Liang - Vallco impact on Vehicle Hours Traveled. Time spent stuck in traffic.

From: Liang C
Date: Sun, Nov 15, 2015 at 11:49 PM
Subject: Comment on Vallco EIR - Vehicle Minutes/Hours Traveled
To: "City of Cupertino Planning Dept." <planning@cupertino.org>

RE: Comment on Vallco EIR

Please study the amount of extra time residents and workers need to spend on the road due to the massive office park from Apple Campus 2 and Vallco.

For highway access, please study the Vehicle Hours Traveled (VHT) to understand the amount of extra time vehicles spent on the freeway.

Vehicle Miles Traveled (VMT) is not a true measurement of traffic congestion since it doesn't take into account of the speed vehicles take to travel at all. The longer a vehicle spent on the road the more greenhouse gas emission it generates. Whenever a vehicle travels lower than 50 miles per hour, it emits more greenhouse gas.  The more time vehicles spent on the road and increase the amount of time when accidents might occur. The more time each driver spent on the road, also increase the stress level and impact the health of drivers.

The EIR for GPA provided the average speed of each segment of the freeway. Please convert that to the time it takes to go through each segment. Please provide the time it takes to travel from different points of freeways within 30 mile radius.

The EIR for GPA only studied freeway segments within the City of Cupertino and at most one exit outside of Cupertino. However, 84% of Cupertino workers do not live in Cupertino. Many travel long distance from their home to Cupertino. The Hills at Vallco and Apple Campus 2 will double the number of workers who commute into Cupertino. They won't be living within one exit of Cupertino.

Please extend the study of freeways to a 20-mile radius to provide the LOS data for those road segments and also the time it takes to go through the segment. This way, a worker or a resident can figure out how much longer their commute time will increase.

For local streets, please study the amount of time from different corners of Cupertino to reach schools, libraries, Quinlan center and other common destinations. The LOS is one possible measure for one intersection. But one often need to travel through multiple intersections. At some intersections it takes extremely long to make a left turn and that adds to the local travel time. When the total amount of time it takes to go through artery streets, such as Stevens Creek or Wolfe, is longer than expected, people tend to take a short cut and use other streets, such as McClellan and Blaney. But these secondary streets are not equipped to handle the added traffic and these vehicles taking short cut tend to have impatient drivers who are driving at a higher speed. And that leads to more risks on traffic accidents. And there are more bicycles on these secondary streets, which add to the risks of fatal accidents.

Please study the impact on secondary streets when the artery streets have too many intersections with low LOS, and especially the impact on traffic accidents.

The more time it takes to travel on freeway or local street also increases the emergency response time that emergency vehicles need to get to hospitals. Cupertino doesn't have its own major hospitals. Our patients need to go to El Camino hospital in Mountain View or Good Samaritan Hospital in Los Gatos. Residents often need to drive by themselves to send a sick relative to the hospital. The time it takes to reach hospitals should be studied.

Many services, such as pluming, gardening, cleaning services, etc. for Cupertino residents are provided by companies in San Jose or other areas. The longer time it takes for these service workers to reach Cupertino, the less likely they want to serve Cupertino residents, or the more they will charge the residents. And the longer time Cupertino residents have to wait for these services.

Liang Chao