1 From: Cox, Robert
Sent: Monday, June 10, 2024 2:43 PM
To: City Council
Subject: Comment on Item 6.1 “Holistic Citywide Review of Parking Regulations” CAUTION: EXTERNAL EMAIL ‐ Ensure you trust this email before clicking on any links or attachments.
Mayor Showalter, Vice Mayor MaƟchak, and Members of the Mountain View City Council, Thank you for the opportunity to comment on item 6.1 “HolisƟc Citywide Review of Parking RegulaƟons” While I am the co‐chair of the Downtown ResidenƟal Parking SubcommiƩee of the Old Mountain View Neighborhood AssociaƟon, I am wriƟng your as a private res ident, rather than in my capacity of as co‐chair of
that subcommiƩee. Our commiƩee was established with a vote of the city council to advise the council on parking policy affecƟng our neighborhood. In the future, we would appr eciate advance noƟce (more than just the Thursday before the council meeƟng) on when such items are coming to council. This will allow our commiƩee more Ɵme to discuss and comment on any policy issue and submit our comments as a group. In the past, cit y staff would reach out to us weeks in advance of such council meeƟngs.
I do appreciate the city’s willingness to reopen the issue of the ResidenƟal Parking Permit Program. In the past, our commiƩee raised concerns that the complicated process developed by city staff would make it overly difficult to establish parking zones. The fact that no zones hav e been established since the program was
inaugurated bears this out. Other ciƟes in our vicinity have established zones in areas of high parking demand.
I support revisiƟng this issue and engaging our parking subcommiƩee in the discussion.
Another concern I would like address
ed is the enforcement of parking rules which prohibit the parking of cars on the street in front of driveways and fully or parƟally in red zones. As noted in the staff report, the California Vehicle Code prohibits parking in front of driveways. Parking parƟally or fully within re d zones is also a parking violaƟon. I live on a street with 22 homes and only 7 street parking spaces. The temptaƟon to violate street parking rules in such a case is high. But there are good reasons for these rules. Shortly aŌer our street was established in 1995, the Minton fire raged across our street, the heat of which damag ed the windows of one
of the residences on our street. If there had been no place for the fire trucks to park or use the hydrants, even more damage could have been done. Also, many driveways on our street are adjacent to one another. In such cases, when a neighbor parks his car in front of his driveway, it limits the visibility and turning radius of person using the adjacent driveway. At a minimum, the police should place warning noƟces on the violaƟng vehicles informing the owners of their violaƟons. Tickets should follow if the viol aƟons persist.
I would also like the city to explore how to deal with private delivery vehicles that double park or park in the middle of streets while doing their deliveries, rathe r than parking in approved parking spaces. A neighbor of mine recently damaged the side mirror of his car trying to drive around an Amazon truck that was parked in the middle of a street. One possibility would be to designate parking spaces in Ɵght parking areas for loading and unloading, although I do not know whether thi
s would cause more harm (by denying parking spaces for
general use) than good (stopping the trucks from blocking our streets). City staff should conduct outreach and come up with good soluƟons.
2 Finally, I have noƟced that PODS oŌen show up in the public street parking next to the large apartment complex at the end of my street. These PODS can remain for days. I would like clarificaƟon on whether storing a PODS on the street for days is an allowable use of public street parking.
Thanks you for the opportunity to comment. I look forward to staff proacƟvely involving our commiƩee on parking issues in the future.
Robert Cox