When we last checked in with the City Council Transportation Committee, they decided to table a motion to increase the speed limit on Chandler Boulevard, where the limit would increase from 35 MPH to 45 MPH along the Orange Line, and Riverside Drive which would change the limit from 35 MPH to 40 MPH for its entire length between the Burbank border and Van Nuys Boulevard in Sherman Oaks. The Councilman for the area, Paul Krekorian, wanted a chance for the community to give input on the increases before the proposal went through, and now the increases are back on the agenda for tomorrow's meeting.

So what was the community's feedback? Unsurprisingly, they are concerned that faster speeds for cars will lead to roads that are less safe for pedestrians and cyclists, especially those observing a religious holiday, senior citizens, and school students. Last year, we saw the Woodland Hills-Warner Center Neighborhood Council voice similar concerns but that didn't stop speed limits from being increased near schools, places of worship and shopping malls.

Those fighting the limit increases are in for a long haul. As we've seen before, the scapegoat for speed limit increases used by the LADOT and Council is a state law that mandates that a speed survey be completed every five to seven years and that the new limit be set within five miles per hour of the 85th percentile of drivers. Last year, Assemblyman Paul Krekorian sponsored legislation that would have changed the way limits are calculated across the state; but with Krekorian moving his offices from Sacramento to 200 Spring Street, a new leader on this issue has yet to emerge.

I've been corresponding on this issue with staff from Assembly Transportation Committee Chair Mike Eng, who have been nothing but polite and helpful despite the pounding Eng took on this blog after Krekorian's legislation was bottled in his committee last year. When I asked them if any new legislation had been submitted on this issue, they pointed me to committee staff who basically said, "not that we know of." Last week, over 400 pieces of legislation were filed before a 2/16 deadline, but to the best knowledge of both the Chairman's staff and Committee staff, none of them dealt with reforming the way the state looks at speed limit increases.

One reason that legislators may be hesitant to pick up this fight in Sacramento is because it looks to be a daunting task to get this law changed. First off, there are entrenched interests who will push back both officially, such as AAA, or unofficially, in the form of "expert testimony" given by our friends at the California Highway Patrol. Second, following the Transportation Committee's rejection of Krekorian's legislation last year, Eng and his Senate counterpart Alan Lowenthal held a special "informational" hearing on this issue in October of last year. Attached here, you can find an informational packet that was given to all legislators in attendance, which outlines a major hurdle to reforming the laws requiring speed limit increases.

The process for setting speed limits is guided by federal standards contained in the National MUTCD. Any change to the process in California must be approved by the Federal Highway Administration as being "in substantial compliance" with the National MUTCD. The process for setting speed limits on California streets and highways is contained in the Californiasupplement to the MUTCD, which is known simply as the California MUTCD. Caltrans is responsible for maintaining the guidance and standards in the manual and receives input on changes to the manual from the California Traffic Control Devices Committee (CTCDC), an advisory body convened by Caltrans.

In other words, even if a legislator is successful in guiding reform legislation through the Assembly and Senate. And then is successful in getting our car-loving, jet-setting Governor to sign the legislation; before it can become law it must be approved by the Highway Division of the federal government. In the era of term limits, a legislator could spend his entire time in office focused solely on this issue and not get anywhere.

There are plenty of people who have argued that the problem isn't that the law doesn't provide enough flexibility to keep speed limits low, but that our roads in Southern California are designed to move cars as quickly as possible at the expense of other modes.  Thus, limits are going to keep rising on arterial streets until capacity issues cause them to slow down.  The response from those fighting the increases in Sacramento and locally has been that a legislative victory is a heck of a lot easier than reforming the LADOT.  However, if that's not the case, then the time is ripe for communities to take control of their streets through better design and traffic enforcement rather than focusing on the limits by themselves.

Over the weekend, the Los Angeles Times took a look at the coming budget crisis at Metro.  The article just scratches the surface of the issue, correctly noting that there are a lot of reasons for the quarter of a billion dollar operating deficit including the state’s budget grabs, lower than projected sales tax revenue and an 8% decline in ridership from Metro’s record setting year in 2008.

However, while the article is very clear that over $150 million of the $250 million deficit comes from the state’s grab of a fund dedicated to transit operations, it doesn’t name names for who it to blame for that raid.  The word "Schwarzenegger" doesn’t appear.  And, to be fair, while Los Angeles County is home to the last two Assembly Speakers, the current Chair of the Assembly Transportation Committee, and Chair of a Transportation sub-committee that deals with funding issues; none of these leaders are mentioned or quoted.  Assembly Members Fabian Nunez, Karen Bass, Mike Eng, and Michale Feuer, take a bow.

