Editorials

City rethinks Telegraph Ave. traffic lights

By Kurtis Alexander, Daily Planet staff
Wednesday May 01, 2002

Transportation officials admit poor public communication linesZ 

Admitted blunders by city traffic officials sent the Berkeley City Council spinning Monday night, driving councilmembers to rethink the fate of a traffic project on Telegraph Avenue. 

Under heavy fire from South Berkeley neighbors, City Council voted, after nearly an hour of debate, to give itself the option of altering how two long-planned traffic signals on Telegraph will be utilized, if at all. 

Neighbors say they have only recently been informed of the year-old traffic project and, even this late in the process, deserve to play a role in how the increasing numbers of vehicles in the area will be navigated by their homes. 

“There has been very poor public consultation,” conceded Peter Hillier, assistant city manager for transportation, who took the lead on the project, only after he started working for the city just three months ago. “People would have had to have shown initiative to know this was going on.” 

“It’s incredible that this has been going on for more than a year and we just heard about it,” echoed neighbor Wim-Kees vanHout. 

The traffic signals, which are already under construction on corners at Stuart Street and Russell Street, come as part of a half-million-dollar grant, aimed at reducing traffic, from the California Department of Transportation. The signals have long been scheduled to be activated in September.  

As a result of Monday’s Council action, though, the project on Telegraph must be reconsidered by Council late summer before the traffic lights can be turned on. In the meantime, public hearings are slated to continue between neighbors and city traffic engineers. 

Councilmembers Kriss Worthington and Dona Spring expressed concern about bringing the issue back to council and not letting it proceed as planned. The worry, they say, is breaching terms of the Caltrans grant. 

“My problem with this is that we may lose the money,” said Spring. “I assume that Caltrans will come after us for the money (if we don’t complete the project and turn the traffic signals on).” 

At a cost of more than $200,000 per light, Spring worries that the city, after further public hearings, may decide that traffic signals are not the best way to address the area’s traffic problems, yet still be obliged to pay a hefty sum. 

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“Let’s not jeopardize this,” she said. 

But even with the city leaving open the possibility of not turning on the lights, Councilmember Worthington said this would never happen. 

“They’re going to turn on the lights,” he said of his fellow councilmembers. He called the move of bringing the issue back to council a “political game” and said his colleagues were merely placating opponents by holding additional hearings. Council has no intention but to turn on the lights, he said. 

Neighbors began questioning the project in March when construction began on the traffic lights and new transportation manager Hillier sent out an information letter. Many neighbors said this was the first they had heard about the work. 

Hillier said with his arrival to Berkeley on Jan. 23 and the simultaneous creation of a new city department – Berkeley Office of Transportation – that communication with the public was bound to improve. 

“We’ve gone through a lot of staff people during this process,” noted Worthington.