The San Mateo City Council supported restoring the majority of the parking spaces that were removed on Humboldt Street to make room for bike lanes that were installed just a couple years ago.
The bike lanes along Humboldt Street and Poplar Avenue removed about 200 parking spaces, as part of a $1.5 million federal grant, and the initiative caused an uproar in the neighborhood. A little more than two years later, many residents still want to get rid of the bike infrastructure and reinstall their parking spots — though others prefer the city invest in other alternatives.
While community meetings have been held and petitions have been signed, the City Council had yet to make any consequential decisions over the fate of the bike lanes — that is, until Monday, Feb. 3, when all councilmembers agreed to start the process of removing the bike lanes on Humboldt Street from Second Avenue to Indian Avenue, which would bring back about 100 parking spaces. The plan would also include implementing a pilot program on Fremont Street or Idaho Street. Unlike the current Humboldt Street setup, the pilot would be a bike boulevard, which does not have designated lanes.
Those in favor of keeping the bike lanes have reiterated the critical safety measures it provides on a road known for speeding cars — not to mention the potential $2 million cost to remove most of the bike lanes, conduct a pilot program and implement a long-term bike solution. The reversal could also require paying back a portion of the grant funds and possibly give the city a poor track record on transit-focused projects, therefore making it more difficult for it to secure federal grant funding in the future.
North Central resident Ana Lis Salotti lives on Humboldt Street and relies on the bike lanes to take her daughter to school every day and go on daily errands, as she does not own a car. She moved to the area three years ago, in large part because she can bike to her child’s school, grocery store and medical appointments. She said she is sad to see the council’s decision to unofficially move forward with bike lane removal.
“There are only going to be more cars in the future. The 100 spaces doesn’t solve the problem. It’s only going to get more crowded ... you’re going to spend millions of dollars for a solution that is not a solution,” Salotti said.
She added that many households have several cars and have converted their garage space into living or storage areas.
“The City Council seems to be governing for the longtime residents and not for the people who have come here and want to see something different in the neighborhood,” she said. “There shouldn’t be an expectation that if you have three, four cars that you should be able to always park all your cars right outside your house.”
But both Councilmembers Nicole Fernandez, who represents the district, and Danielle Cwirko-Godycki said the city put themselves in this predicament, as they didn’t heed vehement pushback from the community prior to moving ahead on the project a few years back.
“We are an equity priority area and a community with a history of redlining. In my opinion, these bike lanes are a classic example of the city doing something to the North Central residents, not with them, but to them,” Fernandez said. “This lack of agency for North Central needs to change.”
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Cwirko-Godycki added that in a 2022 report prior to the approval of the project, the majority of North Central residents did not support the bike lanes.
Aurora Torres has been living in North Central for about 16 years and said she doesn’t feel like the city engaged with the community as much as they should have before putting in the bike lanes. She needs her car for her children’s school and after-school programs, not to mention grocery shopping and other errands.
“There was not enough time for us to even say something because it happened too fast,” Torres said. “The owner of my building said no one even asked him if he wanted the bike lane. They didn’t ask our opinion.”
She works in the evenings and returns home anywhere from 9:30-11 p.m., which makes it difficult to find a parking spot, and it also feels unsafe, she said.
Other residents have also voiced frustration that the city prioritized the bike lanes instead of fixing the poor street conditions, roads and sidewalks, as well as inadequate street lighting — though the council also moved forward on funding the latter at the meeting Feb. 3.
Understanding what the majority of residents want is difficult, and residents on both sides of the issue have highlighted figures from the city’s surveys to underscore bike lane support or opposition — or have refuted the data’s reliability altogether. According to the staff report, when asked at a prior community meeting about the impact of the Humboldt bike lanes, nearly the same percentage of North Central residents responded that it had a positive impact as those who said it was negative. However, for those living on Humboldt Street, 76% of respondents said they had a negative impact. Conversely, about 70% of those living outside the neighborhood said it had a positive impact.
“I see how the bike lane is used, and I honestly call into question the numbers they’ve been discussing and what they showed yesterday,” Salotti said. “This is a Spanish-speaking community … so I don’t know the outreach [the city] did but I know there are tons of families that do not have a car. They cannot afford a car, but they can afford a bike. … I see bikes all the time.”
