Atherton committee reviews three design concepts for El Camino Real Complete Streets study

Doug, a town staff member leading the El Camino Real Complete Streets study, told the Atherton Transportation Committee that the project team has developed three concept alternatives and is seeking public input before narrowing to a preferred concept. The study covers roughly a 1.5-mile stretch of El Camino Real that fronts Atherton and adjacent jurisdictions from Renato Court north to Valparaiso, and it is funded in part by a San Mateo County Transportation Authority pedestrian-and-bicycle grant with in-kind contributions from Atherton and Menlo Park and technical support from SamTrans.

The project team framed the work as early-stage concept development, not final designs. "What you're gonna hear tonight are not final answers," Doug said, describing the study as a three-phase effort: (1) a baseline inventory of existing conditions, (2) evaluation of concept alternatives, and (3) selection of a preferred concept and development of a Caltrans Project Initiation Document for engineering. He emphasized that Caltrans must approve any change because El Camino is a state highway.

Why it matters: El Camino carries heavy traffic and is the principal east–west arterial in this part of the county, and residents told staff they avoid walking or biking on the corridor. The town presented data and public-response summaries intended to show whether modest investments could make walking and cycling safer enough to shift some short trips off autos. "Over half the people that are going through Atherton are traveling less than 5 miles," Doug said, a distance the team called potentially bikeable if protected facilities are provided.

Key findings and trade-offs presented - Existing conditions and outreach: Staff reported nearly 300 responses to earlier outreach and an ongoing targeted survey to distinguish Atherton residents from nonresidents. The team found a mix of users, including school‑age children, a sizable senior population and some people with disabilities; staff said roughly 36,000 vehicles travel the corridor daily. The presentation noted that about 9% of corridor users do not drive, and nearly 6% of users reported a disability, according to the study’s baseline analysis. - Crash history: The presentation flagged clusters of collisions near Watkins and Selby and stated that a five‑year snapshot included 73 collisions in the corridor, with several fatalities in prior years. Committee members and the police chief discussed the numbers and context during the meeting; the chief noted that recent annual totals in town are low and that many collisions are minor, while the study team said the pedestrian and bicycle share of crashes is disproportionately high compared with their share of users. - Three concept alternatives: (A) minimal-change approach that adds sidewalks and painted (Class 2) bike lanes on the corridor’s outside shoulders while keeping three travel lanes each way; (B) a full “road diet” that converts one travel lane in each direction to create separated or buffered bike lanes and wider sidewalks; and (C) a hybrid that converts lanes on portions of the corridor (two lanes in one direction, three in the other) to balance capacity and protections. The team described the alternatives as trade-offs among cyclist comfort (buffered or protected lanes), pedestrian crossings and medians, the amount of on-street parking removed, travel speeds and potential diversion of traffic to side streets. - Modeling and expected effects: Study staff said traffic modeling suggests lane conversions would reduce speeds somewhat but that impacts on corridor throughput could be smaller than some residents expect because of platooning and signal timing; staff also said signal timing and intersection changes would be part of later design phases. The team said they modeled effects at key intersections and prioritized not increasing queue lengths on side streets such as Fair Oaks, Atherton Avenue and 5th Avenue.

Public input and next steps: Staff said outreach will continue through February with postcards, an online questionnaire, pop-up events and a virtual community meeting; the team expects to return to the committee with a refined preferred concept in about 60 days and then coordinate design with Caltrans and neighboring cities through the Grand Boulevard Initiative. "If there's consensus on the concept, then this will lead to the next phase of project development through the Caltrans project initiation document," Doug said. The presentation stressed that any preferred concept will require detailed engineering and Caltrans approval before construction drawings or work begin.

Unresolved questions and committee concerns: Committee members pressed for clearer demographic data on who uses the corridor (residents versus people passing through), for more granular counts of walking and biking, and for clarity about how lane conversions would affect platooning and queueing at Menlo Park intersections. A resident who spoke during public comment asked the committee to confirm whether the project team has reliable school‑origin data before deciding on bike-lane placement near Shelby Lane school; staff said they have asked the school for commuting data but the school could not provide it and that the team will seek that information as outreach continues.

What’s next: The study team will keep the survey open through the end of February, hold in-person outreach events and return with refined layouts of each alternative and a committee recommendation to the Town Council in the coming months.