OMVNA Newsletter

July-August, 1999
Volume 11, Number 5

Neighborhood Association Update

OMVNA's Early Beginnings

The Downtown Beat

New Buildings Action Bulletin

OMVNAtalk E-Mail List

Mountain View History

MVLF Mardi Gras in March 2000!

Full Speed Ahead for Light Rail

You Can Never Be Too Careful!

The Old Mountain View Neighborhood is bordered by El Camino Real, Shoreline Boulevard, Evelyn Avenue, and Highway 85. The Old Mountain View Neighborhood Association consists of residents interested in preserving the quality of life in our neighborhood. Together we can make a difference -- join us!

Neighborhood Association Update
by Tim Johnson

The following are the highlights of the July 14, 1999 OMVNA Steering Committee meeting:

• A City staff member has been assigned to take the lead on the Mercy-Bush Park design. OMVNA will continue to monitor this process and keep neighborhood residents informed.
• For the past year, OMVNA has been investigating ways to strengthen the building guidelines of the Old Mountain View Neighborhood Preservation Plan. A small area of Old Mountain View will be selected as a pilot, and efforts to obtain a zoning "overlay" will begin. Approval of the design overlay will require two-thirds' support of the residents of the pilot area. OMVNA will keep you posted on this work.
• Neighborhood emergency preparedness plans are expanded to include the creation of an emergency response team. Also, a centrally located neighborhood site will be stocked with first aid and emergency supplies. The plan will be reviewed by the Fire Department. Stay tuned.
• Former OMVNA Chair Bruce Karney has assumed the position of vice chair for the remainder of the current term. Bruce succeeds Garth Williams who is serving as current OMVNA Chair.
• Given limited resources and an active schedule of ongoing projects, the summer General Meeting will not be held. The next General Meeting will be in the fall, on October 23.
• Finally, OMVNA continues to monitor and be involved in current City plans to revise the Downtown Precise Plan (see related article.)

OMVNA's Early Beginnings
by Bruce Karney

For those of you who are new to the neighborhood or unfamiliar with the history and philosophy behind the creation of OMVNA, here's some background: OMVNA was formally organized on September 20, 1992, but grew out of efforts to improve the quality of life here dating back to the late 1960s. At that time. the neighborhood banded together to oppose completion of a four-lane arterial road slated to connect California (at Hope) with Dana (at Bush), using an S-curve between those two intersections. Had the S-curve been built, many unique and lovely homes would have been destroyed, and the character of the neighborhood damaged beyond repair. California Street indeed was widened to four lanes from Shoreline to Hope, as was Dana from Pioneer to Calderon, but the S-curve was stopped by the neighborhood activists of the late 60s. The redevelopment of Castro Street that began in 1989 reawakened the neighborhood, this time in search of a traffic strategy that would route cars around the neighborhood instead of through it. The neighborhood worked with City staff in 1989-91 to draft the Old Mountain View Neighborhood Preservation and Improvement Plan published in February 1991 and adopted by the City Council on July 30, 1991.

In the mid-90's, OMV residents succeeded in getting Dana turned back into a two-lane street between Pioneer and Calderon, and the City also narrowed California Street between Shoreline and Hope in 1998.

The Downtown Beat
by Julie Lovins (lovins@concentric.net, 964-0368)

Downtown Mountain View is at a critical juncture. New buildings are starting to pop up all over, a delayed reaction to the dramatic changes on Castro Street.

We have a choice. Do we just complain later that the face of Downtown is changing forever, or do we participate in the process of guiding the changes? I hope that several thousand of you will choose to participate in encouraging the City Council, Environmental Planning Commission, and Downtown Committee, all ably supported by the City's Community Development Department, to continue making decisions that reflect their genuine interest in "quality development" and in creating a coherent streetscape and a pleasant landscape. Good things are happening here -- and very quickly, as they must because of the number of development proposals coming in.

One major focus of current decision-making is the tune-up of the Downtown Precise Plan. This could revise the rules of the game, looking at both the past and the future. The community vision for Downtown seems to have changed during the 90s, generally in the direction of less-high buildings, for example. Everyone is trying to make the Downtown area (which runs from approximately Franklin on the west to View on the east) more compatible with the strictly-residential areas that surround it.

The City has announced two important community meetings on this topic. We are advised to get up to speed on some very complex issues, at the first meeting, in order to be able to say anything sensible at the second.

Here's the current version of times and places. Don't let the process pass you by.

• Thursday, August 12, 7-8:45 p.m., Community Room, Mountain View Library: presentation and discussion of development alternatives.
• Wednesday, August 18, 7:30 p.m., Council Chambers, City Hall: public testimony on development alternatives. [After this issue of the newsletter was printed, this meeting was postponed to "sometime after Labor Day."]

