Takin' it to the streets, or how to create the impression of success by lowering your standards

Let's look at a few numbers for traffic density in Poway, specifically in the area around Poway Road. There's a measure called "Level of Service" (LOS) that describes, from A - F, the quality of the traffic situation on the streets: A being the best situation where dear old dad bragged about you to the neighbors, F being the grade that got you into trouble on your report card and strict talkings-to from daddy. A more official way is to use these descriptions from the Highway Capacity Manual (from the Transportation Research Board, a U.S. national highly respected organization) which describes the levels thusly:
A = Free flow
B = Reasonably free flow
C = Stable flow
D = Approaching unstable flow
E = Unstable flow
F = Forced or breakdown flow
Another definition of LOS A is the flow you see either late late at night, or on a car commercial.
Agenda item #8 in the March 16, 2010 Poway City Council meeting had a nice LOS map. I've taken the liberty of adding numbers to various streets as well as the summary in the lower right corner. These numbers, called "Car trips per day", indicate, well, how many cars per day travel these streets. It's interesting to note that the measurements are taken on Tuesdays or Wednesdays, not the weekends. No conspiracy theories here, it's just interesting. Ok, the numbers (obtained in 2007) show the car trips from 2003. The area with the numbers just coincidentally happen to bracket the existing wally-world store with LOS ranging from D to E. Lovely... The only worse area in the city is Espola Road going by Poway High, but that's going to be blessed with a couple of roundabouts (maybe) and made into a wider road with really wide bike lanes on both sides so I'm sure the LOS will move up a grade or two, just enough so daddy will let you take the car this weekend but not enough for him to give it to you forever.
One could note that because of the lousy LOS given in most of the city, they won't allow granny flats anywhere but the areas in east Poway...But that's a separate issue...



There was a 126 page General Plan amendment 10-02, item #15, dealing with the Transportation Master Element (TME) presented at the June 1, 2010 Poway City Council meeting where they changed the road standards. Note: We ALL love and support the General Plan, let's change it!!! Wait, we haven't really changed it, we've merely amended it. It's a living breathing document, don't you know? It presented the current traffic status of the roads, recommended redefinitions of the roads, and future estimates of the traffic on the roads. It also gave guidelines for bicycle paths, pedestrian paths, etc. Some of the following graphics are extracted from the staff report.The first deals with the current definitions of the roadways and traffic levels.

Sounds ok so far. The existing levels are "outdated" and aren't quite what the HCM (used by all local agencies) defines.

Ok again, let's be consistent with the way these things are done everywhere else in the county.

WAIT A SECOND HERE!!! Given the current levels and definitions from the General Plan, a whopping 46% of the roads FAIL to meet the standards? However, by using a standard that everyone else is using (if everyone jumped off a cliff, would you join them?) suddenly and magically EVERY SINGLE roadway is now in full compliance. Abracadabra, we're now in great shape. Thank GOODNESS for being able to lower our standards in the name of being like everyone else. No sense holding our city to some higher standard when a lower one will give us a 100% success rate, right?

Hold on, there's more. Projected studies of the traffic twenty years into the future (2030), show that ALL of the streets ARE STILL in compliance with the redefined elements. Whew, for a second there I thought they might actually have to FIX the traffic but apparently it's all good now and into the future. Of course it doesn't make a difference that every person you talk to about Poway Road traffic complains that it takes 15 minutes to go a mile. What could they talking about, the traffic studies show that the road is perfect?

So now we can add a Lowe's and a superwalmart because the streets can now handle the traffic, all by merely redefining your success criteria.

Just for information, here's pages showing the traffic levels now to show how wonderful the street system is! So don't complain about the traffic, it's all within acceptable limits, you whiner!

(More to come)