Laserfiche WebLink
REPORT <br />To the Honorable Mayor and City Council <br />From the City Manager <br /> <br />September 12, 2016 <br /> <br />SUBJECT <br />Approve the Policy and Guidelines For Residential Traffic Calming in Redwood City <br /> <br />RECOMMENDATION <br />Adopt by resolution a Policy and Guidelines for Residential Traffic Calming in Redwood <br />City; Confirm that adopting the Policy and Guidelines is exempt from the California <br />Environmental Quality Act <br /> <br />BACKGROUND <br />In 1997, the City of Redwood City adopted its “Policy and Guidelines for Speed Hump <br />Use” to address traffic calming requests at that time. Since then the policy has not been <br />updated and is still in use. The policy provides criteria and conditions that need to be <br />met before a speed hump can be placed on a street. Staff use the policy’s speeding <br />thresholds as guidance when deciding whether to pursue the installation of speed <br />humps or if alternative traffic calming measures need to be considered when speed <br />humps are not viable. The current speed-related criteria are: <br />· 85th percentile speed (85% of vehicles drive at or below this speed) is over 33 <br />mph, or <br />· 66% of traffic exceeds the 25 mph speed limit, or <br />· Average speed of the top 15% of traffic is over 40 mph. <br /> <br />Since these guidelines were adopted, several additional traffic calming measures have <br />become accepted engineering practice and are now commonly used to calm traffic on <br />residential streets. The existing policy should therefore be updated to address these <br />additional traffic calming measures and establish a process for their use. Staff <br />recommends that the existing “Policy and Guidelines for Speed Hump Use” be <br />converted to the “Policy and Guidelines for Residential Traffic Calming.” This will inform <br />residents of traffic calming measures, in addition to speed humps, which could <br />potentially improve conditions on their street and provide residents with a clear process <br />on how the measures are evaluated and implemented. <br />Staff have typically been able to process traffic calming requests as they have been <br />received. This is no longer possible as the volume of requests and the associated costs <br />6.3.B. - Page 1