Media/Press

Please check back for any local press and related articles pertaining to issues, concerns and events having to do with GESC.

The Daily News and San Jose Mercury News Article April 10th 2009

Rail neighbors hope to shed NIMBY image
Concerns stem from Caltrain’s bridge that ruined some sidewalks

BY MIKE ROSENBERG
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

Recognizing Peninsula residents’ growing fear that raised high speed train tracks could divide their communities, residents of a San Carlos neighborhood have started sharing their bad experiences from living near an elevated Caltrain bridge.
The Greater East San Carlos neighborhood group, which lies east of the Old County Road industrial corridor that fronts the Caltrain tracks, contends that rail bridges like those envisioned at inter sections where high-speed bullet trains someday may cross can isolate a community.
Since San Carlos city officials, who are in favor of the project, have chosen not to join Palo Alto, Menlo Park and Atherton in lobbying against the rail bridges, the East San Carlos neigh borhood has decided to team up with neighborhood groups from those cities in an informal consortium that has the ear of two state legislators.
Greater East San Carlos group president Ben Fuller said his neighborhood feels isolated from the city’s downtown because of the Holly Street grade separation along El Camino Real, built in the late 1990s. He added that nearby sidewalks have been nar rowed, making it difficult to walk through the area, and that noise and vibrations near the tracks have increased since they were el­evated.  “What they chose to do is literally just separate us from every body else,” Fuller said. “We just want to be part of ‘The City of Good Living,’ ” he said, referring to the city’s motto.
And while city officials say the majority of residents favor the Holly Street rail bridge — which has improved safety and traffic flow — the east neighborhood group says its special interests as direct neighbors of the rail line should be heard. The group has found friends in neighborhoods such as Felton Gables in Menlo Park and Charleston Meadows in Palo Alto, which also lie next to the tracks, and they hope that together their voices will be louder as a regional group.

The work is already paying off. The groups have bypassed local officials and gone directly to their state rep resentatives, having held meetings recently with state Sen. Joe Simitian, D-Palo Alto, and Assem blyman Ira Ruskin, D-Los Altos. Ruskin said that after meeting with the group recently he called Cali fornia High Speed Rail Authority officials into his Sacramento office and relayed the residents’ concerns, including their preference for tunnels or some other non-bridge option. “I share their con cerns,” Ruskin said. “I got the assurance from the high-speed rail people that there would be a be low- grade (option studied) as part of the (planning) process.  “I really admire that they have become a part of the process and want their voices heard,” he said.
The experiences shared by the San Carlos contingent has proven invaluable during the consortium’s planning meetings, said consortium founder and Palo Alto resident Sara Armstrong.  “Here’s the reality — or at least one reality — of what happened in a city that is very similar to cities up and down the Pen insula,” Armstrong said.  Fuller and Armstrong said the consortium should also help dis pel the NIMBY, or “not in my backyard”, stereotype often tagged on homeowners who oppose high-speed rail. By working together as a regional group, they hope to prove that they represent the in terests of many property homeowners in the region and not just their own backyards.  In fact, they said a better name might be YUMBY, or “Yes Under My Backyard,” a reference to their preference for tunneling the train.

“We’re not NIMBYs,” Fuller said. “We care about what happens to communities throughout California.”

Joshua Melvin / Daily News Greater

East San Carlos neighborhood resident Ben Fuller, 41, shows sidewalks near his house Thursday that he said are narrow and dangerous as a result of a Caltrain grade separation. His neighborhood is using its painful experience with Caltrain as an example for why other communities should become involved with high-speed rail planning.

E-mail Mike Rosenberg at mike.rosenberg@dailynewsgroup.com

Article an Jose Mercury News Article February 25th 2009

Major high-speed rail dilemma discovered in San Carlos

By Mike Rosenberg
Daily News Staff Writer
Posted: 02/25/2009 01:29:49 AM PST

New tracks in San Carlos for the state’s proposed bullet train could bar high-profile vehicles from a key route to and from Highway 101, city engineers have discovered.
In the latest of several concerns Peninsula officials have raised about the new high-speed rail line, San Carlos officials sent the state a letter Monday in which they explain how Holly Street would be negatively affected by the project.

