“Sustainable” is easy to define. It is the ability to continue indefinitely activities in any defined place such as an ecosystem or a geographic governmental unit. This means the activities cannot degrade a place, else the “indefinitely” cannot be used because activities supported will be diminished with the degradation. (This, of course, is where we are on the midcoast, with what can be supported continuously declining due to declining support features such as natural resources, even as demands on the same limited place increase and accelerate the decline with growing development and population.) In short, places like the midcoast are being screwed for the long term for the sake of some quickie short-term returns to a relative few.

One does not need to know about everything necessary for a kind of human activity to calculate sustainability. Rather, one can take the most critical local resource in short supply—or, better, two or three resources in short supply—determine how much is available in the leanest of times (a 100-year low, for example), and then determine how much of the scarce resource(s) can be extracted in those lean times without degrading the supportive system. Once one determines the amount that can be extracted, one can then easily calculate how much total combined activity of given kinds and degrees can be sustained.

It’s logical, quantitative, fairly simple, physical (rather than based on woo-woo abstractions), economic, efficient, and responsible. No wonder those few who line their pockets by wrecking places and communities at the expense of everyone else don’t like the concept of sustainability.

Carl May

Oh well, here we go.  The fur is flying once again.  No Brian, I am not going to get into a cat fight.  Too many cats with more experience than me.

Barry you are a wise man.

Mike

i have been thinking about the “Highway improvement problem” since the post started. Where I am working right now, somebody left a Microeconomics text in the lunch room and I have been reviewing it for ideas that relate to our Coastside highway problems..

The problem is to figure out a way to improve the Coastside road system without triggering the classic increase of population, development and vehicle congestion that usually follows building a faster and higher capacity roadway.

So here is my thought so far:

We should move to a Highway 1 and Highway 92 design with 2 lanes of conventional 45 to 55 mph roadway and 2 lanes of officially slow 25 miles per hour or less roadway.

Two “fast lanes of “conventional roadway” is to support the status quo where the same number of cars per hour and same drive time to the Freeway 280 - Hwy 92 junction is preserved. The idea is to make two safe lanes for conventional vehicles. If the travel time and quantity numbers stay constant then the two largest economic terms associated with road driven growth are not increased.

Two “slow lanes” for community travel and low energy transport . We should then build 2 lanes of “officially slow” roadway. We want this to be a parallel road with no minimum speed and a speed limit of about 25 miles per hour. This is an equally safe drive for bicycles, skateboards, electric scooters, electric wheelchairs, battery powered vehicles and driver-less autonomous vehicles like solar powered freight vehicles. In times of traffic congestion, conventional cars can drive on the “officially slow” road too, provided the car goes only 25 mph.

So the point is, we allow the road system to grow and develop so the Coastside can add on low energy life and travel solutions. We make the conventional high energy high speed car roadway safer but we leave the drive time and vehicles per hour unchanged.

I think Doug has a great suggestion in his post on 11/28 at 3:15 pm. Ugly is deinitely a subjective term and I think that the current improvements on the west side of the hill portion of 92 is very pleasant and not ugly. However I would take Leonard’s suggestions in a heartbeat as we desperately need to make improvements to 92 (it’s just that those improvements would not be enough). Ultimately 92 needs to be 4 lanes the entire length as it currently cannot handle today’s traffic volumes, let alone the near future.

And it is typical to hear Mike’s response to the leaving the area question. Just goes to show how many opinions about the needs of our coastside are based on selfish reasons.  Mike, you might want to try this website:
http://www.homes.com/Real_Estate/Counties/OR/

We truly do risk our lives:

Woman dies in car crash on Hwy. 92
By Howard Mintz
Mercury News
Article Launched: 12/02/2007 06:22:20 AM PST

A Half Moon Bay woman was killed Saturday and another person was injured after a head-on collision on Highway 92 in San Mateo County, the California Highway Patrol reported.

The CHP said an Antioch woman was driving a 2006 Honda westbound on Highway 92 near the Highway 35-Skyline Boulevard divide when her car veered into the eastbound lane and crashed head-on into a 1994 Subaru sedan.

A Half Moon Bay woman who was a passenger in the Subaru was pronounced dead at Stanford University Hospital. Injured passengers also were taken to Stanford hospital. The Honda driver suffered moderate injuries, but no information was available on the driver of the Subaru, the CHP reported.

