Council Airport Committee - Regular Meeting

Okay. Let's, let's get started. Miss Luciano, are we, online?

Yes. We are.

Okay.

Are we recording?

Yes. We are. I'm here.

Great.

Thank you.

Okay. Welcome, everybody. I'd like to call the meeting to order. This is the council infrastructure and airport committee. This is Thursday, 11/13/2025. It is 05:40, PM, and, we are not at City Hall. We are at the Hayward Executive Airport at 20301 SkyWest Drive. And if I can have miss Feliciano, if you can please take role.

Sure.

Council member Andrews? Present. Council member Syrup? Present. Mayor Salinas?

Present. Thank you. Next is public comment. This is reserved for anybody who would like to make a public comment on something that is not on the agenda. Is there anybody in the room that would like to make a public comment on something that is not on the agenda? I do have public comment cards. I haven't looked at all of them yet, but I'm assuming I know what the item is. Anybody would like to make a public comment on something that is not on the agenda? I see somebody standing up. And, did you fill out a, did you

fill out a

card? Okay.

It say there. So it'd be one of my cards that says public comment on public comment.

I know. But I So What what is your name?

Abiru.

Did you say Bill?

No. Kelly.

Oh, Kelly. I saw that. Kelly. Okay. Got it.

Okay. So I wanna go back on the airport. This is called the Hayward Executive Airport. You should read the sign when you drove in. It said it's Hayward Executive Airport. This is not a social sign social service organization. This does not do charity. This is providing executive services. And I wanna go back in history to ten years ago and talk about the mistakes of the past because people like to forget them. And so just remind you of the stupid mistakes that you made whenever it was, like, ten years ago.

This organization had all these acres of a 100 acres or whatever, SkyWest, and you had people called the park some park district hard. And they were paying you money every year so that they could run a park and mow the lawn and take care of the garbage and and keep everything nice. So then your your agency, your staff decided that that wasn't good enough. They decided that they couldn't they thought they could make more money somewhere else. They told them

to get lost or raise the rent or whatever. They kind of

sent the message to get get rid of them, get rid of the park that was the park agency that was paying the money to run the park for them. Then they they left. And then now this airport has to pay people to go out there and mow the lawn, and you're getting nothing for the rent. So that's how we ended up where we are right now is thanks to the actions or inactions of this this body, you went from a situation where you were sitting there making money and you had clean lawns to where you now have no money coming in monthly, and you have to go out there and cut take care of the lawn yourself. Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay.

Are there any other public comments? I have Alejandro Haso. It says both items.

Yeah. I can say the

Oh, both items on the other thing. Okay. Alright. And I just wanna okay. I think we okay. I think we got it. Is there anybody online that would like to make a public comment on something that is not on the agenda?

I don't have anyone, mayor.

Thank you. So I will close public comments, and then then I'll move on to item number one on reports and action items, which is which is the, SkyWest Properties update and report. And I believe, Alex, our public works director, Alex Amiri, will kick this off, and then I believe we'll move on from Thank

you, Mr. Mayor and council members. The residents here, both San Lorenzo and Saum Hayward, have been asking for updates on SkyWest. So we thought that by having this meeting here, conveniently located here near them, we can provide an update. And as the staff report indicates, I am planning to have a community meeting at the location that is convenient to them in the community to be able to hear more community members and provide information. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor, council members, ladies and gentlemen. I'm Doug McNealy, the airport manager, and I'd like to make a brief presentation this evening about SkyWest Properties in response to the request we've had to bring you up to date. So this is this is the slide that shows the aerial photograph. The SkyWest portion of it, I we have a pointer here?

Okay. Is the yellow up toward the top. That's the 126 acres that we're talking about. So 126 acres, yellow airport property line is at the top that separates the dividing line between Hayward and San Lorenzo. Also note the SkyWest property site is located off the immediate approach end of Runways 10 left and 10 right.

The 18 hole SkyWest golf course opened in 1963. Sublease for the leasehold was assigned to the Hayward Area Recreation of Parks District or Hard in 1975. The sublease was amended on four occasions including extensions with the last extension in 2019 allowing Hard to evaluate whether they wish to continue to operate the golf course. Hard ceased operation of the golf course in September 2020. Next, please.

