lanes.

I want to also make a comment on the taxes.

Gas tax is not the only tax, and many of the cyclists also drive.

So it's time.

Caller, you're on the line.

You have two minutes.

Yeah.

Hey, can you hear me?

Yes.

Okay, so as the Mac, um, the closest thing we have to uh city council, the Mac, you should be looking at making the Castro Valley the most vibrant, resilient community possible.

So look around you.

The Bay Area cities that are the most modern, desirable, economically successful, actually have bike lanes.

And I have heard musings around, you know, amongst you just now looking to see whether or not there was a compromise.

You know, can we get rid of the median, etc.

etc.

You have to realize that you know the present design is the compromise.

They kept more parking than they actually removed.

And while as a cyclist, I would actually prefer a continuous separated bike lane.

One of the few things I can actually agree with Mr.

Moulton Bet about is that this is actually a decent first step to the commitments that the community made as part of the bike ped master plan.

And I don't think that this is the some voice of the radical bicycle community or whatever.

Um this is actually the um voice of Castro Valley writ large.

In one week, 490 people have signed a petition asking you to keep these bike lanes, including some very poignant pleas for the safety of their children.

Uh we heard one high school student's scary experience tonight.

In addition to that, though, you gotta keep the bike lanes.

Why?

Because getting rid of them would be a complete waste of taxpayer money.

You just put this in.

Are you kidding me?

You now want to rip them out.

That is ridiculous.

There's no data saying that businesses were actually harmed.

And as a taxpayer, I would object strongly to it to wasting our money like that.

In addition to that, there are policies that the Board of Supervisors and yourselves have approved.

Complete streets, bike ped master plan, etc., that you need to follow through on.

The most important thing is safety.

So we need to agree that the lives of people is worth much more than that's your time.

Caller, you're on the line.

You have two minutes, John.

Thank you.

Uh I'm John Spangler.

I'm vice chair of the BART Bike Advisory Task Force.

I've lived in Alameda since 1997.

I'm a second generation Bay Area native.

I've been riding a bike since I was six, and I'm 73.

I'm league cycling instructor.

I've been on the bike task force for BART since 2011.

And I've ridden a lot in Castor Valley.

I've also driven through Castor Valley once.

I drove through after the bike lanes were installed.

I had zero trouble finding parking or navigating my way through, except for the stop and go traffic from so many cars.

I would have much preferred to have been on my bike to go through Castor Valley.

But I just come back from delivering a friend to Pleasanton for surgery.

70% of all roadways and maintenance are paid for by general tax revenues, not by gas taxes.

That includes federal income tax, state income tax, and other general revenues.

Do not think that gas taxes pay from anything at all.

They may pay for 25% of road all roadway infrastructure and maybe 25% of bike lanes.

If that most of that is grant money from other sources, this is not a zero sum.

This is a an opportunity to make your streets safer and make sure that bicyclists who have the same rights and responsibilities as all vehicle drivers have a safe place on the roads.

Please take a look at what's going on.

Listen to the citizens of Saster Valley, act as a rep representative body and vote on behalf of the people who show up.

Thank you very much.

Hi, this is Alejandro Hasso.

Um I'm coacher of bike here, our local bike advocacy group here in the area.

And also I work at my family's business in Julius Buttonaria right here in Tierland, right next to Castro Valley.

So, you know, first of all, thank you for the productive discussion.

And um, I like I mentioned, I don't want to speak just as an advocate for bikes.

I want to speak as uh someone that works and has a local business here in the Eden area.

Um, because uh I think a lot of the concerns about parking are not really actual.

Uh here our business has a big parking lot, and that does not automatically translate to business.

Uh, here we have to actively uh perform uh marketing campaigns.

We have to make sure products are good.

We have to uh make sure we provide good customer service to bring customers and make sure they come back.

Parking on its own does not bring customers, and also why would so many businesses spend so much money to remove their own parking spots in front of their business to put parklets?

That's because uh spaces for people uh generally business, not spaces for cars.

Um, yeah, and also uh I want to second that about uh taxes and how roads are paid for in Alameda County.

A lot of our roads on uh complete projects, they get paid for through the measure BB sales tax.

Uh so if you bike, if you walk, if you take public transit, you're contributing through the road, uh, just like in Castro Valley Boulevard.

Um, also um, yeah, and also, um, yeah, if you want to really make sure there's parking available, you should implement uh parking meters uh just like in San Jose, which actually is a good uh revenue source uh that helps uh to pay for uh some of the repayments in San Jose.

Um I know somebody that works there, and uh the parking generates plenty of revenue um that pays for a lot of these projects.

So you should look into parking meters to balance that uh parking availability.

Uh yeah, thank you.

