Exhibit 1
[Mayor’s letterhead]
November 20, 2024
Honorable Carl Guardino
Chair, California Transportation Commission
1120 N Street, MS 52
Sacramento, CA 95814
RE: Ala-61 Capital Preventative Maintenance project on Otis Drive in the City of Alameda
Dear Chair Guardino and Commissioners,
On behalf of the City of Alameda (City), I am writing in support of Caltrans’s request to the California Transportation Commission (CTC) for $700,000 in supplemental State Highway Operations and Protection Program (SHOPP) funding to evaluate a road diet and safety improvements on Otis Drive between Broadway and Fernside Blvd in the City of Alameda as part of Caltrans’ Ala-61 Capital Preventative Maintenance (CapM) project. These funds will help deliver safety and multimodal access improvements to this important corridor, and support creating a complete street.
Otis Drive between Broadway and Fernside Blvd carries significant automobile through traffic, but it is also a residential street, and it fronts a City park that connects to an elementary school. This stretch includes uncontrolled, four-lane crossings for key school and bicycle routes and is a High Injury Corridor in the City’s Vision Zero Action Plan, based on injury crash data. The City has received community reports of safety issues on this corridor for years.
When Caltrans presented this CapM project to the City Transportation Commission on August 28, 2024, community members submitted 42 pages of written public comments focusing mostly on Otis Drive safety concerns, including a letter from the Otis Elementary School principal. Even after the meeting, I and City Councilmembers continued to hear from concerned residents who wanted safety improvements on this street. We appreciate Caltrans’s willingness to reassess its design for this street.
Increasing safety and comfort on Otis Drive is a City priority. In 2021, we implemented a road diet with a protected intersection on a City-controlled section of Otis Drive further west. The Route 61 portion of Otis Drive carries larger auto volumes, so it is imperative that road diet and/or other safety improvement alternatives be studied fully, and that residents, the City Transportation Commission, and City Council get a chance to consider priorities and tradeoffs for this corridor.
On November 19, 2024, the Alameda City Council approved this letter of support. On behalf of the City of Alameda, I want to thank the California Transportation Commission for considering additional funding for this project to support analysis of a road diet and other safety measures for this important corridor.
Best regards,
Marilyn Ezzy Ashcraft
Mayor, City of Alameda
Cc:
• Alameda City Council
• City of Alameda Transportation Commission
• Dina El-Tawansy, District 4 Director, Caltrans
• Jack Siauw, District 4 Division Chief, East Region