As has been noted several times, one of the reasons the debate on the Governor’s current transit raid is receiving such a frosty reception compared to previous years is because the press is covering the impact transit cuts state wide are having on riders, especially those that are transit-dependent.  The next step is for the press to start naming names, so that you don’t have to read transportation blogs to be able to pin the blame on the Donkeys and the Governor.

Today the Assembly Select Committee on Rail will discuss transit safety downtown. Wonder how much of the hearing will be on Metrolink? Photo: Gary Se7en/Flickr

Monday, Nov. 30, 1-4 p.m.
An Assessment of Rail Safety and Transportation in L.A. County
Assembly Select Committee on Rail
Assemblymember Mike Davis, Chair

Tuesday, Dec. 1, 1-4 p.m.
High Occupancy Vehicle Lanes II: The Next Generation
Senate Transportation & Housing Committee
Senator Alan Lowenthal, Chair

Friday, Dec. 4, 9:30 a.m.-Noon
Status of Transit in California
Assembly Transportation Committee
Assemblymember Mike Eng, Chair

For those of you who haven't attended one of these before, a few pointers:

If you want to provide public comment at the hearing arrive early, ask one of the staff people for a card to sign up to speak and then find a comfortable place to sit. It will be a while before it is your turn to comment.

The proceedings start with remarks by the Chair and probably all the Committee members in attendance.

Next is testimony by the hearing invitees. This can include experts (from academia and industry), elected officials, agency management, stakeholders, business and labor representatives, etc. They often have ready prepared written remarks that are made part of the record that they verbally summarize followed by questioning by the Committee members.

Anyone else present in a official capacity (a legislative deputy, mayor of a local city) may be called during this phase or will be the first called during the general comment period.

After all the bigshots and such have their turn members of the public like you will finally be called. Generally the time limit is short, perhaps 3 minutes. One strategy to compensate is to like the invitees bring extended remarks in writing and submit them for the record. Have copies to give the Committee Clerk to distribute to the Committee members for their review. A few extras for members of the media, bloggers, interested audience members, etc. would be a good idea to have ready.

If you are there representing an organization mention that in the introduction of your verbal remarks. Or mention affiliations for identification purposes while noting you are speaking solely for yourself. And if you have a website or blog post your written comments to give them wider circulation.

And if you attend, don't be discouraged if no one seems to listen or hear what you have to say. If you are informed, focused and articulate you never know when and how your comments will have an impact. Good luck!

More and more states are adopting laws that  protect cyclists from passing cars by requiring that cyclists receive a three foot buffer on their left before any vehicle can pass them.  According to a recent USA Today article, fourteen states and the District of Columbia have adopted the three-foot-law and it has already passed one legislative body in New Jersey.

Often times the "Three-Feet-Law" is included in a package of safety laws for .  In Colorado it was accompanied with a law making it illegal to throw bottles at cyclists.  In Wisconsin, it was accompanied by a law spelling out the illegality of "dooring" cyclists, even if it is done "accidently."

Needless to say, California is not one of the states that has the 3-foot-law on the books.  There was an effort in 2006 to pass legislation authored by Assemblyman Nava (D-Santa Barbara) that would have changed state law that currently requires drivers to give cyclists a "safe distance" when passing to one requiring a hard three feet.  However, that legislation died in committee after a lobbying effort from members of the trucking industry and the California Highway Patrol.  The CHP’s opposition should come as no surprise after the group charged with keeping our highways safe lobbied against legislation that would help keep speed limits from being raised by speeders and trips over itself to distribute misinformation about cyclists’ rights.

The California Bike Coalition summarizes the benefits and limits of the proposed "Safe Passing Law" which was reintroduced by Nava as A.B. 1941 for the current term but isn’t expected to move this session:

Defining safe passing distance as three feet is easy to understand and
explain to the public. However, is three feet sufficient to protect a
cyclist from a potential collision, particularly with a speeding
vehicle? This bill would also change the law to allow a person to drive
a vehicle in a designated 2-way left-turn lane when overtaking and
passing a bicycle.

According to the California Bike Coalition, there isn’t a push to pass a three-foot-law in California at the moment. Even if there was a push for the law, it seems unlikely to get past the Assembly Transportation Committee as it is chaired by speeding traffic and highway expansion advocate Mike Eng (D-Pasadena)

However, that doesn’t mean there aren’t other safety issues being worked on at the moment.  The Bike Coalition believes that implementation of the state’s "Complete Streets" law will make streets safer through proper engineering as towns’ circulation plans fall into compliance.  Locally, the Los Angeles County Bike Coalition is looking into "vulnerable user’s laws" on the books in other states that set strict mandatory penalties for any driver that crashes into pedestrians or cyclists.