Carler, you're on the line.

You have two minutes.

Caller, you have two minutes.

Hi.

Uh can you hear me?

Yes.

Yes.

My name's Colin.

I'm uh Castor Valley resident, been here over 30 years.

Um before the strapping was done, dedicated lanes.

I used to uh commute from the east side of town from Palomar's Hills to Bart.

And I felt like I was taking my life in my own hands.

Uh it's not just survival cities, but I'm a um uh an experienced rider.

I've been riding for over 30 years, and normally uh bike 10,000 miles a year, probably more miles than on my car.

Um after the dedicated lanes were put in, um, it's been much safer.

Um, I don't have I'm not forced into the traffic.

Uh don't get people yelling at me, throwing beer cats, beer cans at me, opening doors in front of me, or turning in my bike lane.

Um, I urge the Mac to open up your eyes.

Um, you're not just uh voting for citizens of Casper Valley, but Alameda County.

Um I represent folks from Fremont, uh Three-wheeler Cycling Club, um the Tri Valley Um Valley Spokesman, and another Bay Area, um, San Francisco Randonairs, uh, all have bike routes through Castor Valley to get from East Bay to Alameda to the East Bay Hills for recreation and commuting.

Um I urge you to keep the bike lanes safe.

I had several um friends of mine had been hit and killed by cars, and uh it's not just for um our safety, but we're willing to share with uh the community.

Thank you.

We have no additional speakers for public comment.

Thank you, madam clerk.

Um last opportunity.

If there's anyone online who has not spoken and wishes to speak, please hit the raise hand button at the bottom of your screen.

Is or is there anyone else in the room that wishes to speak?

Daniel, you're on the line, you have two minutes.

Thanks so much.

Daniel Shodel, Castro Valley resident.

And I just wanted to add uh for the speakers who said they have not had problems parking in Castro Valley.

I'm very jealous.

Maybe you have better luck than me.

But I would say these 35 spots that we're discussing are such a tiny fraction of all of the available parking spots in the area.

This is not the make or break for our parking challenges.

And there's been no evidence as others have mentioned that any business revenue is being impacted, either negatively or positively.

I think it's a short-sighted decision for businesses to complain when the long in the long run, the bike lanes may in fact bring more business.

Considering that parking has been such a long-standing challenge.

There are many who may not even bother trying to come to your business, make it safe to get there by bike and install a bike rack out front.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right, no other speakers.

Uh, we will close public comment at this point and come back to the council for comments and discussion, potentially a motion.

Um, let's start with Councilmember Davis.

Thank you.

Um, I'll call you chair.

Um I want to thank everyone who's participating in this.

There are a lot of very educated folks on bicycles and the safety associated with bicycles, and uh I appreciate that.

A lot of the comments that have been said, I'm gonna reiterate uh my fellow uh council members know that I'm a registered traffic engineer, and one of my areas of expertise is happens to be bicycles and civil litigation involving bicycles.

So uh I've experienced a lot of these issues that people profess are problems, um, some are real, some aren't.

When we talk about Castle Valley Boulevard and the volume of traffic traveling on there, we say 30,000 vehicles, the more vehicles you have makes it more important to have a bike lane.

The purpose of a bike lane is to separate the bicyclists from the motor vehicle traffic.

If you didn't have that bike lane there, that bicyclist has the right to that entire number two lane, and some people alluded to the fact that if we remove the bike lanes, what to what degree does it expose the county to potential liability?

And I'd play say, I'll be putting my business card on on telephone poles all down the street because I think they expose themselves uh tremendously.

The um we need bike lanes as part of an integrated transportation system.

Yes, vehicles are the primary ones, transit is important, bicycles are important.

You know, people were alluded to the fact of complete streets, and that's a topic that I also teach through the University of California.

Tech transfer is complete streets where you're looking not at the street, you're looking from building to building and and how to incorporate transportation in the best way.

The um one of the interesting things I found was looking at the data that was collected, and I compliment the uh public works for getting that comprehensive data, and recognizing that data is going to vary by season, and it's going to vary by day.

You know, typically in traffic engineering, we say plus or minus 10% could vary easily, but the um interesting thing was that you're looking at the data, the vast majority of the bicyclists were using that bike lane between 8 a.m.

to 4 p.m.

So there's a lot of time where bicyclists aren't readily using it, that in fact it might be able to be used for parking.

When we um you know, KB homes was talked about.

One of the things to remember about KB homes, it is a transit-oriented development.

It was built based on not having to require the same number of parking spaces as another development because they were close proximity to transit, and you know that first mile and last mile applies to that, and uh getting to BART.

Not all businesses are dependent upon on street.

Now I can think there's a few businesses along that street that could use that on-street parking, but not the entire area.

