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Politics & Government

Without Lower-Cost Options, Council Instead Debates a Name Change

The Los Altos City Council discusses renaming the Collector Traffic Master Plan and ponders a test roundabout at Fremont Avenue and Fallen Leaf Lane.

Still not fully satisfied with a draft traffic-calming master plan, the Los Altos City Council sent consultants back to the drawing board to come up with cheaper alternatives to slowing down traffic on the city’s through routes.

Not much had changed since a , when the City Council told two consultants from RBF Consulting essentially the same thing as it did Tuesday night: how costly all RBF's traffic-calming suggestions were, possibly as much as $9 million total.

During Tuesday night's study session for a traffic-calming plan, the consultants told council members that cheaper would not be better.

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In fact, RBF’s Dawn Wilson told the council that cheaper traffic-calming devices, like speed bumps, would most likely send drivers off of major collector streets onto neighborhood streets to avoid the slowing devices.

Both traffic commission members who attended Tuesday’s study session and council members continued to ask if cheaper alternatives could be used to slow down drivers.

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“I’m still concerned about the cost,” said Councilwoman Val Carpenter. “I personally like speed bumps and I’m frustrated they’re not in here.”

Earlier, staff had told council members and commissioners that speed bumps are allowed under city statutes on neighborhood streets but not on larger collector streets.

Councilwoman Megan Satterlee said she does not agree with finding cheaper alternatives. Satterlee also wondered if Los Altos would create an “obstacle course” by adding too many calming devices around the city.

“If we wind up diverting traffic (into neighborhoods), that will be a major disaster,” she said.

The council was also still wary of roundabouts recommended by the consultants for several intersections, but toward the end of the meeting came to a consensus that a test roundabout could be implemented, possibly at the intersection of Fremont Avenue and Fallen Leaf Lane, or Fremont and Newcastle Drive/Truman Avenue.

Wilson told the council that the Federal Highway Administration has studied roundabouts and found them to be safer than traditional intersections. She displayed a diagram that showed how roundabouts reduce points of conflict between vehicles and pedestrians or bicycles by half, from 16 points to eight. In addition to improving safety, she said roundabouts have also been shown to improve traffic flow.

No votes are taken at study sessions, so the plan will come back with revisions to future traffic commission and council meetings.

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