BY BRADEN CARTWRIGHT
Daily Post Staff Writer
Mountain View City Council is pushing RV dwellers from neighborhood streets to office areas.
Council passed an ordinance on Tuesday (May 24) that bans oversized vehicles on another 37 residential streets narrower than 40 feet. They also newly allowed overnight parking on 30 streets, mostly in commercial areas.
Vice Mayor Alison Hicks said businesses and property owners aren’t happy about seeing more RVs. She said several have contacted her to see what they can do about it, she said. “I’m happy to see that now that this problem may be more visible, they may want to partner and help solve the problem,” she said.
In 2020, 57% of Mountain View voters approved a ban on large vehicles parking on streets less than 40 feet wide. The ban applied to 444 streets, or 89% of the city. A consultant measured 72 miles of roads with a laser scanning system in March and April, and found another 37 streets that qualified.
The signs went up on narrow streets last August, but police aren’t enforcing the ban yet because a group of RV dwellers is suing the city. They argue that the ban is discriminately forcing poor people out of the city.
The city agreed to put off enforcement until July 4 while the two sides discuss a settlement.
Complaints led to signs
The commercial streets that will now be open for overnight parking were evaluated in light of the oversized vehicle ban. Public Works Director Dawn Cameron said the signs were put up because of complaints, but they don’t actually correspond to traffic safety.
The signs aren’t justified, nor were they put up in all similar locations, Cameron said.
In April 2022, the city mailed notices to property owners along streets with signs banning overnight parking. They got 57 responses, and 48 people said they were concerned about allowing overnight parking. Most of their complaints were about losing parking or road space for themselves.
Enforce the 72 hour parking rules and street sweeping rules that have been in place before anyone who is making any of these decisions was even working for the city.
The safe street lots were opened for a reason. Businesses “partnering” to solve this is a silly statement. If it was that simple we wouldn’t even be discussing this disaster.
Mr H, how do you intend to make it possible for poor people to live in a community that is too expensive for them. Don’t give me a bumper sticker slogan. Seriously, how do you do that?
Is your plan like this — you take away things people have earned, like a home in a good neighborhood, and give that wealth to people who haven’t earned it?
The good’ol “i did it, why can’t you” argument. Maybe you should think about how people shouldn’t need to endure that commute. Maybe people should be able to afford to live where they work.
Maybe people should work harder to be able to afford to live where they work? That means making smart choices in education, not doing drugs and working two jobs if necessary. Then you work your way up. It’s a struggle but you shouldn’t live on handouts from others.
Sounds like Hahueabi is a socialust/communist. He probably won’t come out and say that. Communists use the “fairness” argument to convince people to let the government decide what’s fair.
When people don’t want to work hard, they end up living in their car or RV. Then they expect those of us who did work hard to give them free stuff. And Lucas Ramirez and the rest of city council think it’s more important to appease these free loaders than respect the taxpayers who pay the bills in mountain view.