Upfront
Locations are approximate
BIKE injury
BIKE injury
ay ssw pre Ex on eg Or
Alma St
Page Mill Rd VEHICLE injury
VEHICLE injury
Park Blvd
Grant Ave
Birch St
Sheridan Ave
UNKNOWN no injury
VEHICLE injury
Sherman Ave
VEHICLE no injury
AOL
Olive Ave
car ended up in the plate-glass window, an almost identical incident nearly occurred at that location. As a pedestrian watched, a driver turning left from Sherman Avenue almost collided with a pickup truck driving south on Park. The sedan had turned in front of the truck without hesitating. Todd Burke, president of the homeowners association for the nearby Palo Alto Central condominium complex, said such close calls are routine. Residents of the 141-unit complex use Sherman on the east side of Park Boulevard to exit the complex, but for whatever reason, northbound traffic on Park often speeds, he said. There is often a blind spot on the corner when a vehicle parks there, he said. “If there is a truck parked on Sherman and there’s a bicyclist or a speeding car and I can’t see them coming, it’s a bit of a leap of faith,” he said.
Accidents on Park Blvd. January 2013 – March 21, 2014
California Ave
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From Page Mill Road to California Avenue, “there’s nothing slowing traffic down,” he said. Alice Jacobs, a mother who lives nearby on Sherman Avenue, was home when the March 15 accident occurred. She and her husband heard the loud crash between 9:30 and 10 p.m. “Someone was going south on Park and was crossing the intersection, and they T-boned a person crossing from Sherman. The car was thrown into the law building. It makes me nervous walking around. We stand on that corner. If someone was walking there when that accident occurred, they could have been wiped out if it occurred during the day,” she said. Jacobs’ husband witnessed a collision between a car and a bicyclist on Oct. 30 just north of the same intersection, she said. “The cyclist was heading southbound on Park Boulevard, and a parked driver opened his car door across the bike lane without looking first. The cyclist was seriously injured and needed medical atten-
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Park Boulevard
Fry’s
Park Boulevard has been the scene of vehicle-vehicle, vehicle-bicycle and vehicle-pedestrian accidents, seven between January 2013 and March 21 this year. tion,” she said. Burke said the street is dangerous for pedestrians. “Have you ever seen how many people are walking on that street when people are getting off the train to go to the AOL building? There is significant traffic,” he said. Several employees at tech firms said they are fearful of crossing the street, which has only one crosswalk at Page Mill Road. “I wish there were more crosswalks. It’s a death trap for pedestrians,” a Groupon employee said on his way to lunch. The city has made some im-
provements, Chief Transportation Official Jaime Rodriguez said. It resurfaced Park Boulevard south of California Avenue last summer and added wider bicycle lanes with green bike-lane markings and intersection improvements at Page Mill Road, he said. The City Council approved additional studies as part of the Park Boulevard Bicycle Boulevard project on March 17. The improvements would be decided upon after the traffic studies and bicycle/pedestrian counts and community outreach, he said. Burke said his vision for a safer boulevard would include
additional crosswalks and speedreduction devices — perhaps in the form of raised crosswalks and flashing beacons to alert drivers when pedestrians are crossing, he said. He wouldn’t mind a speed hump or two, although that would be controversial, he said. A study by Fehr & Peers Transportation Consultants for planning and preliminary environmental assessments is scheduled to take 18 months, with public outreach in about one year, according to a Planning Department report. N Staff Writer Sue Dremann can be emailed at sdremann@ paweekly.com.
Not in Our Schools
Inspirations a guide to the spiritual community FIRST CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH, UCC £ nxÊ Õ ÃÊ, >`]Ê*> Ê Ì ÊUÊÈxä®ÊnxÈ ÈÈÈÓÊUÊÜÜÜ°vVV«>° À}Ê Sunday Worship and Church School at 10 a.m.
This Sunday:Not So Subtle Rev. David Howell preaching An Open and Affirming Congregation of the United Church of Christ We celebrate Marriage Equality
Inspirations is a resource for ongoing religious services and special events. To inquire about or to reserve space in Inspirations, please contact Blanca Yoc at 223-6596 or email byoc@paweekly.com
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Gunn students join in a “National Day of Silence” to call attention to that issue, with teachers notified ahead of time about which students are participating. Not in Our Schools is a project of the Oakland-based nonprofit media company The Working Group. The group, which produced the PBS series “Not in Our Town,” says it combines media and outreach efforts to “battle against intolerance” and encourage democracy and citizen participation. The group’s director, Becki Cohn-Vargas, formerly an administrator with the Palo Alto school district, said Gunn has become a model campus in the national Not in Our Schools effort. “The kind of acceptance and inclusion we focus on has become part of the daily fabric of their school,” Cohn-Vargas said. “They have created a model where teachers in all departments take responsibility for opening dialogue on issues of ending bullying and of creating identity-safe classrooms where all students belong.” Also observing Not in Our Schools next week will be Jordan Middle School. Terman Middle School held Not in Our Schools week March 3 to 7. Palo Alto High School and JLS Middle School will observe it April 21 to 25. N Staff Writer Chris Kenrick can be emailed at ckenrick@ paweekly.com.