The CHP reported that all passengers appeared to be wearing seat belts.

In 2001, I was in a head on crash on 92 coming up towards Skyline when I was hit by a woman coming down the hill driving on the wrong side of the road at about 40 mph and I was going uphill at about 30 mph.  When I saw her, there was no time to react and no side lane to avoid her.  To this day, I still am amazed that I survived.  The woman who hit me was lost.  At impact, it felt like everything inside my body was exploding as the airbag started coming out.  Being short, I was sure the airbag would kill me if the crash didn’t.  Then came the realization that I had survived, although I still wondered whether I had or not.  My worst fear was that I would never see my children again.  It took 3 months of my life to get to the point where I wasn’t in severe pain all the time. 

Surely something could be done to improve this road without raping the Coastside and making the road safer.  There must be some common ground that we can all agree on.

My heart goes out to the victims in this crash.

How does one improve a road to protect against such incompetent (for whatever reason) drivers of the sort who caused the head-ons? The fault is not the road’s; it is the drivers’. Even with four-laning and adding a median barrier to every road in the state, one would still be confined (by the barrier) to one side of the road and all the dangerous drivers going the same direction (at least until they spin and end up facing you).

Why did these drivers on 92 end up in the wrong lane? Get this kind of person (or the person who forced them into the oncoming lane) off the road, permanently, and the accident rate will go down. I haven’t driven 92 much lately. Is the CHP ever out there enforcing the rules of the road?

Carl May

Here we go again another of our Coastsiders killed on 92 by a head on 12/03. The road will never be improved not freewayized just safety improvements until a bunch of sacred frogs snakes or woodland rats get killed in a head on.Then maybe we can get San Mateo county to saftyize the road. I love the idea of getting people who cant stay on their side off the road but who are they?. The courts keep putting DUI’s back on the road. Glad im retired & dont have to drive it to commute any more but still fear for friends & neighbors. This from a 38 year HMB old guy. There just isnt anyplace to go to avoid a head on except into or over the side.Please all i ask is for room to get out of the way hopefully.

I just found out who the woman was and she was a family friend of mine. God bless her and her family. And for those folks that are dead-set on trying to prevent road improvements of any kind for fear that in someway it might lead to more homeowners on the coastside: yet another person’s blood is on your hands.

Oh, and 4 lanes with a median barrier would have prevented this latest death..

Without knowing the circumstances of the accident, we don’t know what might have prevented this latest tragedy. Or if the steps that might have purportedly prevented this tragedy (in the minds of those who use a tragedy to promote their greater overdevelopment agenda) might actually cause others.

Carl May

Carl,
Keep trying to convince yourself… I’m telling you that in this case a median would have prevented this tragedy.

Simple, offhand answers always work in the land of make-believe. What else might have prevented this tragedy? We can’t know that without actually knowing the circumstances of the crash. What was going on with the driver of the car that veered into the wrong lane? Alcohol or drugs? Fiddling with a cell phone? Changing a CD? Emotionally distraught over something? In the real world, many things might have conceivably prevented the tragedy; but to get real one has to know something about the circumstances rather than jump to specious (and, for some, agenda-serving) conclusions.

Carl May

Carl,
I truly believe it has been a long time since you’ve lived in the real-world. It is a certainty that if there had been a median between the 2 lanes, a life would not have been lost last Saturday. All of the questions that you pose sounds to me like a way to try and reconcile your opinion so that you can sleep at night.

It’s like the old NRA slogun that guns don’t kill people, people kill people.  (Hopefully this thread will not evolve into a right to bear arms discussion.)

Highway 92 does kill people and one doesn’t have to have an agenda to acknowledge that. 

Maybe, those of us who have had serious accidents on this road or have lost spouses, children, friends and neighbors on it should all get together as a body to lobby for change.

A road that can be driven perfectly safely is not comparable to a gun designed to kill. Deflecting responsibility to an inanimate entity is something the coastside had in spades during the Devil’s Slide bypass controversy. (Truth is, the highway from Montara to Pacifica does not have a particularly high accident rate and almost all fatal accidents that have occurred there over recent decades involve alcohol/drugs, reckless driving, or suicides.) When transference of responsibility is used to avoid confronting human mistakes, no good answers are possible.

