it is not recommended that a mallTherefore, be developed on Telegraph Avenue at this time because of the greater need for improved access and additional parking, because there is no evidence that the mall would increase the amount of sales that the Shopping District can anticipate during the next few years, and because the merchant organization has not established a pattern in which the advantages of a mall can be clearly used aid the District. Since these conditions can be expected to continue change in the future it would be desirable to provide sufficient flexibility the design of the project, such that when a need is felt and alternative circulation routes and parking are provided the mall could be constructed. to
to
in
From a shopping district standpoint, it would be preferable for the two main east-west arterials (Bancroft and Durant) to be routed in tunnels under Telegraph Avenue so that there would be no cross traffic at these intersections. However, provision would have to be made for access from these arterials to the by-pass streets and parking structures. The advantages of the expensive approach would be the complete freedom of students and customers in circulating from the Student Union area down to Channing Way and along Bancreft without interference. At present sucha solution appears to be prohibitlvely expensive and no commensurate increase in sales can be anticipated.
There is a distinct set of advantages to the creation of a partial mall such as the one at California Avenue in Palo Alto. Such a mall would show that the merchants and the city are interested in the appearance and improve- ment of the District, it would retain some of the parking spaces, it would provide direct access to the stores along Telegraph Avenue, and it would not be prohibitively expensive.
F-5
CS Scanned with CamScanner
FN
August 2, 1968To: William C. Hanley, City Manager
From: Norman Murdoch, Director of Planning
Subject: MALL OR PARTIAL MALL ON TELEGRAPH AVENUE BETWEEN DWIGHT WAY AND
BANCROFT WAY -- A REVIEW OF PAST STUDIES
During the early sixties the question of a mall or partial mall on Telegraph Avenue was examined in detail as part of the planning for the proposed South Campus Urban Renewal Project. A number of alternatives were analyzed in depth.
After discussion by a citizens committee -- and some exposure to the Sather Gate Merchants -- the City staff and consultants on the renewal program agreed that a plan which embodied a partial mall on Telegraph Avenue (i.e, sidewalk widening) combined with a new street 150 feet west of Telegraph Avenue would be a desirable solution providing a balanced response to the sometimes conflicting demands for pedestrian access, vehicular access, parking, and amenity.
The City Council discussed the evaluation of the South Campus Plan at not less eight meetings starting in 1961. After fomulation of the Urban Renewal Plan, the City Council -- acting as the official Urban Renewal Agency -- held a series of seven public hearings on the proposed Urban Renewal Plan. Strong opposition to the new street and partial mall concept was presented by Telegraph Avenue merchants. Opposition increased and expanded to include expressions of reloca- tion fears and great concern with the stringency of rehabilitation standards relating to seismic forces. Responding to the apparently united opposition of residents, merchants and many U.C. students, the City Council voted to abandon the Urban Renewal effort on June 30, 1966.
than
Subsequently, the City developed alternate approaches to improvement of the South Campus area. An intensified code enforcement effort was initiated in 1967. In the Spring of 1968 the City Council approved the conversion of Telegraph and Dana to a one-way pair to provide some improvement for vehicular and pedestrian circulation. The University has proceeded with its previously planned acquisition program.
Blight in the area has been reduced. In addition the Department of Housing and Urban Development has established socially oriented priorities for the use of Urban Renewal funds. Combined, these factors make it very unlikely that the Telegraph Avenue area could be revived as a Federally-Assisted Urban Renewal Area.
Initiation of Planning
As early as 1960 the South Campus Renewal area was the subject of considerable ex- amination under the auspices of the office of Urban Renewal Coordinator, City Manager's Office. The project eligibility and boundaries were firmed up in dis- cussion with federal officials early in 1961 and a sample survey of the area was conducted in April 1961 indicating that physical conditions were such as to allow a feasible renewal effort.
Apparently there was considerable interest in the possibility of creating a mal1 on Telegraph Avenue and in May 1962 a report to the City Planning Commission on a South of Campus Landscape and Circulation Plan prepared by a Berkeley Liaison Committee--Arthur Hargrave, chairman recommended a possibility of one-way parallel couplets on the east and west sides of Telegraph Avenue to allow a mall on Telegraph Avenue.
HUNGILAINGHT/77
B45M8n
1968a
ENVI 2.
On August 20, 1963 _the Berkeley City Council established planning goals for the South Campus Urban Renewal Project including:
"The plan should recognize the demands for pedestrian circulation and for bicycle and automobile circulation and make balanced provision for each within the limited public rights-of-way available."