Torres said she also questions the data, but said she believes bike lane use is actually lower than reported, adding that she has nothing against the bike lanes but feels they shouldn’t come at the expense of most residents, especially those living on Humboldt Street.
“I’m not against the bike lane but there has to be a better way to share the street, because I don’t think it’s fair to remove all the parking,” Torres said.
The city will still hold community meetings and discuss the matter again with the council before an official vote is held.
(11) comments
Good news. But before the final vote, City Council folks should be prepared to be inundated by those who demand the bicycle lanes remain. City Council should ensure that the residents most affected receive the most consideration – residents had to deal with problematic bicycle lanes every day since they were first installed. As for the cost, I’m happy if my tax money goes toward removing the bicycle lanes.
Who are the residents who are most affected by the decision?
Does the guy who was put in a coma while biking, prior installing the bike lanes, count as "affected?": He is currently in a coma after suffering a broken collar bone, severe head trauma and multiple broken ribs.
https://www.smdailyjournal.com/news/local/driver-accused-of-san-mateo-hit-and-run-arrested-and-charged/article_de56ab42-56e4-11eb-a556-937fa0732fbd.html
And the City Council was inundated with community input at the meeting. 75% of attendees were in support of the bike lanes, many of them children, teens, and new residents paying the most in taxes.
TBot, aren't we all happy I'm here to explain to you what is really going on?
Here is what happened. There were plenty of people living along Humboldt Street asking to keep the bike lanes. There was hardly anyone living along Humboldt Street asking to remove them. Almost all car-only speakers are living on side streets and 'don't want to be forced to store their own cars on their own lawn'. Their main argument was that they made bad choices (hence too many cars) and now the government should take care of their problem - created by their own addiction to convenience. It's like a bunch of smokers begging for more free cigarettes.
The majority of the public told the council "We don't want to share the road" - and certainly none of the car-only people. In fact not one speaker said that "Bicycle Boulevards" are great - not even staff could sell that argument. They mentioned 28th bike boulevard, some mentioned Sunnybrae bike boulevard - but no one knew of a working example in all of San Mateo County.
So what do Rob Newsom, Adam Loraine, Lisa Diaz Nash, Danielle Cwirko-Godycki, Nicole Fernandez decide: let's do another expensive "share the road" experiment.
Anyone watching would have to agree that the council looked weak and uninformed. Already you can tell who is capable of making good independent decisions and who is bound to "special interest". The score was 0:5 for 'special interest'.
The new rallying cry for the council will be rolled at the next City Strategy Meeting: "Lawns over Children!"
Two moms gave live public comments at the City Council meeting, one who relayed the story of her son getting hit by a car while biking to elementary school on a residential street without a bike lane, and the other who lives on Humboldt St, is a single-car household, bikes her three kids to school every single day on the Humboldt bike lanes, and relayed the story of being hit by a car who didn't look for bicyclists before pulling out of a parking spot. The bike trailer with her two kids in it was directly hit.
I would say those women and their kids were pretty affected.
Some stats from the City Council meeting:
* 106 total unique commenters between live comments and written comments
* 36 commenters identified as living in North Central. Of those, 20 commented in favor of keeping the bike lanes, 15 commented to ask the lanes be removed, and 1 didn't express an opinion on the removal.
* Of the 36 commenters who identified as living in North Central, 12 stated they live on N Humboldt St. Of those 12, 10 commented in favor of keeping the bike lanes and 2 commented to ask the lanes be removed.
Three for one…
joebob91, are you saying that intersections would have bike lanes? The poor guy was hit in an intersection by someone who ran a stop sign. An unfortunate accident but not one which could have been avoided by bike lanes. You say 75% of attendees at a meeting were in support of bike lanes but was the meeting “loaded” with supporters to the exclusion of non-supporters? The article states that for those living on Humboldt Street (the most affected), 76% of respondents said bike lanes had a negative impact. Again, it comes down to efficiency and convenience for those who are most affected.
eGerd – TBot here. It seems to me that if 76% of the people most affected said bike lanes had a negative impact, I doubt they’d want to keep bike lanes but would support an alternative. Of course many who don’t live on Humboldt are okay with bike lanes because those lanes are not in their backyard. Let’s find out exactly who is in favor of bike lanes and after removing the lanes from Humboldt, we can install lanes in their neighborhood, removing 100 parking spaces, and seeing if they keep the same opinion. Again, it comes down to efficiency and convenience for those who are most affected.