When we when uh the petition that was handed out last time of quote unquote all the businesses between Redwood and Center as a form letter.

Well, we just went up here, sign this.

And for businesses like uh the Dim sum and uh May May who signed those letters saying they don't have enough parking.

It's ridiculous when they have 340 plus spaces off street.

We heard uh discussion about well, can we narrow the lanes and try to get uh something else in there?

The thing to remember, and and staff uh clearly pointed out you have transit vehicles and you have trucks, you have fire equipment.

The thing to remember, mirror to mirror dimension for one of those vehicles is a hundred and ten inches, so that's what a little less than uh 10 feet, so you want to make sure we provide that clearance and that sort of thing.

The other thing is with bike lanes, a bicyclist is required to travel in that bike lane, so that again we're defining where it is appropriate for bicyclist to be and a vehicle driver.

Uh Caltrans.

Guidelines, there the Caltrans documents were quoted and that sort of thing.

The first page of the Caltrans manuals say these are guidelines.

These are not cast in concrete uh design requirements, so that I think that our engineering staff did a very prudent and reasonable assessment and determine that what has been put out there has been the is in fact the safest thing to put out there.

Um was raised.

Well, we're removing this parking, uh well, what about ADA?

Well, ADA parking isn't supposed to be on street because you're supposed to have a six foot uh buffer beside it so that vehicle you know, people can get in and out, and so that isn't really an issue here now.

So we've heard that well, some people believe it's yes or no, how we go with this.

I'm gonna throw out another alternative is that if we assess which businesses are critical for that on-street parking, that we define those areas, and there's a treatment that we use in traffic engineering all the time.

When you approach an intersection when you have a bike lane, you have a broken white line.

That means both bicyclists and vehicle drivers can use that space.

Perhaps we can use that approach in the immediate area where we may need some on-street parking.

Um, and perhaps remove the uh the no parking signs in that area so that it can be a mixed uh facility.

And then the other thing I I really have a heart on about is the you know, businesses saying that it's adversely affecting them.

I haven't heard of one business raising a complaint about this.

If that was if their livelihood was so affected, wouldn't they be here telling us the economic impact in a definitive manner as to uh the impact on the community on their businesses?

So I'm throwing out that alternative for uh discussion.

I think it's a viable one.

It's a fairly easy one to implement uh because you wouldn't have to grind out markings, you could just black out the striping to make it uh compatible with uh Caltrans guidelines, and you'd be addressing um the parking needs of very specific businesses.

Those are my comments.

Thank you, Councilmember Davis.

Umber Thomas.

Thank you.

Uh last time I was here, um, I I voted for uh you know the keeping it the way it is, because I saw another blessing on there because streets were clean, no garbage, no motorhomes, none of that stuff.

Um but I also feel for a few businesses May May Market is not suffering.

Um H.

Low Peninsula is not suffering, and I said one of the callers said KB homes, I guess have enough parking.

But I'm concerned about the burrito shop and the Thai restaurant, a few businesses, and as my partner here said, we can have a mixed use, you know, take off some stuff and um, you know, have some mixed use.

Um, and then I'm also concerned about you know, we're progressing as a community.

We have Doordash, we have Uber Eats coming flying in, and their business is getting the food in time.

So they need parking too.

Whenever these small businesses they have Uberies coming in, they need to have a parking on the street.

They can just come in, fly in.

Otherwise, what they're using is handicapped parking.

And I've I've challenged a few of folks, why are you parking here?

And did they say, yeah, two minutes, two minutes, we'll be out.

So some of those businesses, small businesses are suffering, and we have to access it, like my uh Ray said, we have to ask us which one it is, and if they are suffering, and you know, we need to give their parkings back, like a mixed use uh and go that route.

Daniel, um, I have a quick question for you.

Is it possible to come up?

Sorry.

It's quick.

Uh 35 parkings were taken off, right?

I mean, for this purpose, 2025 up.

12 and 23.

Any of it handicapped parking?

Any of the handy car?

Yeah.

No, everything was straight uh regular parking.

Oh, handicap parking on on street is provided.

Okay.

Got it.

That's it.

That's all I have.

Thank you.

Yes, just for your info, by the way, the burrito shop or that area one space was uh lost.

Thank you.

Got it, thank you.

Councilmember Mota.

Yes, um I agree with um uh councilmember Davis.

I definitely have to consider um options here.

Um I think safety of um pedestrians, cyclists are very important.

Um I have a child that drives a bike, and I definitely want my child to be safe while going to school and traveling on Casha Valley Boulevard.

So I'm definitely um for safety first.