"Study should be given to the feasibility of converting Telegraph Avenue to. a pedestrian mall, to a one-way street or to a limited traffic street, and to plans that solve related circulation, parking and loading problems." During the course of renewal planning a number of specialized consultants were engaged including Wilbur Smith and Associates (traffic and parking), Riches Research (economic analysis) and DeMars and Reay (design). Each of these consult- ants were involved in the question of converting Telegraph Avenue to a mall or partial mall and reported as summarized in the following paragraphs.
Traffic and Parking Study (Wilbur Smith)
The first phase report dated August 1963 by Wilbur Smith and Associates pre- sented the results of field studies undertaken in May of that year. The study area was bounded by Bancroft, Bowditch, Dwight and Fulton. Major conclusions included:
1) Of the 56,000 vehicles entering the area daily, approximately 70 percent travel through without stopping;
2) Public transit delivers approximately 8 per cent of all vehicular passen~ gers to the area during business hours;
3) Pedestrian volumes along Telegraph near the campus total 20,000 persons during the business day, exceeding vehicular traffic in the area; 4) If all the parkers who had destination in the area or parked here and walked out to the campus or other location were to be served, there would be need for 250 more parking spaces.
a
In their second phase report dated September 1964, Wilbur Smith and Associates recommended the circulation plan subsequently shown in the Renewal Plan (1.e. semi-mall on Telegraph Avenue and new one-way street 150 west of Telegraph Avenue) for the following reasons:
1) Traffic volumes greater than 1975 projections can be accommodated; 2) Decrease in traffic concentrations makes possible greater freedom of operation for both vehicles and pedestrians;
3) One-way operation offers safer pedestrian crossing opportunities and elimination of turn conflicts.
4) Permits Telegraph Avenue sidewalk widening particularly at intersections; 5) New street provides added traffic capacity.
3. sconomic Analysis (Riches Research, Inc.)
In January 1964 Riches Research, Inc. completed its economic analysis of the South Campus Area for the Urban Renewal Agency. One of the specific assignments to Riches Research was to examine the possibility of converting Telegraph Avenue between Bancroft Way and Dwight Way into a mall. Riches Research recommended against the conversion of Telegraph Avenue to a full mall because:
1) A mall would require replacement of parking and (vehicular) access which would be eliminated;
2) No indication that mall would cause increase in sales; 3) The new streets (necessary adjuncts to a mall) wil1 separate the district!'s expansion areas from main groups of shops and stores.
Design Program (DeMars and Reay)
In October 1964, the architectural consultants reported on the proposed South Campus Urban Renewal Project. Their recommended design concepts for the Telegraph Avenue commercial area included:
1) Wider sidewalks along both sides of Telegraph Avenue can provide the much needed space for heavy pedestrian movements and the areas necessary for the in- stallation of street furniture and landscaping.
2) Repaving the sidewalk in brick with concrete bands, and providing benches, poster kiosks, bulletin boards, coordinated newspaper stands, well- designed trash containers, decorative street lamps, etc. are means for improving the physical and visual aspects of the shopping environment; 3) Parking bays of two cars each can be spaced in the widened sidewalk area of the street pavement to provide for short term parking and spot servicing to the stores;
4) Midblock cross walks can encourage to and fro shopping movements these cross walks are best located at the widened sidewalk areas, so that the street crossing distance is a minimum.
Analysis of Alternatives
While the consultants reported separately their efforts were coordinated by the staff. Documentation is not complete but it is clear that in 1963 and 1964 a larg number of alternatives were seriously examined. The staff and consultants were struggling to develop a solution which would balance the legitimate demands of the pedestrian, vehicular traffic and parking, all of which are heavy in Sather Gate commercial area. The major alternatives examined are summarized below:
D
4. Proposed
Existing
Situation
A
Characteristics
Retain existing two-way traffic
on Telegraph Avenue.
Convert Telegraph Avenue to
pedestrian mall with two new
streets east and west of
Telegraph Avenue
B Telegraph one-way north and
Dana one-way south
C
D
E
F
G
withMake Telegraph Avenue mall
Bowditch north and Dana one-
way south.
Mall on Telegraph Avenue between
Durant and Bancroft only
Telegraph Avenue northbound,
Dana southbound. Convert
Bancroft to two-way traffic.
Mall between Bancroft and
Durant with two one-way streets
east and west of Telegraph.
Telegraph one-way north, with
widened sidewalks and new
street 150 feet west,
southbound.
Evaluation
Does not respond to heavy pedestrian
movement and growing traffic
congestion.
Does respond to major problems but
is a costly solution for both the
public and private owners.
This does provide a modest increase
in traffic capacity but makes for
an inconvenient southbound move-
ment. (This was the interim solu-
tion adopted by the City Council
in May 1968.)
Creates mall but with serious traf-
fic disadvantages and very diffi-
cult service access to stores.
Serious traffic circuities are
created and no improvement in
amenity south of Durant.