Tomorrow, new rules governing how municipalities evaluate speed limits on local roads will go into effect.  Unfortunately, these rules allow municipalities even less room than before to resist speed limit changes.  The new rules maintain the backbone of the bad law, speed limits are set based on how fast the "eighty-fifth" percentile of drivers are speeding but still manage to make it harder for municipalities to resist faster streets for pesky reasons like pedestrians or cyclists want to use the street.

Why does Caltrans continue to push rules that sacrifice the safety and livability of communities to speeding cars?  In short, state law directs them to encourage roads efficient only when they are moving as many cars as possible.  A road with a slower than "necessary" speed limit is considered inefficient.  Those people walking or biking aren't considered at all in these engineering surveys, mistakenly referred to as science by car-loving politicians.

The new language requires that speed limits be set at the closest five mile interval to the "eighty-fifth percentile."  Thus, if fifteen percent of all drivers are speeding by 6 miles per hour over the speed limit, the new limit would be ten miles per hour higher than the current one.  Thus, unsafe driving is it's own reward.  The faster and more unsafe people drive, the higher the speed limit will be on their local streets. 

When the "eighty-fifth percentile" rule was first put in place in the 1996 Manual, the rule asked municipalities to set the limit at the first speed limit below the "eighty-fifth percentile."  Thus, even if a driver were going thirty-nine miles per hour, they could set the limit at thirty-five.  Today, that would not be the case.

There is still flexibility for local DOT's to repress the speed limit by five miles per hour off the new speed; but under the new rules there is a new series of hoops that local officials will have to jump through to keep the speed limits lower.  So if the LADOT is willing to do the work, these new rules will have little impact on our streets as speed limit raises roll through the city in the coming years.

Unfortunately, legislative efforts to amend the laws that create the guides for organizations such as Caltrans; haven't gone very well.  When Valley Assemblyman Paul Krekorian introduced and pushed legislation that would have given communities more leeway; it was stalled in committee thanks to the lobbying efforts of the auto lobby and Transportation Committee Chair Mike Eng (D-Pasadena).  Eng promised that he was very concerned about speed limits going up and vowed to hold hearings to find the best way to ammend the law requiring the eighty-fifth percentile; but that was on May 11 and Eng has yet to act on his promise.

Last week, community forums were held in Glendale and La Cañada Flintridge on the proposed project that would construct a tunnel connecting the I-710 and I-210 freeways in Pasadena.  The Glendale News Press reported, in two separate stories, that opposition to the project is as strong as ever and that Caltrans isn't happy that the opposition is speaking up now.

Joining residents in voicing his displeasure was Glendale Councilman Ara Najarian, who claims that the project would cause "tremendous damage" to his constituent's quality of life.  Najarian also sits on the Metro Board and is scheduled to Chair the Metro Board for the 2010 Fiscal year, beginning in 29 days.  Nearly 250 people attended the two hearings, and most of those in who spoke raised questions about the project's impacts on their lives or opposed it altogether.

The main concern voiced was that completing a connection between the two highways will not only increase traffic on the roads, but also push some of that traffic onto local streets.  In other words, while it may temporarily provide some relief on the highway, it would do so by permanently congesting their local streets.

Caltrans wasn't impressed.  The next day a second article appeared in the News Press with District Director Doug Failing urging those in opposition to what Environmental Defense has called one of the worst highway projects in America, to hold their opposition until Caltrans can complete it's study that will tell it whether or not to proceed with an environmental study.  Basically, Caltrans wants those in opposition should trust Caltrans to do what's best for everyone.

Failings call for opponents to cease fire would carry a little more weight if he were calling it for both sides.  Oddly, while Najarian is urged to hold his fire while Caltrans does its studies, the same calls weren't made when speeding traffic advocate Asm. Mike Eng taunted Smart Growth advocates that the 710 would be extended "whether they liked it or not."  When government agencies are asking opponents to calm down and not doing the same for proponents, it creates the image that the decision has already been made.

Of course, once the decision's announced, then I'm sure opponents can voice whatever opinions they like.

Auto Club spokesman, Asm. Mike Eng

Despite the support of just about everyone in Los Angeles, A.B. 766 didn't muster the support to even come to a vote at the Assembly Transportation Committee Hearing yesterday.  How could such a slam dunk piece of legislation, a bill that would protect cyclists and pedestrians from the increased speeding of drivers, be such a non-starter with the State Legislature?

Unfortunately, the largest slice of the blame can be served to L.A. County Assemblyman and Transportation Committee Chair Mike "the 710 Tunnel Project Is Going to Happen Whether You Like It or Not" Eng and the Los Angeles City Government.  Eng allowed and encouraged the California Highway Patrol to act as an "expert witness" despite their clear disdain for the legislation and accepted their criticisms of "Safer Streets" as fact.  This luxury was not granted to the local police that testified concerning how current law is making their roads inhospitable to everyone, especially those of us that don't use a motor to get around, but including automobile drivers.