Um, but I definitely want to consider some alternatives for also um the businesses um and options for them to have um some sort of parking or Uber Eats or something that um would give the businesses some flexibility as well.

Um, I've seen um some of the parking of big rig trucks um doing deliveries to those businesses where they're blocking the entire lane of a residential area, and it really impedes on those people needing to get in and out.

It almost blocks the entire um street for even a small car to get by, um, doing deliveries to those businesses that need their food, need supplies and things like that.

So um the streets are already small off of Cash Valley Boulevard in those residential areas, so um that's the reason why I'm thinking of considering some alternative options.

Um so that's my comments.

Thank you very much, yes.

Councilmember Fiebig.

Yes, a lot of interesting things here tonight.

Um, you know, and it it is something I think we have to look at, and as I mentioned to begin with, I you know was hoping that there might be some kind of compromise or you know, something that would benefit both parties of interest, seems like um the you know, safety, you know, it's we it's the bicyclists, but it's the really the safety of of that aspect, and then also the businesses, they also matter in the business district.

So, and then if you dive deeper, you also have seniors who may not be able to get to the businesses or ride a bike themselves personally.

Um ADA, I guess, may or may not matter, but I also thought what about the families with you know the young children, you know, with car seats and things like that.

So there is a need for parking.

I I have several other categories too for that, but there's also a need for safety.

I wrote down about half a dozen potential solutions.

I thought, but I think I think the one I'm hearing here, and the one I like the best is some kind of compromise and maybe a reduction of the 35 spaces, you know, where we keep some and we look at what benefits perhaps are what businesses perhaps are hurt the worst and consider making that something different, like a shared lane, as Ray had mentioned, or or something to that effect.

So that's my thoughts.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Councilmember DeVinny.

Thanks, Chair.

Uh, great testimony tonight.

Uh uh I generally agree uh with just about everything, which is paradoxical because we have two sides here.

But I think a lot of really good points have been made.

I can quibble with a few things here and there, but but in general, uh uh the testimony to tonight, the testimony uh from our last meeting, the numerous letters that we've received, um, the I can't, countless conversations uh I've had with people directly, both in favor of bike lanes and in favor of parking, have really informed my my decision.

Um I I one of the things I heard tonight was a lot of generalizations.

Um HL Peninsula doesn't need any more parking, so on and so forth.

I I'd like to just briefly go through the businesses that are affected by this.

Uh on the north side, again, it's not too many businesses, it's the nobody perfect uh uh uh dog adoption uh center or cat adoption center, and then HL Peninsula.

And and again, the north side is was was so close to not losing parking.

And I say that by from Center Street to Marshall is a sharew.

I know that the the bicycle crowd doesn't like those, but it seems to be uh a miserable destined best uh best choice of design on that doesn't affect uh on street parking at all.

Uh the next section, we take away all the on-street parking um uh between HL Peninsula and the uh nobody's perfect uh center, and then from there on down, we retain all the all street uh on-street parking, and we still have a class two uh buffer bike lane.

Um so it just seems to me like like that one little section uh in between forest and and and marshall, um it's almost the same width.

Um I was hoping that uh uh that at least on that side uh we could find room to retain the parking and also have the uh the bike lane.

The southern Samsung Southern side to me seems to be more problematic, and a number of businesses um are affected.

Uh, not necessarily in in order, but we have starting down at Fremont Bank, Southern Comfort, um the mobile home parks are greatly somebody said there was no housing, there's there's quite a bit of housing that's affected.

There's the Chinese homes on Cato Court.

Um there's certainly K and B.

That's probably the most greatly impacted by uh uh by the loss of uh on street parking, burrito shop top tie, hairdresser, auto repair shop.

Um so I just wanted to mention those to get rid of the generalizations.

So I'm thinking about all of these businesses as and how they might be uh impacted.

Um this has already gone to transportation and planning once.

Um, and they wanted to uh support uh Director Will Dessenvet's decision.

Uh however they put a big caveat on it that uh if it could be proven that uh this is adversely affecting businesses in a commercial district, um, that they would reconsider that idea.

I don't know if that burden of proof has been made or not.

I don't know if that burden of proof is up to them to make to make that.

Um but uh but that's that is how they decided it.

Um I think at least on the correspondence that we received, this council person thinks that that perhaps it should be warranted, and we ought to re-look at uh at the effect of uh of business.

Um the uh in part of my conversations, um uh I I think it's important to to look at the scale of this.

Um and it's it's kind of a uh a privileged group that gets to use the bike lanes.

Um I I dare say not necessarily the one percent, um, but certainly the physically fit, uh certainly not senior citizens, people with enough leisure time, um, people that aren't multitasking.

I don't fall into any of those categories, but I'm thinking of everybody out here.