New traffic couplet provides no
traffic advantage compared with
Plan B; Bancroft is wider than
Channing Way.
Traffic pattern is awkward and new
streets take most valuable
property.
Despite high acquisition costs be-
tween Durant and Bancroft, this
was a solution with apparently
minimum drawbacks and was thus
adopted as recommended urban re-
newal plan; provides only widened
sidewalks rather than full mal1.
Norman Murdoch
Director of Planning
Rigel Robinson
Councilmember District 7
2180 Milvia Street, Berkeley, CA 94704 ● Tel: (510) 981-7170 ● TDD: (510) 981-6903 ● E-Mail:
SUPPLEMENTAL
AGENDA MATERIAL
for Supplemental Packet 1
Meeting Date: February 22, 2022
Item Number: 27
Item Description: Southside Complete Streets Project Conceptual Designs
Submitted by: Councilmember Rigel Robinson
This supplemental material contains a referral to the City Manager to develop a process to explore limits on private automobiles on Telegraph Avenue, in response to community feedback the City received during the Southside Complete Streets public engagement process. This supplemental is complementary to the resolution and direction in Item 27 as presented by staff, accompanying but not modifying the existing item.
RECOMMENDATION
Refer to the City Manager to develop a community process to explore limits on private automobiles on Telegraph Avenue and make recommendations. Staff should engage merchants, property owners, students, visitors and tourists, artists, UC Berkeley, local schools, faith institutions, relevant government agencies including AC Transit, and other stakeholders, as well as relevant city commissions, such as the Transportation Commission and the Commission on Disability.
In the evaluation of various approaches, staff should consider strategies to:
• Maintain access for public transit, emergency vehicles, refuse collection vehicles, delivery vehicles, and other commercial vehicles that are essential to Telegraph business operations
• Preserve access for people with disabilities and reduce conflicts between pedestrians and bicyclists
• Improve the pedestrian environment and meet the needs of merchants and the commercial district
BACKGROUND
Outreach for the Southside Complete Streets project1 has been underway since Summer 2021 and construction is expected to take place starting in 2023. This outreach process culminates in a Council vote to approve conceptual project designs. This referral is presented as a supplemental to the approval of said project designs.
City staff and Toole Design have led an incredibly engaging public process for the Southside Complete Streets project. Decals promoting the project were placed on sidewalks in the neighborhood, posters went up in the windows of small businesses, and flyers were mailed directly to residents. The project’s open houses were well attended, and the surveys reached an even broader swath of residents and interested stakeholders.
Through this outreach, a clear demand emerged from organized members of the community:
a Car-Free Telegraph. Community advocates, including the student-led coalition Telegraph for People, have given extensive public comment in support of considering a car-free option for Telegraph Avenue.2 The public engagement process also captured a diversity of public opinions on the proposal which will need to be addressed. These include merchant and business concerns about commercial loading, and transit advocates’ concern about initial suggestions that buses could be diverted from Telegraph.
This community call for limits on private vehicles was further reflected in discussion at the Transportation Commission on January 20, 2022. The Commission passed a motion supporting the staff-recommended design options for the Southside Complete Streets Project, and additionally requesting further research into a car-free approach to Telegraph Avenue, as follows:
“It was Moved/Seconded (Parolek/Ghosh) that the Transportation Commission… support Telegraph Option #4. The Commission strongly recommends that staff demonstrate how Option #4 can be operationalized as a car-free street with a transit lane, and with 2-way bike and micromobility facilities.”
However, considering limits on the use of private automobiles on Telegraph is outside of the scope of the ACTC grant that the City received for this project. Therefore, this supplemental
1 https://berkeleysouthsidecompletestreets.org/
2 https://www.telegraphforpeople.com/option-five
serves to directly respond to community input and provide explicit direction to City staff to explore limits on private automobiles on Telegraph Avenue from Bancroft to Dwight, and design a corresponding community engagement process.
By approving the conceptual designs for the Southside Complete Streets Project, the City is committing to a long-overdue reorientation of Telegraph Avenue that is a reflection of years of city planning and community advocacy, including various City plans and Council referrals. 3 The proposed design is adaptable to a range of use cases, ranging from status quo vehicle traffic to a car-free zone. As the project moves forward, it is timely for staff to begin to apply concerted planning efforts to the operational questions of Telegraph Avenue.
All over the globe, cities have developed ways to return streets to the people and design plazas that center modes of transportation other than cars. Cities such as Paris4 have designated zones through which private automobiles are to be permanently prohibited. Other cities, like Bogota,5 have limited private automobiles on certain days of the week. And just across the Bay, San Francisco6 is developing its Better Market Street plan, which prohibits private automobiles from traveling along Market Street, though they can still cross at intersections. The space is instead prioritized for public transit, pedestrians, cyclists, commercial vehicles, and taxis.
