The City of Santa Clara is looking to create a neighborhood in the Tasman East area, with  4,000+ units of housing, near Great America heavy and light rail stations, and the Guadalupe River and San Tomas Aquino Creek trails.

On Tuesday evening starting at 5pm, Santa Clara City Council are holding a study session  on transportation for the area. The draft plans include basic bike lanes, but could be greatly improved for safe and sustainable transportation access.   The meeting will be at Santa Clara City Hall, 1500 Warburton Ave, Santa Clara, CA.  Please share in blog comments if you can attend, and anything you hear at the meeting.

• streets can be a valuable part of the public realm, helping to creating a pleasant and attractive place. This requires designing some streets considering their role serving people in the neighborhood, not just people driving through.
• consider designing Lick Mill for neighborhood focus. Designing Lick Mill for fast car traffic would bisect the new neighborhood, create noise, and discourage the streets there from being part of the place (see proposed design below, with unprotected bike lanes and travel lanes that are 12″ in width; narrower lanes would create space for a buffer or barrier)
• carefully design the pedestrian/bike connections to trails, rail stations and bus stops, to encourage use of trails and transit
• design a complete bike network that can be used by people of all ages and abilities.
• consider complete safe routes to nearby schools, parks, and job centers.
• support the staff proposal to exempt the area from “level of service standards” which require street widening if cars are delayed at the peak of rush hour, to foster a more pedestrian-friendly environment the rest of the day and week

Here are more detailed recommendations from Betsy Megas, a local bike advocate, who recommends that the city:

• Improve bike and pedestrian facilities along Lafayette, in conjunction with the project rather than as a project for “someday.” This stretch is busy, but it follows a train track, meaning there are few intersections and conflict points. With a simple, striped bike lane (there is already space along most of the way), it could be comparable to Evelyn through Sunnyvale.
• Think through connections to San Tomas Aquino trail and Guadalupe trail, as well as ACE and Amtrak trains, and Tasman Light Rail and buses. The intersection opposite the ACE station is not currently well designed for bike/ped access.
• Repurpose the bridge already over Lafayette at the golf course.
• Extend the complete streets on Tasman throughout Santa Clara, and make the bike facilities consistent and connected with the lanes in San Jose.
• Improve bicycle facilities on the existing part of Lick Mill.
• Consider designing Lafayette to be the main route for through traffic and keeping Lick Mill slower and quieter, with more of a residential feel. A calmer Lick Mill would also be better for placemaking, access to Ulistac for recreation, and so on.
• Build in ample, secure bike parking for residences.