Seema – I’m sorry to hear about folks involved in accidents but are you guaranteeing that the installation of bike lanes will remove all possibility of bike and car accidents? These are cherry-picked events and sometimes accidents happen. What about the hundreds or thousands or tens of thousands who bike without bike lanes and are not involved in an accident? You list a number of stats from the City Council meeting but as with joebob91, was the meeting “loaded” with supporters? Again, I refer you to the article which states that for those living on Humboldt Street (the most affected), 76% of respondents said bike lanes had a negative impact. Again, it comes down to efficiency and convenience for those who are most affected.
Terence, you are touching on the difficulty of community outreach and demographically accurate representation.
Yes, 76% of N Humboldt St residents who filled out a survey at the December 4 community meeting said that the bike lanes impacted them negatively. But the sample size was very small - 21 people.
https://www.youtube.com/live/fdadxvZGxCY?si=4CWrR13qTa4YX4Fz&t=3566
The bike lanes run along 10 blocks of N Humboldt St in North Central and there an average of 25 buildings on each block. Many of these are multifamily buildings (including the Westlake Condominiums) so I think it's safe to say there are likely several thousand residents of N Humboldt St in North Central.
To be able to draw statistically significant conclusions (confidence level of 95%, margin of error of 5%) would require a sample size of several hundred individuals.
You could just as easily say that based on the Council Meeting, 83% of Humboldt St residents want the bicycle lanes to stay, but neither statement should be the basis of any data-driven conclusions.
Thank you for the response, Seema, and for clarifying sample size and drawing statistically significant conclusions. Good points for any discussions which cite statistics – we may not know the sample size or their significance. Folks will use statistics, no matter how significant to push their POV. As you note, there are potentially several hundred individuals that must be sampled to draw a statistically significant conclusion. So it sounds like comparisons in this thread don't mean anything since none are statistically significant. Each side can cite a statistic but that distracts from the issue – what is best for those mostly affected by these bike lanes? Who lives on Humboldt St and uses the road for everyday living vs who uses the road only when passing through?
More people really living on Humboldt spoke out FOR the bike lanes.
People that spoke out AGAINST the bike lanes were old people NOT living on Humboldt Street, who 'don't want to cement my lawn to store their own car'.
But nobody asked them about their 2 driveway spots they already MUST have.
And nobody asked them, how many blue disability curves have been painted for these old ladies (that don't live on Humboldt).
And talking about numbers and statistics:
- in this neighborhood every house needs to have 2 garage spots and 2 driveway spots.
- I assume every apartment needs to have 1-2 spots for cars.
But the neighborhood average cars per household is 1.7 and >15% of households have no cars at all. This is the municipal code and the census talking - so no made up statistics like the council invented.
Nobody prevents these residents and landlords to adding more spots, but the census clearly says there should be no cars on public property.
Joni Mitchel: “They paved paradise and put up a parking lot”.
If you look at the whole project from start to finish and take out all the noise the City of San Mateo took HUD funding to NOT fix one housing problem or no transportation problem either. But they re-paved the street, put up signals and signage, and put up more parking.
As always HUD and bicycle funding ended up in a all-car-all-the-time project.
The homeless or transportation situation will never be solved as long as San Mateo Democrats don't learn to execute but keep leading like entitled toddlers: "me, me. me".
The really sad thing happening here is that the taxpayers get to pay for this nonsense. First to install these lanes and now, to take them out. The streets were paid for by the taxpayers and both cars and bikes can use them. The parking was established because it was needed. Taking away the spots did not eliminate the need, but catering to the bikers has cost, as it seems, many millions of dollars - our dollars. Let's try thinking before acting, and spending less energy trying to please all of the interests. Too bad the council members can't be personally paid to reimburse the taxpayers for these blunders.
Taxpayers will pay for the decision to rip out the bike lanes. Diminished home values will lower property taxes. More crashes will increase car insurance rates in the zip code. Crashes will also tax our PD and FD who need to respond. Road and paving budgets will need to increase due to the incremental car congestion and wear and tear on our streets.
Every time someone takes a bike, instead of a car, they are saving taxpayers money.
https://medium.com/strava-metro/whats-the-cost-of-choosing-to-drive-a-car-instead-of-riding-a-bike-436ebd0166cd#:~:text=Every%20mile%20you%20ride%20is,It's%20good%20for%20personal%20health.
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