Um so uh a reason for me to want to reinstall the parking to get rid of the or change the design of the the bike lanes is I think it's a very small group of Castor Valley citizens that are benefiting from this.

Um I understand kids and and safe travel to school uh is fantastic, a great idea.

I wouldn't send my kids down Castor Valley Boulevard, period, with the bike lanes.

I would not I'd send my kids, my kids are in their 40s, but I wouldn't send my great grandkids down there, and I'm hoping that everybody in the bike community always rides with their head on a swivel because the bike lanes don't provide force field um and uh so at any rate, I think it's uh when I'm balancing the the equities here.

Um, I think it's the scale and the loss to such a uh uh a greater group, the loss of of what I think is needed parking to the merchants in the commercial district.

Um I'm I'm very interested in exploring Ray's idea.

And if Ray, perhaps you can uh uh after Chair Mulgru has talked to provide a little bit more uh flavor on that.

Um I'm big I understood two things that came out of that recommendation is uh a daytime uh use of the bike lanes, which insinuates that perhaps nighttime parking would be allowed, and then another one, a shared um uh bike lane and parking opportunity.

I'm envisioning a hashed line.

You talked about painting the existing uh uh bike lanes and creating some kind of a hash line.

So if I can get a little bit more flavor for that, I was really hoping tonight that uh Daniel was gonna tell us that there's another design out there that we can come up with and perhaps raise come up with something here.

Um but short of that um I'm afraid we are at a zero sum vote, at least in my eyes.

And that that's it.

Thank you, council member.

Um I want to thank all the council members for the input and the willingness to examine alternatives.

I want to thank everybody who's here tonight and spoke um spoke your truth, uh, appreciate it.

Um the community of Castro Valley, cyclists, pedestrians, motorists, business owners, customers of those businesses, delivery firms, all residents of Castro Valley, in my opinion, should have had the opportunity to weigh in on this project um before a decision was made to ban parking and exchange it for class two bike lanes.

I believe if that had happened, as it should have, we would not be in the current position of polarization, all or nothing.

Um, and I believe that uh speaker earlier tonight talked about trade-offs as being um what it's all about.

There were no trade offs when this project was done.

Nothing was considered.

Um there were none.

And yet here we are.

And I I believe it was uh I believe it was the idea of this council to come back to ground zero at the last meeting and give the public um the public process a chance to work, to talk about alternatives, to talk about trade-offs.

I don't believe any member up here is anti-bike lane or anti-cyclist.

I don't believe that.

I have no reason to believe that.

I think it's all about what's good for the community.

And I'm hearing tonight for the first time, really, um, that there are lots of alternatives to consider.

And I think there has to be a way.

I believe there has to be a way to increase and maintain and increase cyclist safety and accessibility without damaging the ability of businesses to feed their families and serve the needs of the community.

Having said that I mean you know we can we can consider the two polls all parking or all bicycling we can consider a number of derivations derivatives of that uh time of day um time of day parking where it works we can consider um parking in front of key businesses businesses that needed parking in certain segments we could rotate I mean there's all kinds of alternatives to consider that would serve the needs of cyclists and serve the needs of the rest of the community and having said that um councilmember Davini asked for a little clarification from council member davis I'd be willing to hear that uh councilman member uh Davini you first asked about the broken stripe well uh alternative and uh again it's it's a common treatment that we use in traffic engineering for we have a right turn lane that you have that broken line so that you're sharing the bicyclist and vehicle driver both know that they're sharing that particular space I have not seen it done but I think that uh my review of of the vehicle code and and Caltrans uh and other design manuals it is not prohibited that we could break up the line and create a mid-block shared uh I would you know defer to staff on that one and uh the other option of course is in areas that need overnight parking that you would um uh between hours of eight a.m and four p.m.

it's a bike lane and then afterwards you can use it for parking and it may just be in spot locations did I answer your question.

Uh despite having a driver's license I'm not a traffic engineer.

I think you have um if I could paraphrase I mean would you be suggesting perhaps I'm gonna just call it a hashtagged bike lane which suggests dual use would that be conceivable doing that along the entire southern side from Fremont Bank I I don't all the way all the way down to the mobile home parks I don't alter I I don't believe that it needs needed the entire length I think there's specific locations and you cite well uh Wells Fargo we got a parking lot.

