Complete Streets plan is about safety for all on our roadways

QThe Complete Streets plan to curtail roadway fatalities raises a question: Why are cities spending millions of taxpayer dollars based on hopes and no realistic basis or expectations?

Fremont is spending millions reconfiguring streets and is potentially making them unsafe for everyone on the road. For example, reducing the number of car lanes makes them unsafe because it practically eliminates any flexibility to maneuver around an emergency situation without going into the next lane.

In addition, there is very little increase in bicycle traffic. Yet bicycle lanes have been effectively widened, making it unsafe for car drivers.

AComplete Streets refers to making local road changes to benefit all users — drivers, bicyclists, pedestrians and transit users. It often means losing a lane of traffic, lower speed limits, new bike lanes, shorter pedestrian crossings and more bus-friendly traffic lights.

Bicycling in the Bay Area is slowly on the increase, according to census data. San Jose is on track to have 3 percent to 4 percent of trips taken by bicyclists by next year in some areas. That’s short of the 5 percent goal citywide, but it is inching up.

San Jose city has a long-term goal of 15 percent of trips by bike in 2040. John-The-City-BikeGuy says he is “optimistic San Jose will, in the long term, see biking rates far above 5 percent.”

The city’s bike plan calls for completing a 500-mile network, consisting of 400 miles of on-street bikeways and 100 miles of off-street trails. To date, San Jose has completed 236 miles of bike lanes.

QIt seems that Fremont is planning more changes that would add to this list of making “bad” streets and not “complete streets.” Sorry for expressing an opposing viewpoint. Nonetheless, it is based on firsthand experience of driving and observing bicyclists and pedestrians also behaving unsafely in addition to some motorists.

AThis is really all about slowing down traffic. In 2015, all fatal traffic crashes in Fremont occurred on major streets with speed limits of 40 mph or greater, and 50 percent of the fatalities occurred on Fremont Boulevard alone. The city has since lowered the speed limit from 45 to 40 mph and from 40 to 35 mph on 11 major streets.

In Oakland, 2 of 3 drivers yield at some crosswalks on Telegraph, compared with 20 percent a few years ago. Speeding is down 45 percent.

QI am not sure about other streets, but Lincoln Avenue has gone from a pedestrian nightmare with two lanes each way, to a walkable downtown street that slowed cars coming through downtown Willow Glen and turned it back to a wonderful downtown block.

AIt’s important to remember that these projects are about safety more than anything.