Two tracks for the bullet train would be built parallel to the existing Caltrain tracks that run through San Carlos east of El Camino Real. The existing tracks cross Holly Street via a grade separation — where they are elevated above the U-shaped roadway. The rail bridge would need to be widened to accommodate the additional tracks, which would lower the vertical clearance of the street below, said Robert Weil, the city’s public works director.

Fifteen feet of vertical clearance is needed underneath the bridge; the clearance is currently 15 feet and three inches.  It appears the new tracks and wider bridge would reduce the clearance to less than 15 feet, Weil said  “So something has to give,” he said. “Either Holly Street has to be re-lowered or the whole rail structure has to be raised.  Otherwise a tall truck would run right into the bottom of the bridge.”

Lowering Holly may not be possible because the street may not comply with roadway design standards, Weil said.

The California High Speed Rail Authority is accepting comments through April 6 before it begins planning the San Francisco-to-San Jose portion of the high-speed rail line, which is expected to whisk passengers from the Bay Area to Southern California in 2½ hours.  In their letter, San Carlos officials urged the rail authority to address the engineering conflict in detail and to determine the impacts of raising the bridge.

Rail authority officials on Monday told the San Carlos City Council that it may be possible to raise the bridge, said Assistant City Manger Brian Moura.
It isn’t clear yet what sort of legal action the city could take to resolve the issue if the rail authority fails to develop a solution, Weil said.  The rail authority only recently learned of the issue, said Deputy Director Dan Leavitt.  “There may be some adjustments to the road profile, that’s something we’ll look at,” Leavitt said. “We’ll certainly try to minimize any sort of impacts we can on existing facilities.”

San Carlos’ letter included roughly a dozen comments on the proposed bullet train. The authors called for a visual impact study, a noise volume analysis and raised concerns about potential increases in vibration. The letter did not mention other potential conflicts with the city’s other grade separation, over Brittan Avenue.

A group representing the neighborhood near the tracks, Greater East San Carlos, will also submit a letter to the state, said President Ben Fuller. It cites eight concerns, including the need for long-term parking and increased landscaping around the tracks.

San Carlos is the latest of several Peninsula cities to question the bullet train project. It recently came under fire in Palo Alto and other towns that have been meeting to discuss forming a consortium to better negotiate with the rail authority.

E-mail Mike Rosenberg at mike.rosenberg@dailynewsgroup.com

San Mateo Daily News Article Wednesday October 29, 2008
Council rejects planning commission proposal
Multi-family developments voted down as residents feared property value decreases

BY JESSICA BERNSTEIN-WAX
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

The San Carlos City Council has unani mously voted down a proposed change to the city’s general plan that east side residents feared could jeopardize their homes.

At its Monday night meeting, the council rejected a planning commission recommendation to allow multi-family developments on a portion of Holly Street and the south side of Springfield Drive. It also voted down a General Plan Ad visory Committee, or GPAC, proposal to apply that designa tion just to Holly Street.

Residents had feared the changes would cause their property values to plummet and put them at risk of losing their homes to developers.  “The people who bought those houses, they bought them to live in them,” Vice Mayor Bob Grassilli said at the meeting. “To put a cloud over someone’s home is just not right.”
The decision came at about 11:15 p.m. after dozens of east side residents clad in red T-shirts flooded council chambers, spilling into the lobby and an overflow room on the second floor. Emo tions ran from fear to anger to disbelief during more than two hours of public comment, pep pered with frequent applause and jeers.
Some of the nearly 50 speakers said they were worried the city would take over their homes as part of future development projects, although San Carlos officials noted that California Propo sition 99 prohibits state and local governments from acquiring an owner-occupied residence for a private project.
Critics have questioned how much the propo sition, passed in June, protects renters and even homeowners living on their properties if, for ex ample, a private developer includes space for a public facility.

Linda Ledwith, a resident of the south side of Springfield Drive, anticipated that tough economic times would force some owners to sell to developers whether or not the city got involved.  “Who is going to buy their parcel? A developer. And so it will begin,” Ledwith said. “One by one, our parcels on Springfield will be plucked up, and us long-term residents will sit and watch as our neighborhood is decimated.”

Others voiced concern that just designating the area as multi-family low density could se verely impact home values and complained that east side residents lacked proper representation on the planning commission and in the city gov ernment. They pointed to a number of develop ment projects under way in the area and said the city wasn’t reinvesting proceeds into their neighborhood.