Finally, if you agree with me that all the hard work sprucing up the sidewalk cafes has been worth it, please tell the restaurants! And please take advantage of Downtown's latest innovation, our late-Wednesday afternoon Farmers' Market (W. Evelyn, Bryant to Franklin).

New Buildings Action Bulletin

Currently, all new downtown buildings must be approved by the Planning Department and the City Council. This situation will last until approximately November when a new Downtown Precise Plan is approved; at that point, Council approval will no longer be required.

Here is information from the City (as of June 1999) about projects that are under construction or under review:

* FAR is the Floor Area Ratio: the ratio of the building's floor space to the size of its lot. A two story building that completely covers its lot would have an FAR of 2.0.

OMVNAtalk E-mail List
by Bruce Karney, OMVNA Webmaster

OMVNAtalk is a new neighborhood e-mail list you can subscribe to if you would like to send or receive e-mail about issues of interest. It is an unmoderated list, which means that messages are not censored or filtered by anyone. There is no charge for subscribing to or using the list.

You may send announcements of any kind, including commercial announcements, as long as there is a clear link to Old Mountain View. For example, an announcement of a garage sale or an artist's open studio in our neighborhood would be appropriate. So would a message containing your opinion about current local events.

To read the complete usage guidelines and to learn how to subscribe, go to: http://www.omvna.org/omvnatalk.html

Mountain View History

Speaking of cyberspace, if you grew up in the Santa Clara Valley before 1970 ... and/or have any stories to tell about this valley's rich history, please send them to MVNick@aol.com so they can be posted on "Pages of the Past."

MVLF Mardi Gras in March 2000!

The Mountain View Library Foundation is gearing up for a great party/celebration/fundraiser on March 4, 2000. The event will feature lots of great Cajun food, fabulous music (blues, jazz and zydeco) and a silent auction. In addition to marking this not-to-be-missed event on your calendar, we hoping that some of you civic-minded OMVNA bibliophiles will help sell tickets and secure corporate underwriting. Intrigued? Want more info? Please call Anita Louis Grossman at 969-4031. By the way, funds raised by the MVLF are used to enhance library collections, pilot new programs and purchase additional capital items.

Full Speed Ahead for Light Rail

Immediately past midnight on December 20, 1999, the Tasman West Light Rail Project will open for service to the public -- a year ahead of its scheduled completion date and well within budget!

In Downtown Mountain View, a multimodal transit center with park and ride facilities will provide connections between light rail, VTA buses and shuttles and Caltrain. Passengers will also be able to connect with Amtrak service to Sacramento, bike routes and county expressways. Do we live in a great city or what?!!!

You Can Never Be Too Careful!
By Tim Johnson

This is the third in a series on safety and emergency preparedness.

An emergency situation such as an earthquake is challenging for everybody and especially for people with disabilities and special needs. However, with careful preparation, you can increase your ability to effectively care for yourself and your family while waiting for help. The American Red Cross offers the following recommendations.

1. Establish a Personal Support Network. A personal support network is made up of individuals who will check with you in an emergency to ensure you are O.K. and to give assistance if needed. This network can consist of friends, roommates, family members, relatives, personal attendants, co-workers and neighbors.
2. Make Multiple Copies of Your Health Card. An emergency health information card communicates to rescuers what they need to know if they find you unconscious or incoherent, or if they need to quickly help evacuate you.
3. Establish an Emergency Contact List. Ask several relatives or friends who live outside your immediate area (approximately 100 miles away) to act as a clearinghouse for information about you and your family after a quake.
4. Store Emergency Documents. Store emergency documents in your home emergency supply kits.
5. Conduct an "Ability Self-Assessment." Evaluate your capabilities, limitations and needs, as well as your surroundings to determine what type of help you will need in an emergency.
6. Carry-With-You Supplies. There are certain items and supplies that you should keep with you at all times: emergency health information card, instructions on personal assistance needs and how best to provide them, copy of emergency documents, essential medications/copies of prescriptions (at least a week's supply), a flashlight on key ring, a signaling device (whistle, beeper, bell, screecher), and a small battery-operated radio and extra batteries
7. Disability-Related Supplies to Add to Regular Emergency Kits. Store supplies in areas you anticipate will be easy to reach after a quake.
8. Equipment and Assistive Devices. Keep important equipment and assistive devices in a consistent, convenient and secured place, so you can quickly and easily locate them.

For more information on this topic, please see the American Red Cross website at http://www.redcross.org/disaster/safety/eqtips.html

The Old Mountain View Neighborhood Association Newsletter
is published by a volunteer editorial committee & distributed to some 2000 homes and businesses by volunteers.

To get in touch with us:

• Write to P.O.Box 391328, Mtn. View, CA 94039
• Call the editor, Anita Grossman at 969-4031 or e-mail at anilou@aol.com
• Find us on the Web at http://www.omvna.org/

The opinions printed in this newsletter are not necessarily those of the OMVNA Steering Committee.