As part of the project outreach for Southside Complete Streets, the consultant group, Toole Design, assembled the following visual aids to respond to the community push for a car-free option and illustrate potential scenarios the city could consider and work towards:
3 https://www.berkeleyside.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/2019-10-29-Item-30-Referral-Telegraph- Shared-Streets.pdf
4 https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-05-13/new-paris-car-ban-will-target-through-traffic 5 https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/article/bogota-colombia-ciclovia-bans-cars-on-roads- each-
sunday#:~:text=Spurred%20by%20environmental%20concerns%2C%20an,out%20to%20bike%20or%20 ride
6 https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2019/10/28/20932554/new-york-san-francisco-car-free-zones
These cross-sections demonstrate how the proposed design could be programmed and operated in different ways without major hardscape changes.
Councilmember Robinson, the representative for District 7, which encompasses the UC Berkeley campus and Southside neighborhood, has spoken publicly in support of a car-free vision for Telegraph a number of times.7 However, implementing such a vision is much easier said than done. A process designed to explore limits to private automobiles on Telegraph Avenue must be thorough and transparent, and it must explore openly and honestly all potential benefits and drawbacks.
Telegraph Avenue is a historic destination and a beautiful commercial district that enjoys heavy foot traffic. Because of this, Telegraph, specifically the four blocks from Bancroft to Dwight which have been the focus of the Southside Complete Streets project, is an ideal candidate for a street that could be re-envisioned to limit the presence of the private automobile. However, it is also a narrow street with various utilities running just below the pavement. Businesses do not have a back alley as they do in many commercial districts, so commercial loading as well as refuse collection all happens on the main street itself. The street services a major bus route as well as campus shuttles. Fire engine access is critical as well, and there are already frustrations among merchants and business owners around the availability of on-street parking spaces.
There are a variety of considerations to be mindful of while exploring such a concept for a street as complicated and with as many uses and stakeholders as Telegraph:
• Dedicated bus lane: California Vehicle Code states that only buses and emergency vehicles are allowed to drive in a bus only lane. The only exceptions are vehicles trying to access a parking space/loading zone, making a turn, or going around an obstacle in the roadway. But even in those cases, they can’t drive predominantly in the bus only lane. Would this prevent a scenario with only a dedicated lane of vehicle travel for buses from being feasible?
• Double-parking: All potential designs must anticipate challenges related to double- parking, which is an issue throughout the Southside neighborhood. FedEx, UPS, Amazon, et cetera all essentially have double parking tickets baked into the cost of doing business, so it is difficult to deter this behavior without substantial enforcement that would far exceed current parking enforcement capacity.
• Definition of commercial vehicles: Proposals that would treat private vehicles differently from commercial vehicles would need to carefully assess how to define and distinguish commercial vehicles. Would that mean vehicles with commercial license plates? Or with visible merchant parking permits? Or transportation network companies? Or taxis? Or food delivery services? How can we accommodate the needs of sidewalk vendors, who are currently not eligible for merchant parking permits? • Disabled access: Disabled drivers at present are legally allowed to share the loading zones by using disabled placards or plates. Without private vehicle access, would these vehicles also be prohibited? Could such concerns be ameliorated with designated ADA parking spaces nearby on cross-streets?
• Ped-bike conflicts: How would bikes circulate in the southbound direction, and how would that be separated from main pedestrian traffic areas to avoid pedestrian injuries, particularly for the visually impaired?
• Emergency vehicle access: How would fire lane requirements for Telegraph Avenue complicate potential limits on vehicles and roadway width? • Refuse vehicle access: How would refuse collection activities be affected by different operations on the street?
• Telegraph Channing Garage access: How would vehicles arriving from the south be directed to the Telegraph Channing Garage?
7 https://www.mercurynews.com/2020/02/04/not-just-market-street-this-iconic-bay-area-avenue-could- ban-cars-too/
These are just a select few of the questions that a community process to explore limits on private automobiles on Telegraph Avenue would need to answer, in addition to new questions and concerns that may arise during the process. With this referral, Council refers to the City Manager to determine the best course of action to answer these questions and to engage the community in deciding the future of mobility on Telegraph Avenue.
FINANCIAL IMPLICATIONS
A robust community process will incur meaningful costs for staff time and outreach. Staff are encouraged to return to Council with funding estimates and to pursue grant opportunities from regional agencies for active transportation projects to finance this work. Implementation of any proposed changes to the traffic configuration on Telegraph, whether by way of new striping, retractable bollards, or active enforcement, would also require resources and funding in an amount that could only be determined by a thorough planning process.
CONTACT PERSON
Councilmember Rigel Robinson, (510) 981-7170
Angie Chen, Legislative Assistant
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