I think Fremont Bank uses it mostly for their brinks delivery but okay so we're gonna put you're not gonna have a bike lane so you can facilitate brinks delivery just suggesting it yeah uh and then and then how would we select those of those eight or nine thank you for this uh of those eight or nine uh uh businesses how would we select which one would get that treatment and and which one wouldn't get that treatment I would leave it to staff to work with area businesses to determine that so uh just uh to us says uh appreciate uh council member Davis's advice is and uh suggestion but he fully knows uh we're now going to design it here at this table uh he also knows that uh there are variations uh nuanced things that we have to look at for this body let me let me put it this way I can't imagine uh board of supervisors taking the kind of risk removing a bike lane and because like one of the gentlemen somebody said it no matter who which who caused the accident somebody gets hurt the county is going to bear enormous liability and responsibility I, for one of the director of the agency when a county engineer would not recommend to the full board to do so.

In fact, I would oppose any action uh to that effect so uh I was hoping through this dialogue and discussion that you can see right now, we have a very optimal scenario for Castro Valley Boulevard that balances, like I said, it's a compromise, it's a balance, it's a shared use of the facility where we maintained over 90% of the parking along that corridor when we installed this bike lane.

And like I told you in front of the restaurant, there's an excess of sometimes 12, 15, 20 cars that used to be legally parked that could have consumed the parking spaces.

So while I do appreciate, and I'm a very strong proponent of businesses and business, let's give the businesses the opportunity to come up with a solution.

Let's give the businesses to say uh, you know, we have an idea, maybe we can do this, and let's continue to work with that.

I think uh this body right now have an opportunity to let this thing take the time.

Let's get, let's collect the data, let's collect the information, and not be uh part of the decision process where you're advancing uh a high-risk environment.

I don't think that's your intention.

I don't think that would be the case.

This uh, you know, kind of checkered bike land is not going to work very well either because uh you know, people are gonna park even now with the bike land, people are parking.

So uh uh enforcement.

You can imagine having a CHP chasing uh bike lane parking violations.

I know you know, so let's be let's be rational, let's be practical.

And uh this body need to advance your long-standing decision to advance safety for all users, and this current situation right now does that and give us the opportunity to continue to work on coming up with a solution that can enhance and advance uh uh further all users, including uh potential solutions for parking, uh working with businesses, chamber of commerce and others to see what can be done.

So uh I would I would really encourage you not to attempt to design a bike claim facility or roadway infrastructure as a committee uh right now.

So uh I do appreciate and I I have a great deal of respect for uh Mr.

Davis there, he's an excellent traffic engineer, uh, but he is also one of those pragmatic people that I know that he's not gonna sit down and uh design something without proper survey, detailed information to make that kind of call.

Thank you.

Mr.

Chair, yes.

Just one last question.

You what is the time frame that you believe you need to adequately assess these bike lanes?

The assessment is an ongoing process.

My suggestion is at least another one year to allow for bike for bikers to get familiar with the system so that we can develop another measurement of bike utilization.

Daniel, excuse me for just one second, please.

Um, council member Davis, um, what what is being assessed in your question is how long would it take to assess what is being assessed?

Well, he indicated he wanted to we should step back from what we are proposing so that staff could further assess.

So I assume that he had a knowledge as to what they were in fact going to be assessing, and therefore I was just asking for a timeline for when that we might expect that to come back to us.

Okay, we have we have not to my knowledge proposed anything yet tonight.

Yes, but we're just having conversations.

Yes, we are.

Um and I while I appreciate that question, I think it's a good question.

I think it should be broadened, um, not to just assessing individual business need.

I think that question should be broadened to include assessing other alternatives besides just um spot parking, uh, should be included.

Time of day parking should be in things like lane width to protect the cyclists to allow for the needs of the businesses to be met.

Um so I if it's the will of the council that it that we focus just on the business spot business um that's that's okay, but my my preference would be to broaden it to look at other alternatives as well.

I'm not sure I heard what you said because uh you're speaking away from the mic, but uh if you have any question from my point of view, very simple uh thing is number one, you want to retain the safety factor that we currently enjoy along that roadway.

Number two, uh you don't want to put any kind of piecemeal uh bike lane along that corridor because that creates additional uh safety risk.

So uh while we continually look at what's going on, what you know, because this is not uh one time shot uh where we do a two weeks bike count or something like that and move on.

Uh let's continue to monitor, see what's going on.

Let's uh maybe the businesses can come and chat with you guys and or suggest any kind of solutions that they can think of.

We can we can continue to work on those things.

But at this time, uh the safety factor associated with the bike lane outweighs the value that has been raised to the impact of the uh the uh the loss of parking because we maintain majority of the parking along this corridor.

So just to be blunt, I'm just telling you what I would be saying to our board if I was asked is number one KB homes was never supposed to be dependent on on street parking.

Number two, uh areas like the burrito space lost uh one space.

No one is gonna come back and say, you know what, forget AB 413, let's go allow people to park because the law says no.

So some of these things are some of the factors that we have taken into much consideration when we came up with these compromise.

