CCMIN050107 - Laserfiche WebLink

community. He found it troublesome also to do an analysis on one data point and asked for one more five years out, determining what it would be with and without the extension. Lastly, regarding getting to the hospital from Livermore, there has always been an EVA so people can get between Livermore and Pleasanton. Valerie Arkin felt the extension will become an expressway and commuters would use it as a cut-through. Her main concern is child safety, said there is a third school planned on Stoneridge with a driveway right on Stoneridge and with the many kids who bike, walk and skateboard to and from school, she felt it was not safe. There is also the greater possibility for child abductions, and she felt a freeway on-ramp should not be located near a school. There are also two heavily used parks in the area with balls going into the street and felt this was another safety issue. Regarding traffic, the extension is not a good idea and she asked people to consider the children in the community. Les Young said the Stoneridge extension has been in the plan, all residents in the corridor were fully disclosed as they purchased their homes and if they were not, their problem should lie with their real estate agents. Stoneridge housing has been built with sound walls to accommodate roads going through, leaving the extension in the plan does not mean it would be built but available to be built, and if taken out, he doubts it would ever get back into the plan. Regarding safety, he drives to Safeway because it is dangerous crossing between Valley and Santa Rita. He said the City’s predecessors had the foresight to include the extension in the General Plan and asked the Council not to be short-sighted. Jennifer Gurney said we have a small town feel, well-attended community events, community spirit and a nice-looking town, and believes a large thorough-fare through the town will change this. The long wide streets paralleling I-580 in neighboring cities look like strip malls on steroids to her, she felt it would be impossible to make a 6-lane thoroughfare look scenic and would significantly change the feel of the city. The projections show that the number of cars on Valley and other roads are reduced in the hundreds by increasing the number of cars on Stoneridge by the thousands. She was not sure if people in those neighborhoods would feel the change by extending Stoneridge, and felt we were looking in the wrong place for answers. John Grozier lives with Stoneridge Drive in his backyard, thinks people should be mindful that the traffic report shows a volume re-distribution and not a volume reduction so no neighborhood benefits and it actually gets worse everywhere. The study area is the most heavily traveled street in Pleasanton; 6400 cars on one end at I-680 and 3300 at the other end at Stoneridge and El Charro. Some characteristics of the neighborhood include a church, a large park, 2 schools, children walking to school on Stoneridge, being able to hear I-580 from the neighborhood, they can hear the airport, and the potential smell from exhaust of 3300 cars. He said a real life experience is that almost 100 cars a day need to make a left turn to get back on Stoneridge Drive and with the addition of 3 traffic lights, at least 100 cars will be queuing up to get out of the neighborhood, making it more difficult. In summary, he felt we should focus less on convenience and more on safety. He also thinks we should be looking for ways to reduce the volume of traffic through State Route 84 improvements and should not duplicate existing problems, but fix current ones. James Paxson thanked Councilmember Sullivan and others regarding retaining flexibility when looking at the Land Use Element and hoped it would be preserved while moving forward in bringing a specific plan for the park, as having this flexibility was extremely important to them. City Council Minutes 14 May 1, 2007