Terrible and unexpected tragedies wring powerful emotions from us, but good people who have been harmed are not honored by unsupported and irrational campaigns. What were the facts of this tragedy? Not just the knee-jerk assumptions being made but the actual causes of the accident? Perhaps road conditions played a part, perhaps not. A median might prevent most head-ons on a given road, but it might also make accidents caused by drivers going in the same direction worse. What is best overall for a particular highway depends on actual circumstances.

Sadly, as we saw with years of arguing over the bypass, not everyone involved in such matters really cares about the victims; rather, they see incidents that can be exploited for their own ulterior purposes. That may or may not not be the case with anyone writing messages here in Town Hall, but it is a common practice when it comes to roads serving the coastside.

Carl May

I think we all know what your ulterior motive is Carl… To try and keep the coast to yourself. Of course “a road that can be driven perfectly safe” is a subjective statement based upon how accurate a person can drive given the current conditions. You yourself have already stated that you have not driven 92 in quite a while, which is entirely contrary to the average person living on the coastside. Sorry but your statements are not adding any legitimacy to your arguments.
Ray

Um, someone has not noticed the narrow, overpopulated coastal terrace with 24,000 people overdrawing its limited resources. One is hardly alone here. Trying to personalize a discussion that calls for objectivity is commonly a tactic of one without a better basis for his own offhand bias.

I never said I have not driven 92 in a long time. I said I have not driven it much lately. Words have meaning. One’s reading comprehension problems are not an excuse for false characterizations of others.

Now, what were the circumstances behind the tragedy under discussion? If one does not know, then one is just winging it in the ozone with assertions about what might be done to correct any remediable causes involved. Flailing and kicking one’s feet while screaming “Just fix it!” demonstrates ignorance of the extensive political, bureaucratic, engineering, financial, environmental, etc., policies, analyses, and debates concerning Highway 92 from the top of the hill to Crystal Springs over the past thirty years. Ignorance is not a great platform from which to operate.

Carl May

Drunk drivers and people getting hit head-on happens on every road and highway whether they be curvy or straight-aways.

Changing Highway 92 won’t put an end to drunk driving accidents.  Dividers might hamper head-on accidents, but there will always be risk of being rear-ended.  Accidents happen when people drive carelessly.

Highway 92’s fastest speed limit posted is 45 MPH, however, drivers attempt the curves and limited straight-aways at speeds in excess of 45 MPH.  I travel Highway 92 at speeds between 30 MPH and 42 MPH and the travel time, with no traffic, totals ten minutes from Main Street to 280.  Traveling Highway 92 at speeds under the fastest limit possible also allows for me to stop for any exiting cars at residential driveways, nurseries, pumpkin/tree farms, from the waste station road, or the quarry road.

Highway 92’s fastest speed limit posted is 45 MPH, so perhaps, it isn’t that Highway 92 needs to be changed?  Perhaps it is the drivers’ perception of what type of road Highway 92 represents?  Perhaps the term “Highway” confuses drivers who think they should be able to travel in excess of 55 or 65 MPH as they would any “highway” in California?  Perhaps all the commuters traveling Highway 92 have a perception that as soon as they hit the road, er, the highway, then they should be able to accelerate over the hill to their destination?

I advocate that we all simply slow down.  It’s the most sensuous commute in the Bay Area - Enjoy it, don’t complain!  We can’t force everyone to slow down on Highway 92, the posted speed limit signs aren’t even able to do this currently!  However, if we drive slower, then that does force everyone behind us to drive slower.  Stopping to let other drivers out of their driveways and onto the highway, allows the drivers behind us to see that it doesn’t take so long out of all our time to mellow out and allow others to merge.

Our population moves so fast, we assume Highway 92 needs an upgrade to allow us to keep up.  Remember when “Overnight Delivery” was an amazing service?  Or Fax Machines, wow!  Instantaneous!  And now we are so integrated with the internet that we can use 511.org to observe evening commute traffic before leaving work.  We get information overnight and immediately, but Highway 92’s fastest speed limit is 45 MPH, so slow it down and you will find there is no need to “improve” the road.  That’s the beauty of Highway 92, although it’s named a “highway,” it is really a meandering little country road.

p.s. Villages in Ireland and Italy exist fine without traffic on their streets.  Consider that possibility for a downtown HMB!