The share of that we put in up to some of somebody mentioned that's a downhill high speed area, which allows bikers to go down very fast so they can take the lane.

They can share the road.

So if there was any parking need at that location, uh we maintained it, we left it alone.

So uh, but I would I would generally encourage you to come up with general guidance rather than specific actual design type of parameters at the body here, because we have to go the drawing board with specific survey data with information in order to make that call.

And don't forget the enforcement aspect of these things.

Appreciate it.

Um we are to decide what, if anything, we recommend to transportation and planning committee.

And uh it's hearing pretty unanimous that that we believe there is an alternative to let's remove the bike lane.

That I'm hearing nobody say that that's the direction we should go.

Is that is that fairly accurate?

Removing the bike lane as it was installed.

Yes, okay.

Um, so great that that's a boundary, wonderful.

What what kinds of and I'm hearing from pretty much everybody that that we're looking for um study and recommendation of different alternatives what what are what are those alternatives, what are those aspects of this situation that we would like to ask transportation and planning to direct staff to study?

Um again, I don't want to quibble with you, Chair, but it sounds like the alternatives is is to let enough time pass so that the businesses can adopt and come up with their own recommendations, but I don't know how business comes up with a recommendation to restreet to restore on street parking when they think that it needed when there's no other alternatives to that.

So I'm I'm at a that is a real conundrum here, where again, as I've stated several times tonight, I really think we're at a zero sub game.

We're gonna we're gonna vote to put in or or you know, keep the uh keep the bike lanes or remove them.

Um I definitely agree safety benefits um outweigh parking concerns.

I get that, and that's very loud and clear.

Um, however, safety outcomes must be measured, um, not assumed, and given the corridor of what 30,000 now daily.

Um, I would just request, you know, ongoing collision tracking, um, bicycle involvement involved accidents reports, um, public shared safety performance matrix.

I think those are kind of fair enough.

Um, and then also, you know, you spoke in your report about future um refinements may be considered um if issues persist.

Um I support adaptive management.

Um, however, without defined thresholds, timelines, decision triggers, refinements become discretionary rather than accountable.

Um I would recommend also with that is an evaluation intervals, um objective criteria for modification.

So I would definitely um want to hear what your plan is for the businesses um to have some options.

Um I think um member Davis mentioned some options, and that's non-can't do that, right?

So we don't want to have the businesses say, oh, just give us this or do this when that's not even an option, it's not on the table.

So if we give them options and give them things that we're we are not coming up with, right?

And it's coming from your department and things that you can come up with that they do have these different options available to them, then that gives some flexibility to them to consider what their options are.

Because they're not gonna come up with planning options and parking and all that, you know.

So I that's something that I would recommend.

That's the only comment I have.

Thank you.

Council Member Thomas, did you want to check in?

As I said before, we don't have it, and uh like Daniel said, we can add it to our specific plan, parking structure, but that's gonna be a long way away.

Uh, but you know, look at if you live in Castro Valley.

Um, you go into a Ross, TJ Maxx, Breakfast Club, Starbucks, Safeway, Don Jose, Lourdes, you go into that parking lot.

You can't find parking sometimes.

You have to drive away, find so that's what I'm saying.

No, adding businesses and safety.

I'll always support a safety.

So we have to make sure that if people are coming to Castro Valley, they need to have, you know, they're coming to uh HL Peninsula, May May Market, visiting the breakers club.

They need to find ample parking.

So a parking structure is the solution.

I strongly believe it, and this is Castle Valley, and we have to work what is best for Castle Valley.

Thank you.

Other comments or discussion.

Councilmember Davis, you seem to have the clearest specific uh thoughts on this.

Would you care to make a motion?

If you'd like me to try to fabricate a motion, yes.

I'm making this motion just to get this on the record.

I move that public works agency be instructed to work with area businesses to determine what spaces are needed for their businesses and modify the existing signing, striping to facilitate a shared parking and bike lane, and facilitate on-street parking at specific locations that are needed for parking between 4 p.m.

and 8 a.m.

Thank you.

Do we have second?

Can I make a friendly uh amendment to that?

Once once a second has been given, yes.

I will second it.

May I now make a friendly amendment?

Can we put a time limit on when public works is going to reach out to the business community?

Explore perhaps your idea, uh member Davis of shared parking.

Um and uh and I would suggest that uh we do this again in three months.

I would like to see a three month uh time frame and the whole community come back and do this again.

I would consider a six-month time period as a friendly amendment, but I think a few months is just too soon.

Six works for me.

Okay, we have a motion and a second and any other discussion.

Madam Clerk.

Council Member DeVini.

All right, Councilmember Davis.

Aye, council member feebig, council member Mota?

Aye.

Councilmember Thomas?