“If you live on the west side of San Carlos, it is the city of good living,” said Kelly Reutlinger. “But if you live on the east side, you better watch out.”
The plan to include Springfield in the pro posal to revamp Holly Street and make it a more fitting gateway to the city sprung from a letter west side resident Bonnie McClure sent GPAC in September. The committee didn’t adopt the change, but the planning commission recom mended it and also proposed giving two parcels on Fairfield Drive a neighborhood retail des ignation, potentially opening up the cul de sac to heavy traffic.
At the meeting, McClure said she had worked 18 years to widen Holly Street and thought it would make a “very important” gateway to the city. If developers built up the north side of Holly, ensuing traffic problems could necessitate a widening of Springfield as well, McClure said.  “We all have changes in our neighborhoods,” she added.  Outraged residents met her comments with jeers of, “Stay up in the hills!” and “Your house isn’t being taken!”  After the council rejected the proposal, those same people embraced each other and gave council members a standing ovation.

Also Monday, the council unanimously voted to support a GPAC and planning commission recommendation not to allow mixed-use development in a commercial zone east of Industrial Road between Bransten Road and Brittan Avenue.  Business owners had worried that the introduction of residential housing would negatively impact their operations, some of which involve noise and chemicals appropriate for industrial areas but not family neighborhoods.

San Mateo Daily News Article Sunday October 26, 2008

San Carlos residents worry about zoning
Planning commission idea protested

BY JESSICA BERNSTEIN-WAX
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

A recent San Carlos Planning Commission recommendation has some residents of the city’s east side worried their neighborhood is slated for a major development they believe could sink property values — or even wipe out their homes.

But the city says it won’t seize any private property, and there are currently no develop ments in the works.  At its Oct. 6 meeting, the planning com mission proposed a change to San Carlos’ general plan that would extend a multi-fam ily, low-density land use designation planned for part of Holly Street to the south side of Springfield Drive. It would also give two par cels on Fairfield Drive a neighborhood retail designation, potentially opening up the cul de sac to heavy traffic.
“They adopted it late at night on a Monday with no one there from the east side,” said Linda Ledwith, a resident who has lived on the south side of Springfield since 1996 and grew up in the neighborhood.

“It smells like a bad Disney movie: There’s a villain, and he wants my house,” she said.

Stan Paresa, who lives in one of the homes that would receive a retail designation, expressed similar fears and said he had suffered depression and disbelief since learning of the proposal.  “If I’m kicked out of here, since we refinanced and everything, I would have to move to Texas,” Paresa, 51, said. “I have no place to go.”  Ledwith and Paresa plan to attend Mon day’s city council meeting with as many as 200 of their neighbors. Council members will consider the commission’s recommendation and a number of other proposed changes to the general plan.
The proposal to include Springfield in slated changes to Holly Street, considered a gateway to the city, apparently sprung from a letter west side resident Bonnie McClure sent San Carlos’ General Plan Advisory Commit tee in September. It wasn’t clear why McClure felt invested in the project, and she couldn’t be reached for comment Friday.
Community Development Director Al Sa vay described the recommendation as a first step and said that even if the council approves it Monday, the decision won’t be finalized for about a year.  “The whole community still has months and months to examine this and debate it,” Savay said.  He added that the city has no plans to pur chase properties and isn’t talking with any de velopers at this time.  “Any changes in the area would be depen dent on the market forces,” Savay said. “It’s up to each individual property owner – there’s no one that’s going to force them to sell their But Jim Reutlinger, a resident of the north side of Spring field Drive, said a multi-family designation on the street would make his home’s value sink. And if an apartment building eventually sprung up across the street, Reutlinger predicted his property would lose 50 percent of its value.
“It just doesn’t make sense to me that someone can write a letter like that, and it turns into this,” said Reutlinger, who recently completed $250,000 of renovations on his home. “What’s to stop us from going to the next planning commission meeting and proposing they tear down Laurel Street?”
Reutlinger said he planned to pool money with several neighbors to hire a lawyer if the council approves the new designation.

E-mail Jessica Bernstein-Wax at jbernstein@dailynewsgroup.com.

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