Evergreen Sidewalk Update : 8/20/2014

(updated 11/24/14) 

Dear Homesteaders:
True, we were unsuccessful in our attempts to reason with the County against yet another MHS juggernaut, resulting in an urban concrete slab being forced onto what used to be a very charming, unique green street with a 100% safety record.

In the two years since the construction project, we have noted an increase in speeding cars and  THREE car accidents :
- one on the curve between Linden and Ethel
- one mid block between Hawthorne and Scott
- one after a car swerved out of control near Evergreen and Melrose

Information about the Evergreen Safe Routes to Schools sidewalk fiasco is still in the process of being updated and consolidated here. : http://evergreensidewalk.blogspot.com/

Thanks for the "I'm sorry I did not get more involved..." apologies, but try not to beat yourself up about it too much - the project had already progressed too far to turn back before we found out about it. Seems to be the way a lot of projects are planned - not just in Marin County, but everywhere.

We can change that too, but it will take some time, effort and honest information exchanges.
Social media is a great tool for civic engagement.

In the meantime, if you happen to be involved in government planning, try to hire planners who learn about local community plan guidelines before they design public spaces or decide what gets approved for construction. You will save a lot of heartache and money. 

It's nice to know that there are many of us who value what is left of our semi-rural environment. 
We can work to restore the character and permeability while keeping the positive aspects of the hideous polluting slab. 

A recent search yielded this article on sidewalk battles elsewhere:

http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/nation/2007-06-17-sidewalks_N.htm

Rather than seeing this experience as a failure on our part to stop the unstoppable,  I choose to see it as the County's failure to serve our community by failing to respect the Tamalpais Community Plan and CEQA.

After all, there was no proper planning procedure, no public hearing; only a couple of meetings.
A public meeting is not a public hearing.

The first meeting was held  in July 2010, after funding was secured and the sidewalk was designed, at Marin Horizon School.
The second meeting was held, not at our Homestead Valley Community Center, but at the Mill Valley Community Center, and it was filled with sidewalk supporters : friends of the school and lobbyists for the MCBC and Safe Routes to School bike/ped infrastructure.

We blogged and emailed until the construction trucks arrived, then did our best to document what was happening so we could perhaps figure out what went wrong after the fact. 
Perhaps all this work can help the County and Safe Routes  "do better next time."

Maybe someday (hopefully sooner than later) the "powers that be" will realize that more inclusive planning processes can bring about better results, less wasteful and more respectful of the communities they claim to serve.

Please join us in Nextdoor so we can all share in the task of informing our neighbors about what is happening in our community.