Thank you to the over 40 members of our community and especially those of you from Walk-Bike Cupertino (WBC) who attended the first community meeting on December 1st for the 2016 Cupertino Bike Plan.
The meeting was run by Christopher Kidd with the consulting firm Alta Planning (www.altaplanning.com) and David Stillman, Senior Civil Engineer with the city of Cupertino. Other members of the city attended along with Alta staff. The format was about a 20 minute overview of the city’s streets, reported bicycle injury accidents, the planning process and how the rest of the community meeting was to be run.
After the presentation the community broke up into 4 groups with an Alta facilitator at each table. The members at each table were encouraged to participate in an open discussion of ideas and observations regarding the future for biking in, around and through Cupertino. These ideas were memorialized by the facilitator and then each table was allowed to present their groups findings to all those in attendance.
Here are some of the observations by myself and Cupertino Bike/Ped Commissioner, Pete Heller, also a member of WBC:
- Desire to emulate cities like Portland that have successfully increased bike usage
- Consistent desire to have kids get to school by bike through “Safe Routes to Schools”
- Support to add Class IV bikeway on Stevens Creek Boulevard. Bicycles separated from vehicle traffic with a definable barrier
- Interest in implementing recreational as well as commuter bikeways on McClellan, Pacific, Regnart and Calaveras creeks, Stelling, Blaney and Tantau
- Along with the creeks and rail road tracks there was interest in creating a trail along Hwy 280 from Tantau to Miller
- Desire to increase bike parking facilities, particularly at shopping destinations. Perhaps corral type parking like the new facility at De Anza College;
- Desire to utilize UP rail right-of-way for a trail for north-south travel from Rancho San Antonio to Saratoga PG&E right-of-way trail beginning where it connects to Hwy 9. The representative from Rails-to-Trails attended the meeting.
- Desire to connect to Don Burnett Bridge using routes through planned development of the Oaks Shopping Center. It was suggested times that this be the connection to the Stevens Creek Trail from Sunnyvale, through De Anza College to McClellan and then west to Foothill Boulevard.
There was support for abandoning the propose bridge over Stevens Creek connecting the trail to Rancho San Antonio Park. People believe there are better uses of 2 million dollars. One person in particular represented she has the documents where the Church agreed to have this route open and the gate should be unlocked accordingly. She is going to provide David Stillman those documents.
There was also a VTA representative in attendance. She appeared to be mostly interested in Stevens Creek Boulevard.
In general, the meeting went very well. Clearly WBC was well represented.
There will be a second community meeting to go over a draft of the plan early 2016. Hope to see as many as possible in attendance.
Gary E. Jones
Cupertino Bike/Ped Commissioner
Member, Walk-Bike Cupertino