BY BRADEN CARTWRIGHT
Daily Post Staff Writer
Councilwoman Sally Meadows says she wants to make the streets of Los Altos safer, even if that means losing some of the city’s rural feel.
So expect brighter crosswalks, more green paint, protected bike lanes and renovated shoulders if Meadows gets elected to a second term.
“It does make it feel a little less rural. But when you’re balancing safety, especially when you’re talking about kids and routes to school, I think you’ve got to go with doing what we can to make things safe,” Meadows said in an interview.
A lot of the car accidents in Los Altos are related to distracted drivers and not how the roads are designed, Meadows said.
But Los Altos has some trouble spots, like the road behind Los Altos High School that was redesigned last year, causing chaos and confusion among neighbors and students using Jardin Drive.
Meadows, 65, said she wants to avoid “over-engineering” bike lanes, like the protected bike lanes under design for San Antonio Road.
El Camino Real is also getting bike lanes in Los Altos as part of a repaving project from Palo Alto to Mountain View.
Meadows said she would be interested in the city paying for more protections for cyclists on El Camino, but she wants to consider whether the city should invest there or more throughout the city.
Meadows said she wants to get e-bikes off the sidewalk through more enforcement.
She said she’s proud of council’s decision to move away from a goal of reaching a score of 76 on the pavement condition index, or PCI. Council is focusing less on the PCI and more on the outcomes of safe routes to school, Meadows said.
Ten or so years ago, green paint was controversial in Los Altos, especially in front of someone’s house, Meadows said.
But the city is continuing to change, not just on the roads but in downtown and at shopping centers too.
“Change is always difficult,” Meadows said. “On the other side of most change, people move on and you get used to it. When we look back at what Los Altos was — it was Ohlone land at one point, then it was orchards, then it was ranch houses and now it’s a hub of Silicon Valley.”
Meadows said another priority is funding a new police station.
“Four years from now, it better be under construction. I’m not sure if it will be completed, but it’ll be under construction,” she said.
Meadows want to cement “good governance” practices that she tried to implement in her first four-year term.
Council members five or six years ago pushed their own agendas, resulting in the city getting sued for blocking new development and preventing wireless equipment, Meadows said.
Meadows said she’s tried to move the city to more transparency and objectivity in its rules, because nobody looks back on the lawsuits fondly.
“I’m not running for re-election to serve my own agenda. I’m really just trying to help us make what are difficult decisions from a basis of fact,” Meadows said.
Meadows’ website shows she has the endorsements of 11 former Los Altos mayors including King Lear, Penny Lave and Jean Mordo.
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