BY BRADEN CARTWRIGHT
Daily Post Staff Writer
Palo Alto business owners say the new bike lanes on El Camino Real are creating a headache for their operations.
City Transportation Planning Manager Nate Baird said he is trying to help businesses find parking just off El Camino, but it’s impossible to replace the 500 parking spaces that were there before.
“The changes we’re making really are balancing a lot of competing interests for limited curb space, so where we’ve been able to help we’ve tried to do so,” Baird said. “But many folks wish that they had the previous supply still available.”
Dan Pokarney, service and parts director for McLaren at 4192 El Camino Real, said his shop no longer has a place for transporter trucks to park and unload cars, which can take up to 30 minutes.
The other day, a driver from Baltimore had to risk a ticket while he unloaded cars and had them inspected, Pokarney said in an interview.
Delivery trucks with heavy car parts also don’t have a space to legally park, so they’re stopping along red curbs.
Pokarney said he wants kids to have a safe way to get to school, but the new bike lanes have restricted his business.
“They’re kind of choking us out,” he said.
Tony Lee, owner of Stanford Coin Wash at 2045 El Camino Real, told the city that the lack of convenient parking has led to a decline in customers, impacting his revenue and threatening his viability.
“A laundromat’s business model relies heavily on customers’ ability to load and unload bulky and heavy items,” Lee said. “Customers often arrive with multiple large bags or baskets of laundry, and the ‘No Parking’ restriction makes it extremely difficult, and in some cases impossible, for them to access my business.”
Lee said the parking restrictions are particularly difficult for customers who are elderly or disabled.
Council on Aug. 11 approved changes to parking permits in the Evergreen Park-Mayfield neighbor-hood, hoping to help businesses on El Camino without upsetting residents.
The city increased the number of employee permits from 50 to 65, adjusted the zone boundaries and added two-hour limits just off of El Camino on Park, Leland, Stanford and Oxford avenues.
The new rules should also help Sundance The Steakhouse and Cardinal Bike Shop, Baird said.
Both of those business owners opposed the bike lanes when they were approved by Palo Alto City Council.
Baird said the stretch between Cambridge and Park avenues has been the most impacted, along with Portage Avenue by the Ventura neighborhood.
Further south, the owner of Celia’s Mexican Restaurant at 3740 El Camino Real asked for help from the city.
Baird said he met with the owner to discuss her parking needs. But her restaurant is in the middle of a long block, so the city has no easy solution.
“We’ve done what we can thus far,” Baird said.
The bike lanes were added as part of a Caltrans repaving project throughout Mountain View, Los Altos and Palo Alto.
Caltrans pushed Palo Alto City Council to approve the project on June 18, 2024, citing safety concerns. One bicyclist was killed and 32 bicyclists were injured in Palo Alto on El Camino from 2016 to 2020, and a bike lane will help drivers anticipate and notice them, Caltrans Office Chief Sergio Ruiz told council.
“Whether we like it or not, Caltrans is doing this,” Councilman Greer Stone said at the meeting. Palo Alto lost an estimated 500 parking spaces during the repaving.
Mayor Ed Lauing said the city would go “block by block, business by business” to find parking solutions.
“The access for local-serving retailers and restaurants and other businesses is serious… We’re going to get that done. We have to get that done,” Lauing said.
The new bike lanes have also led to an increase in complaints about RVs parking near businesses, according to a report by City Manager Ed Shikada.
The city estimated that 40 people were living in RVs along El Camino before the repaving.
Anyone surprised by this fiasco except maybe the City Council’s Retail Committee whose member vehemently trashed former mayor Lydia Kuo for suggesting outreach to the ECR retailers first?
Remember that PA’s city attorney refused to take any action to oppose th Caltrans mandate — or at least stall until Caltrans repaved ECR after so many years of neglect.
Since she’s retiring, maybe a priority for her successor could be defending the interests of the community paying her big bucks?
(Note the overlap between the 3 council members screening candidates, the Retail Commissioners who opposed the outreach and the Transportation Commissioner who negotiates with Caltrans.)
Obviously we need to waste millions more on retail and transportation consultants to explore this shocking development. Perhaps PA’s “Biking / Pedestrian and Multi-modal” transportation consultants, the Bike Coalition and the city staffers pushing for bike lanes on other major roads could opine?
Snark aside, we need an accurate count of actual ECR bike traffic since many say they rarely / never see anyone nuts enough to bike on the bike lanes followed by an action plan to save our poor retailers!
If the city had the spine to remove the shanty town none of this would have come to pass.
This month I’ve driven four round trips along El Camino from Menlo Park to Los Altos, down to Miramonte/Shoreline, three weekday afternoon and dinner hour trips, and one Saturday trip, 4pm one way, 8pm returning.
On all but two of these trips I saw no bicyclists. On two trips I saw only one bicyclist.
Nor do I believe that this is really about safety for bicyclists. It looks more like another assault on driving, parking, and small businesses. Palo Altans should demand the removal of these partitions. They’re eyesores that are putting stores out of business and are hugely inconvenient for patrons of stores along El Camino.
This is all just the brutal way the the real-estate development complex and their enablers in government play the long con. It will take years but the silly bike lane will outlive its usefulness and be removed, but only after the small independent retailers on ECR are destroyed and the real-estate development complex takes control of their properties.
We need a Trumpian decree to make bicycle lanes on busy important roads illegal.
The road is for commute and business.
The road is not for leisurely sporting.
When I need to exercise I DRIVE to the gym.
I don’t know about a Trumpian decree but I’d agree re limiting bike lanes on busy roads.
The selfishness, virtue-signalling and sense of entitlement of the bike lobby is incredible. Just look at the Richmond-Bay Bridge where they replaced breakdown lanes for 35,000 DAILY commuters with bike lanes serving fewer than 100 bicyclists — and that’s only in good weather.
My bike riding on El Camino days are in the past, and I’d advise the same for anyone who wants to avoid the possiblity of danger and injury. How many really ride their bicycles on El Camino anyway?
When I saw these bollards right through El Camino it looked to me that it was all about getting RVs off of El Camino, not going through massive expensive and disrupting change for sake of a few bike riders.
Bike riders was likely an excuse to give in to the people who have been consistently complaining about the El Camino RV Park for years. Both are ugly and a pain in the ***.
Personally, I’d rather see the RVs. At least that helps someone.