San Mateo Road is designated as SR 92 - “State Route 92”, not “Highway 92”.  El Camino Real is SR 82, and nobody would call it “highway 82.”  Calling SR 92 “Highway 92” doesn’t make it a highway.  I believe that in all or nearly all posts where I mention 92 I refer to it as SR 92, not as “Highway 92”.  I knew there must be a reason why I was doing that…

I suggest that everyone stop calling it “Highway 92.”  How about using its real name from now on—San Mateo Road?  That’s classier than “92” or “highway 92” or “SR 92”, and hints of it being a “meandering little country road”  And while we’re at it could those who call SR 1 “the freeway” please stop doing so?  It’s not a freeway.

Leonard:  I hadn’t even noticed your use of “State Route,” and had to go back and check!  ha!  Like I didn’t believe you…I even had to check out what my friend Dan had to say:  http://www.cahighways.org/089-096.html#092

I will no longer call it Highway 92 now that I’m educated and will help to spread the word.  :)

Anyway, fabulous, even more to the point of us needing to observe that this is a slow moving route, (>45 MPH), not a major road to handle traffic.  I shudder at the improvement suggestion of four lanes of traffic.  Talk about excess, tonight, heading south on 280 from SFSU, four lanes southbound were filled with red tail lights, as were four lanes of northbound filled with white headlights.  Seven o’clock at night and the eight-lane freeway was full ‘o cars.  I could not wait to get on SR 92 and head into the quiet land, smell the chaparral, the recent storm-freshened Pilarcitos Creek, and even, the eucalyptus.

This SR 92, or San Mateo Road, conversation we’re enjoying here reminds me of Laguna Canyon Road, also known as State Route 133.  Pro-development folks wanted to solve the summer tourist traffic bottlenecks by building out the canyon road to two lanes east, two lanes west.  During winter and spring, the wetlands throughout the canyon would flood the winding road causing more demands for road improvements.  One time, a hippo escaped from the animal park over the hill.  Authorities allowed intervals of officer-directed one-way traffic for a couple weeks, until they got the hippo out.  Just like Half Moon Bay, the only routes to Laguna were north or south on SR 1, or east/west on two-lane Laguna Canyon Road (SR 133).

Old Lagunans firmly stated “No” to any suggestion of road improvements to SR 133.  This debate raged for years, no, it was decades.  Then schemers found a work-around and the go-ahead was given to build-out SR 73 as a Toll Road from the east hills of Newport Beach into the canyon.  Since the Toll Road was built, acres of stucco condos, townhomes, and gated communities invaded an area where I used to ride my horse and hike to find Indian caves.  If the Toll Road hadn’t been built, that canyon would still feel wild.

The mysteries of the canyon are gone since the paving of the Toll Road.

It is difficult to explain to some folks the value of retaining the mysteries by limiting land development.  Down in Laguna a group formed to help preserve and educate the public about Laguna Canyon:  Friends of Laguna Canyon http://www.lagunacanyon.org/who_we_are.html.

Just thought I’d share a parallel coastal road story.

Thanks, Carl, for your explanation of “sustainability” above.

There are those who believe they can always add “just one more” to a system, without destabilizing it; or maybe (to be more cynical) they believe that after the system has been destabilized, they can use the resulting crisis to get some irresponsible technical fix pushed through that would never survive scrutiny without the “emergency”.

There is a section of El Camino Real in Colma with yellow dividers down the center, which might be a short-term solution for keeping drivers on Route 92 in their own lane. I haven’t researched how this solution was found over the hill - it might have been a city project, or a part of the county-wide transportation planning, or a state project, but it did get done.

It seems to me that a middle turning lane separating the traffic and allowing people to turn on and off of highway 92 would solve the situation (see below and previous accidents), no?  I’m not proposing a superhighway, just a safe way to travel from our spectacular community over the hill.  I two lane road is unsafe, period.  People come over the hill to ride ponies, buy flowers and enjoy the beach (and support the city by spending money).  We drive over the hill to get to work, enjoy other areas of California, and get out for awhile.  Be safe out there.