Here's the latest version of the permitting site plan. I wanna be very clear that this is preliminary. This was just a back of an envelope proposal, and the idea behind it was to provide something for everybody. We have to have the safety areas clear for landing and takeoff, but we included the small hangars, recreational development, a dog park, and then an office a class a office park so that we could provide a variety of things and and get some income. Includes a runway safety area, it's 28 acres, open space is 39 acres, aeronautical development 11 acres, the business development was 41, and there's a buffer zone between the homes and that development of seven acres.

Again, a broad brush, there are other steps that must be completed before this design ever be finalized. And as you can see, there are two areas for recreation. The first is on the western edge with a community park. This could be an extension of the existing San Lorenzo Park. Toward the eastern edge, a buffer between future aeronautical development space for trail for a trail connecting Kennedy Park in San Lorenzo.

And I've mentioned the business park. Next please. From the beginning staff has worked to communicate information about SkyWest redevelopment and receive public input. A consultant managed a series of three public workshops in 2021 on July 27, August 10 and August 12. The plan was also publicly discussed with the council airport committee, the Hayward Youth Commission, the Eden Area Municipal Advisory Council and City Council.

Council approval of the draft preliminary plan occurred on 11/16/2021. By the way, these aerial shots are part of the original workshops, and it shows areas and pinpoints where we received calls from. There were over 700 comments that were received. SkyWest projects included as part of the airport layout plan that's currently underway. The AOP is a document showing current design features and serves as a blueprint for future development.

Any proposed uses at the SkyWest site must first be reviewed and approved by both council and the Federal Aviation Administration. And I mentioned what the two exhibits are there. Next, please. Because the proposed project is on airport property and affects the airport and because the airport influences the project, I'd like to take a moment to talk a minute about the airport and highlight some things that we don't ordinarily talk about, particularly the community benefits. And we have some shots here of the open house highway patrol.

The animals to the right, the dogs are part of 4,000 animals that have come through this airport in recent years. So patrol at the bottom with a cadet, a red emergency helicopter air ambulance, and the puppy spot airplane to the fire lift, brought many of those animals in.

Could you have posted cuter pictures of dogs?

We did our best. Okay. Okay.

I have a question. Can I just interrupt? Can you explain a little bit more about those particular dogs?

Wait. Do I what?

The puppies?

Can you explain more about what why why

Sure. Absolutely. So as as you know, you know, there are natural disasters, hurricanes in particular. I know that was one of the things that brought the animals in. They run away and they're found, and there's no way to connect them unless they're chipped with their owner.

So they fly them around the country to find new homes. And we've brought, as I said a minute ago, and I'm gonna ask Carlos who's the general manager of well, was Meridian now at Signature. Am I right about the total number, Carl? Was it about 4,000? Thanks, Carlos.

Thank you.

So moving on, you know, there's a long list in the report, the staff report. I'm just gonna go over some some of the highlights. So lifesaving missions by air ambulance and search and rescue aircraft. These are professional for profit companies that transport very ill people to get them to the hospital or special specialty centers as quickly as possible. Humanitarian efforts, including free volunteer medical and compassion flights, and as I mentioned, rescue flights.

The airport creates over 300 jobs and generates $4,400,000 annually in fuel, possessory and business taxes. Transportation of airfreight including vital medical supplies, youth groups at the airport that develop leadership and career skills, local flight schools that train the commercial pilots of tomorrow. As you may know, there's a severe shortage of pilots on airlines or parking airplanes on the desert because they don't have enough pilots. Breaking news stories are brought to you by the media aircraft, the helicopters, which we have a picture of here. And aviation education, which would include the annual airport open house, airport tours, and we also visit schools and put on presentations.

The airport does operate under a series of limitations that because we take grant funding from the Federal Aviation Administration requires us to do much of it, but not all of it. For example, the quitclaim deed that, you know, transferred the airport from the federal government to the city of Hayward in 1947 states that the property can only be used for aviation purposes. That was one of the conditions. There was an instrument of release in 1966 that had a number of stipulations, right of passage of airplanes overhead. Noise is permittable, and there's a limit on height limit on trees and other structures in the vicinity of the property.

