Honorable Council Members,
Someone forwarded to me the odd April 2 email from former mayor Rick Cline, labeling several volunteer members of our community as “angry advocates”, so I had to read it. I am included in a diatribe against those who did not agree with Rich’s heartfelt, determined preference for separation between trains and cars - a train tunnel through Menlo Park.
I find this odd because Rich knows I was a proponent of tunneling since 2004, when I worked publicly with fellow architects in Palo Alto and Menlo Park to make the argument for same. We talked more than once. I have often pointed to the Highway 1 tunnel from Pacifica to Montara (past Devil’s Slide) as an example of persistence overcoming local agency cost resistance.
That I joined a (very) mixed but earnest group to ask for appropriate study of fully elevated (over downtown) rail separation in the last two years was a matter of long study and an open mind. The study is a lot of work, but I do recommend the open mind part.
As our (very) mixed group has different voices, I hope our current council members do not lump all who make a conclusion with the one they might dislike. Not Dana Hendrickson, nor Steve Schmidt nor I has his "head in the sand” - but we have spent over a hundred hours each on this stuff. Three time mayor Cline had twelve years in office and four years on the council rail subcommittee At this point, we can all only hope all the relevant information - on fully elevated and on Rich’s tunnel - is available to council for full debate. In over four years, it has not yet been.
My thanks to staff and current council for getting us back up to speed soon.
Henry Riggs
