From: Giuliano
To: x-City Clerk"s Office; City Council
Cc: P&R Comm
Subject: Comments for City Council meeting of June 9.
Date: Tuesday, June 9, 2026 12:09:32 AM
Please include these comments as part of the official record of the June 9 City Council meeting. Thank you!
I speak only for myself, and not as part of any organization I belong to.
Item 7, items not on the agenda.
Thank you for the new bike lane on Ralston westbound just before Old County Road!!!!! It could and should be better, but it is a start. Thank you! We need more projects like this in Belmont. In fact, we need better projects in Belmont. Who better than the folks who actually do transit cycling to reach out to. Transit cycling is not recreational cycling, they are at least as different as road cycling is to mountain biking. Please, you need to involve the Belmont transit cycling community in these designs. To date, you simply do not. Not at all. While I applaud the City's desire to do good, what it is doing is often too little, much too little, and much too often in the wrong places, and sometimes actually dangerous.
The Ralston bike lane just added could and should have been largely class 4. Where bike lanes are buffered class 2, they can be class 4. California's DIB-89-02 and DIB-94 requirements for these are essentially the same, and in fact recommend considering a class 4 where a buffered class 2 is planned.
The class 3 and class 2 green bike lanes are next to useless. Study after study show that class 3 bike lanes do not reduce risk; that class 2 bike lanes often result in even more close passes; and show that 85% to 90% of folks will not use them. Even worse, much of the buffered class 2 are door zone bike lanes. 12% to 25% of bike crashes are caused by car occupants opening their doors as cyclists pass by. Every cycling education organization teaches riders to never ride in the door zone. We just spent a considerable sum of money on bike lanes that will do little to make cycling safer, that 85-90% of folks will not consider using, and on door zone bike lanes that 100% should not be using. That's just wrong. If only you had reached out to transit cyclists ...
Item 9, Consent Business, in particular 9(C) 2026 Pavement Rehabilitation Project.
How much of this $3M project's funds are being spent on bike lanes? The funds for this project comes from Measure I, and Belmont says that these funds will include "bicycle and pedestrian pathways". Belmont has further said that it wants to reach a cycling mode split of
1.5% by 2030. That is ridiculously low, we should have at least the ambition to achieve 5%.
At 5%, will $150,000 of this project be spent on adding bike lanes? At 1.5%, will $45,000 be spent on bike lanes? $45,000 is enough to convert 450 yards of class 2 bike lanes to class 4 protected bike lanes, 3x what Belmont has today. $150,000 is enough to convert the bike lanes on Ralston between Academy to Chula Vista to class 4 protected bike lanes, more than 8x what we have now.
Our climate action plan sets an incredibly low bar for bike transit in Belmont at only 1.5% That's just .3% higher than it was in 2001. Surely we can do better than .3% in 30 years, roughly .01% per year. But what ever the figure, even if only 1.5%, it simply will not happen unless you spend money to make it happen. It's not enough to say you will do something, you must take the actions needed to achieve your goals. Otherwise, they are not goals, they are platitudes. And y'all are so much better than that.
giuliano
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Drive a bike a bit more often and cars a bit less. You'll be healthier and happier, and so will our world.
Reach out if you'd like to learn to cycle more safely (LCI #7105). https://bikesiliconvalley.org
https://www.peopleforbikes.org/news/your-bike-advocacy-playbook