Yes, Chair, Vice Chair Malgrew.

Aye.

Motion pass.

Thank you.

Unanimous.

Well done.

Thank everybody for for the input for the uh concern and care on behalf of the community.

Hey, Bill, check what time it is.

All right, we are in to the point of chair's report.

Um the chair, the acting chair has no report.

Are there any can you please be quiet as you exit so we can continue our meeting?

Thank you.

Yeah, we're we're still working here, folks.

Bruce, can we?

Yeah, we're we're trying to wrap up here.

Thanks.

All right.

All right, item seven chair's report.

Chair has no report.

Are there any announcements, discussions from the council?

Yeah, it's uh just a request of um from staff as to do we have any policies in place addressing private bus benches with advertising and their placement.

Can you repeat the question?

Does the county have a policy?

Any policy that um deals with or addresses the placement of bus benches with advertising?

Um I would have to look into that.

I believe the existing bus benches that are owned by AC Transit.

Um I would think that those went in when we did the boulevard um streetscape, but I would have to double check.

My understanding in talking with AC Transit was that the um the ones with the advertising are actually privately owned, and and they place them, and there's a number of them that are placed nowhere near a bus stop.

Uh one example may be in fact, across from the new C V SAN building, but I have nothing to do with that.

I will look into that.

Um that's the first time I've heard that.

I know that the bus shelters, the advertisement is run by Clear Channel, and those are AC transit facilities.

Um, I agree with that.

Yeah, I've never had that question.

I'll look into it.

I'll send you an email.

Can I add a comment also?

Um, can we also look into the garbage?

I think I I went to a meeting a couple years ago where there was some funding or something for the garbage receptors to be redone or maintained in some way.

Um I would just want to kind of look into that and see what our options are for getting those updated, or you know, what's the path forward for for those?

Uh so CVSAN did buy uh garbage cans, and to my knowledge, our office worked between CVSAN and Public Works uh to install those, and I believe that was all wrapped up about a year ago.

Um, I can check with all parties though and get back to you.

That'd be great.

Thank you.

I had a question regarding our tonight, public works.

Is there a way we could get ahead of them, you know, and have a meeting before they do what they do so that we could you know have community involvement and that sort of thing?

Because you know, like the you know, we were talking about those.

What are they called?

The the little bullets on the you know um they weren't gonna do that anymore.

I thought that was a good decision.

I think they still are probably on projects that were already slated.

Um, but it'd be nice to be ahead of those things instead of falling up behind and um having disruptive disruptive community.

And again, you know, the council that was in place in 2019 supposedly had that agreement from public works that the projects that were prioritized would be and indicated by further study um in the document, would be brought back to the max for discussion prior to implementation.

Um, and I think that's being reaffirmed, and uh we we'll follow up with public works, thank you staff district four staff will uh just have a comment.

Um last week uh public comment.

Uh the speaker said that um we're still having issues with the new business permits and getting the permits here.

I just want to I just want to have somebody put it on the agenda and some somebody from the county come and respond to why is it why is it taking this five five six years?

We've been talking about streamlining the business permit for the unincorporated area.

Why is it Dublin and Pleasant and they get they moved there and get the permits real quick?

And for us, it's such a hassle and speakers come and speak about it all the time, and nothing happens, right?

So I just want somebody to respond.

Is why is it taking so long to start a business in unincorporated area?

Noted.

Thank you.

Perhaps um, I have another question.

Sorry.

Sorry, you just opened up a whole, I'm sorry, I just now I'm thinking of stuff.

So just really just really quick.

Um, we had the Big Mac.

Remember, all Mac.

I mean all Mac, all Mac.

I call it the big Mac extra.

Um, are there next steps from that process that we are still following up on, or we're gonna be in the know of what's happening next.

I just I'm just curious because I don't know what's gonna, you know, once we had that meeting and we gave our feedback, we went through the exercise.

I wasn't sure, wasn't left knowing, you know, we'll we'll contact you guys in three months when something is ready.

So just I want to just kind of get a quick update on that.

Uh yeah, I will um double check.

It has been after that meeting, um, I believe it did already go back to unincorporated services.

Um, I don't want to get into too much discussion since this isn't on the agenda.

Um, but I will check and uh we'll provide some type of update on that.

Thank you.

But it is at the board level.

I'm done, I promise.

Just as a follow-up, um, it's probably been five or six months since we've seen ECD here uh with the status and an update and the the the business license permit process could be addressed if they were to come back in the near future.

Noted.

Thank you.

I didn't see your writing it.

It's a steel trap.

Any other comments, announcements?

Do we have anything from from staff?

No, thank you.

We'll find a way to keep you here a little while longer.

All right.

Eight forty-six.