“Highway 92 was closed in both directions shortly after 5 p.m. Saturday after a man driving an eastbound car collided head-on with a westbound minivan. There were no fatalities, though the driver of the car was listed in critical condition and unconscious on Tuesday, said Capt. Michael O’Malley of the Half Moon Bay Police Department.

The accident, which occurred less than a mile east of Main Street, snarled traffic downtown and around Highway 1 for more than an hour as Coastside Fire Protection District emergency crews worked to extract Jim Ostil, 66, of San Leandro from his mangled car.

O’Malley said the accident occurred at around 5:23 p.m., when Ostil, driving a 1991 Mitsubishi 3000, drifted over the yellow double lines into the path of a 1998 Toyota Sienna driven by Shilpa Odera, 41, of Half Moon Bay. The woman’s 16-year-old and 15-year-old daughters were in the minivan with her. Police would not release the names of the under-aged girls. An SMCAlert was broadcast at about 6:09 p.m., alerting travelers to avoid the area until further notice. The Sheriff’s Office was asked to shutdown Highway 92 at Skyline Boulevard and divert traffic north and south at about 5:40 p.m. The department received the all clear at about 6:37 p.m., said Lt. Ken Jones of the Sheriff’s Office.

Because of heavy cloud cover, the victims could not be airlifted by helicopter, and two ambulances were dispatched to take them to Stanford Hospital. Police had no further information on the victims’ medical conditions on Tuesday, though it’s believed that the woman and her daughters have been released from the hospital.”

I’m very glad to hear there were no fatalities in the accident on 92 that you have reported Doug. A family friend of mine was recently killed in 92, and I truly believe that we are in desparate need of improvements to this highway (it is no more a state route, than 280 is a state route). It has nothing to do with drunk drivers, or negligent drivers… It is simply a dangerous road to travel. It needs to be straighten in areas, and widen: 4 lanes to allow for turning left or right, with a median in the middle. Anyone saying differently is merely trying to use this as another way to prevent excessive development, which is a fallacy. The truth is that driving on 92 can be dangerous to your health.

OK, lets keep it simple-minded.

Anyone who cannot drive 92 or 1 safely should not be driving. It is a shame when an incompetent driver crashes into another driving properly, but the road has nothing to do with it.

92 is a State Route; 280 is a U.S. Interstate. Entirely different design and capacity standards apply.

Oversized infrastructure has spurred overpopulation and overdevelopment in California for the past century, accelerating after WWII. Each excess is used by developers to justify greater development, and that, in turn, brings cries for even more infrastructure. This is fact, played out tens, if not hundreds of thousands of times.

All driving is potentially dangerous. Driving on 92 is no different in this regard.

Carl,
please.. keep trying to convince yourself so that you can sleep at night.. I feel a bit sorry for you, and your lack of sympathy for those that have been injured or worse, due to the dangerous conditions of 92.

Not to be dramatic but it seems the road infrastructure not only on highway 92 but everywhere on the coast is a little outdated????

Head-on collision closes Highway 1

From staff reports
Published/Last Modified on Monday, Jun 16, 2008 - 02:59:01 pm PDT
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A head-on traffic collision occurred just after 2 p.m. Monday on Highway 1, just south of Capistrano Road. Both traffic lanes were closed at 2:40 p.m. but were expected to reopen at about 3 p.m. The California Highway Patrol is currently on the scene. The extent of injuries was not immediately clear.

There seems to be at least 2 head-on collisions per year on highway 1. It definitely shows an antiquitated infrastructure some 20 or 30 years old, and that us residents on the coastside must be the first to initiate a change in these conditions. I truly hope nobody was seriously injured. Any thoughts that preventing improvements in our road infrastructure might be a way to prevent growth on the coast must be placed aside as we are all suffering from the lack of resources that have been placed on this problem.

As a survivor (and victim) of a head-on collision on 92 a few years ago, I continue to be saddened that there are those in this community who feel that by not allowing improvements in infrastructure they will somehow prevent further growth.  We truly need to explore any and all options to improve our roads in such a way that does not cause unwanted growth but does save lives.  This should not be a growth issue, an issue of survival of the fittest or an issue of natural selection of who gets to live here.  It took me about three months to get my life back to the point that I wasn’t in constant pain.  Some have not been so lucky.

