COUNCILMAN, KEVIN MCKEOWN AND I strongly differ on traffic philosophy.
Because the vast majority of us must rely on private vehicles for our livelihoods, getting to school, home, shopping, medical appointments, etc. — and will for years to come — I say City Hall must keep major arteries flowing.
McKeown and the Land Use and Circulation Element (LUCE) champion cutting reliance on private cars and helping the environment by decreasing motor vehicle infrastructure while encouraging alternative transportation modes such as bicycling, using mass transit and walking.
We have a classic “chicken or the egg” debate. McKeown supports more amenities to encourage using alternate transportation. I say wait until alternate transportation utilization increases and private vehicle use decreases before misappropriating insufficient automobile infrastructure for low demand transportation modes.
While our goals are not mutually exclusive, it seems that neither LUCE nor City Hall wants to bridge this gap. And, we’ll all suffer for it.
LUCE describes “streets" as “open space” to be utilized for green belts, pedestrian walkways, bike lanes and the like. The city’s goal is "reducing car trips” by any means possible, including impeding traffic flow, reducing subsidized commercial parking and making driving private vehicles as painful as possible, even though alternative transportation networks are decades away. City Hall isn’t even suggesting substitutes for “reducing car trips,” just that nasty cars must go, period!
Mass transit (including busses) should for obvious reasons have its own dedicated right of way. And, I’m for bike lanes, but not on major thoroughfares. Unfortunately, that’s where LUCE, McKeown and his sustainable bike buddies want them. But, isn’t there a contradiction in the occasional, environmentally friendly cyclist casually rolling down Santa Monica’s major avenues in exclusive, virtually empty bike lanes while exhaust from tens of thousands of gridlocked motor vehicles spew pollution into the atmosphere and accelerate global warming?
McKeown is leading the charge to add bike lanes (and remove traffic lanes?) to the Pico neighborhood’s highly congested 20th Street to accommodate its tiny number of bicyclist — without any evidence they will stimulate increased bicycling and/or reduce vehicular traffic. One thing’s for sure, slashing 20th Street’s vehicle capacity will surely increase congestion and pollution.
I wrote about City Council’s June 17 deliberations on LUCE in last week’s column (June 23, page 4, ”Growth could end careers”). I paraphrased McKeown and wrote,“In Amsterdam, bicycles, private vehicles and pedestrians all share the same streets and the ‘sharing’ is accomplished by everyone traveling slowly. Surely, McKeown isn’t seriously suggesting a 10 MPH speed limit in Santa Monica.”
Last Monday, McKeown e-mailed me that after he described Amsterdam’s traffic during the council meeting, he had added, “I don’t think that’s going to work in Santa Monica.” His e-mail continued, “I then went on to explain how instead we might make better use of marked lanes, separating traffic at different speeds as a wiser alternative to the Amsterdam model of slowing everyone down to a speed safe for the slowest.”
I’d missed McKeown’s comment about “not working in Santa Monica” and apologize for inadvertently misrepresenting his position. For the record, here’s what he said at council. “... It (Amsterdam’s traffic mix) all works... but nobody gets to go very fast. I don’t think that’s going to work in Santa Monica. The other way to deal with that is to have clear, marked lanes separating vehicles that are operating at different speeds..."
McKeown’s statement perfectly illustrates how blind idealism reigns over practical problem solving by the pie-in-the-sky Utopians currently on City Council.
In their zeal to be “green," our leaders ignore the fact that many Santa Monicans work, learn and shop in far flung places, by necessity. Walking or using bicycles or the bus is time-consuming and/or impractical for most of us. What happens when LUCE’s transit housing renters change job locations? Or, how about shopping at discount stores such as Target, K-Mart, Walmart or Costco located out of town? Even those living in LUCE’s new "workforce and affordable housing” will keep and use their private vehicles for many reasons.
At the same council meeting, McKeown said, “We need to stop subsidizing commercial parking in this town. If we give people fewer places to park, fewer people will drive." By providing cheap, commercial parking, “we are encouraging people to drive and we’ve got to get out of that." Fearing an influx of out-of-towners, McKeown even expressed strong opposition to building parking lots at transit stops such as Bergamot Station — a position that would also deter Santa Monicans from parking and climbing aboard the very light rail he wants us to ride. Unbelievable.
Arbitrarily making it more difficult to drive, usurping inadequate traffic space, creating more congestion and eliminating parking is just loony. City Hall needs to stop the crap and get real.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on June 30, 2008. Read the original PDF.