As for why the city is to blame, they managed to produce someone from LADOT to advocate concerning legislation that really only effects contractors and the summoned the city's official state lobbyist to stump for Assemblyman Blumenfield's parking legislation; but left the table empty for A.B. 766.  Where was Wendy Greuel, who announced at last week's press conference her intent to travel to Sacrameno and why weren't city lobbyists who were in the room ordered by Villaraigosa to the table?  That left the Enci and Stephen Box and Lieutenant Carl Povilaitis of the Glendale P.D. to do the bulk of the rhetorical lifting against the better recognized "expert" lobbyists from AAA and the Teamsters.  The lack of lobbying power demonstrated by the city has many of us wondering again, does the City really want to see this law changed?

However, none of this would have mattered if it weren't for the clear urban v rural v suburban divide that exists in Sacramento.

Krekorian testified that his bill would allow municipalities, provided they could show a clear danger to pedestrians, to not raise speed limits as a requirement to use radar as an enforcement mechanism.  Instead, if the only thing that had changed on the road was the average speed of drivers then the municipality could hold the limit at it's current speed.  In other words, drivers wouldn't be allowed to increase a speed limit by speeding.  This basic fact, that under current laws unsafe drivers are rewarded with higher speed limits was never addressed again.  In fact, the Teamsters seemed miffed that Krekorian didn't support the goal of ever increasing speed limits as cars can go faster and faster into the future.

However, after the AAA of Northern California, Southern California Auto Club and Teamsters were done their testimony, questions about "the science" of Krekorian's legislation were planted in the minds of the committee.  That it is the opposite of scientific to only take the needs of one user group into account didn't occur to most of the committee, because they've been brainwashed to think only of the drivers, who have a larger percent of the road share than here in Los Angeles.  To be fair, there probably aren't a lot of cyclists or pedestrians in some of their districts, which is why the support of Eng was so crucial and so clearly absent.

And so, listeners heard a parade of legislators talking about "speed traps" mimicking the testimony until finally the California Highway Patrol, the same organization that went into spastic fits when it accidently gave correct information about cyclists riding two abreast, took to the stand to bury A.B. 766.

The CHP, an organization that never met a cyclist it didn't think of as a traffic hazard, also attacked the "science" of Krekorian's legislation in the name of "providing expert testimony."  Not once did the CHP, nor the AAA or Teamsters, ever address pedestrian safety or explain how setting the limit at the eighty-fifth percentile of drivers was "scientific."  Incidentally, a list of how the Teamsters want you to vote in next week's elections can be found in their March-May newsletter which is linked to on the right of this page.

These were two of the three pictures available of Eng in his Online Press Room.

So let's start the clock now.  It's one day with no word on Eng's series of hearings on traffic safety.  I suspect only Krekorian's reputation as a fearless and tireless advocate for what he believes in is going to make this hearing a reality.  Left alone, it would probably become the "Bike Master Plan" of state politics.

Because Streetsblog is about providing answers, I'd like to present an email that was awaiting for me in my inbox this morning.  In it, Josef Bray-Ali outlines the changes that would both make A.B. 766 more palatable to rural leaders and strengthen the bill.  What follows is the text of his email, posted without comment:

Krekorian's AB 766 is flawed and it does not address the abuse of the Engineering and Traffic Survey that has raised the ire of Angelenos.

Here is how to fix it:

(1) DEFINE PEDESTRIAN AND BICYCLISTS SAFETY - per 1,000 car trips, per capita, per anything that is reasonable. Currently, nothing exists as a standard for "safety" in an E&TS. The Los Angeles DOT uses fatalities per millions of vehicle trips! They justify anything using standards like this and we end up with dead neighbors and friends.

(2) Offer scientifically proven methods of improving bicyclists and pedestrian safety, as follows (for pedestrians):

"Much is known about what design features place pedestrians at risk ... [h]igh speeds and high traffic volume, typical of busy roads, are also important risk factors.

Several kinds of environmental modifications offer great promise in protecting pedestrians and bicyclists. These can be divided into three categories: separating pedestrians from vehicles, making pedestrians visible and conspicuous to drivers, and reducing vehicle speeds ... [v]ehicle speeds can be reduced with traffic circles, narrowed traffic lanes, curving or zigzag roadways, raised intersections, and speed bumps. ... These techniques are collectively known as 'traffic calming'."
-pg. 117 - 119, Howard Frumkin, Lawrence D. Frank, Richard Jackson, "Urban sprawl and public health: designing, planning, and building for healthy communities"

There is plenty of good science that has been done on this issue that will allow the state to uniformly apply standards to our roads. A public hearing stapled onto a flawed process is a poor policy! Keep the public hearing if you must, but force Departments of Transportation and City Managers to ignore good science no more.