Michelle,
I truly believe that the majority of the people that live on the coast have the same opinions as you and I. It’s just unfortunate that there have been a select few that tend to be more vocal, and perhaps with more time on there hands, to try and persuade the residents and use other social issues such as degrading our coastal environment, etc to their own purpose.

There’s more to opposition to “upgrading” Hwy 1 than simply opposition to growth.  If you’ve ever walked along Hwy 1 in Pacifica, you know how noisy, dirty, and unpleasant that divided highway can be for mere mortals afoot. Not to mention the misery it imposes on nearby homes and businesses. Finally, you trade one kind of safety drivers for new dangers for pedestrians.

I lived in Moss Beach for about 10 years (before moving to HMB) and had to deal with the current peril of trying to cross Hwy 1 as it is contructed today. Couldn’t even walk my kids to Moss Beach park as I feared for their safety. I think many others agree with me that the current Hwy 1 conditions for pedestrians is lousy, and that too needs to be solved. I actually think we could have road conditions that are safe for all (top priority) and are pleasant and clean.
Oh, and as for businesses… When the Hawaiian place was open, did you ever try and make a left from Northbound 1 to get into the parking lot? Talk about dangerous.  Same goes for the Charthouse when it was opened, and even Sam’s chowder house.

At the sake of getting drawn into a big time sync on the merits of SR-92 “improvements” and the effect on the quality of life that has drawn most of us to live on the coastside, I think I will just state my own observations after moving here 25 years ago.

1) Carl May is right. There are many reasons for the over development on the coastside, population growth, housing cost (coastside vs bayside), etc. However, accessibility has and will fuel growth (wait for the Tunnel to be finished and you will see). SR-92 has been vastly improved since 1985 when it was two lanes all the way and had dotted yellow passing lines in some pretty dangerous places. “Fix SR-92” and then we have to fix SR-1. There is always another bottleneck. If we keep up we can make the coastside look like the peninsula. But then you have to ask why did I move here.

One reason the coast was so attractive to me was I could be in a peaceful, rural setting and still visit San Francisco for arts, entertainment and dining or get to the valley to earn a paycheck. My price was a little longer commute but the reward was being here.

2) Anneliese Agren has the right perspective. SR-92 is only 8 miles long from HMB to 280, so some quick math tells me speeding (60 MPH) vs cautious/safe (40 MPH) would only save you at most 4 minutes. So leave a few minutes earlier, slow down, relax and enjoy the ride and the views (but keep your eyes on the road). We have let the technology rush of always on, instant access, multi-tasking world drive our stress levels to the limit. And the price is our own health and welfare. Life is choices. I like the image of European towns where the autos are secondary to foot traffic.

She also mentioned Laguna Canyon Road (SR-133) which I have driven or another example closer to home, SR-17 which is 2 lanes in each direction with a divider down the center and it still has a combination of narrow shoulders, dense traffic, sharp turns, blind curves, wandering fauna, and sudden changes in traffic speeds have led to driving conditions that result in a number of accidents and fatalities. And driving that on a rainy winter day during commute hours is worse than SR-92 is today especially when you have people of various speeds passing on curves.

3) Accidents happen. And they will continue to happen no matter what “improvements” are made. But the CA highway statistics show that the accident rate for all of California and San Mateo County has been declining from 1999 - 2007 (http://cacrash.org/tnumcnty9107.html). I could not find a breakdown for SR-92 but I bet there is some data out there. http://www-fars.nhtsa.dot.gov/Main/index.aspx this looks like an interesting site but I haven’t figured out if I can get better details.

Anyway, I guess you have to look at the data. For my 25 years here people have been trying to improve the coastside with their individual pet projects and for 25 years the coastside has decided how much they want changed.

You think 92 is a problem - wait until you build a “Beachwood Park” on Highway 1.  Not a good idea either!  A run to the coastal beach makes the park a nuisance ripe for civil lawsuits.

I contend that 70% of the Hwy 92 problems are attributable to slow trucks and the Ox Mt. landfill. It is no secret that trucks are coming here from all over the Bay Area to dump.
Simple solution: BAN TRUCKS FROM 7-9 AM AND AFTER 4 PM.
Everyone is happy ;-)