We are a grant sponsor, and I wanted to talk about what that means for just a minute. When we take money from the federal government, we have to sign a contract each time we do, and the contract has 41 provisions that stipulates that we can do certain things or that we can't. So talking about that for a minute, for example, grand assurance number one, we must comply with all federal regulations, orders, policies, guidelines and requirements. And guidelines include something called advisory circulars. Sometimes people hear that word advisor and they think it means, you know, we have the election to do it or not.

That's not what it means. We have to comply with all of those advisory circulars and there's a lot of them. Grand assurance 19, we can't interfere with the use of the property for airport purposes. For example, that a runway safety area that protects the runways, we can't interfere with that or put things there. Advisory circular or excuse me, number 20, protect terminal airspace, mitigate hazards and prevent future issues.

This would affect the clubhouse and the trees that are out there. 34 mandate the use of FAA standards and completion of all projects. Also in addition to the FAA Caltrans, the California Transportation Department inspects the airport annually using FAA standards and including part 77, which regulates the height of structures and trees around the airport. And finally, the Alameda County Airport Land Use Committee uses state standards, we also have to work with them. So there are a number of limitations that we have to live with here.

In terms of land use, density land density can be an issue near airports. Land density at SkyWest must be carefully evaluated to conform with Caltrans and FAA standards. And for that reason, should be given to limiting recreational amenities. Secondary treated water was used for irrigation and filling in ponds. Secondary treatment water only approved for use on a golf course.

So if it becomes anything other than a golf course, it requires drinking water lines to be installed for irrigation to move forward. Staff looked into estimated costs. We have we're fortunate to have people on staff who have worked for example on the La Vista Park and we've used other we have other sources as well that we use to get this information. So I'm just gonna briefly go over this, and there are significant costs associated with the design, construction, and maintenance of a recreational park area. So these costs are preliminary and cannot be finalized until the site plan for the SkyWest properties is approved.

But the total estimated cost of design and construction is $53,800,000 Annual maintenance is estimated at $3,900,000 So you can see again, I'm not going to read each and every word, but the description of the areas we looked at project design, environmental assessment, park renovations, perimeter fencing, and domestic water installation totaling that amount. Estimated estimated cost continued. So lease maintenance costs, lease rent, and that's at a dollar 18 per square foot per year, 46 acres, that's $2,300,000. We'll have to get new equipment, $70,000. The water, $8.64.

Electricity, 25,000. Tree care, $260,000 with a five man crew. Small tools and equipment, security, weed and road and abatement, and so forth totaling $3,900,000. So this project would have no adverse impact to the general fund, no impact to measure c, potential long term benefits to the general fund through various taxes, revenue to the airport to offset the hard losses. You know, if you look at what we could rent this for at the dollar 18 per square foot compared to the $140,000 approximately that we were getting from hard, we've got some ground to make up in terms of rent.

Revenue to maintain the airport infrastructure, revenue to help offset the SkyWest maintenance, and airport funding for all of this. You know, we have robbed Peter to pay Paul. We have taken from other accounts to get the money, to take care of tree maintenance, take care of cutting, and, you know, the general functions that we we have out there. Next, please. Economic impact, briefly, for tradespeople during construction, work for maintenance workers after construction, employment opportunities, which we expect to be significant, further Hayward presence as a tech leader, and also potential increase in overall economic activity.

So SkyWest summary, what I've I've gone over. Development costs and limitations are are consideration. Fiscal impact and site maintenance, the runway safety area, runway protection zones have to be protected, and we have to have those for the airport. I talked about the quick claim limitations, the instrument release limitations, FAA grant assurances, Caltrans limitations, Alameda land use committee, and FAA approval is required. Both the council is required and FAA approval is required to move forward.

Next. So next steps. As Alex mentioned, we're going to hold another community meeting. Workshops and more to the ones we did before, those were done in 2021. It's now 2025, and it's time to do more.

So we're going to gonna move forward with that. This public meeting was was SEAC, obviously. We're going to present an updated site plan to council, meet with the FAA to discuss the SkyWest site plan, present FAA comments to council, initiate environmental review, submit the updated airport layout plan to the FAA, and then after that, refine the design concepts with further input. Again, I'm gonna end up where I started off. The plan that we have, there's some sort of misunderstanding sometimes that this is a plan that's in stone. It is not. And we're welcoming other comments. We want community output. We've been getting a lot at the meetings, and we want more. Okay?

Not less. We want more to incorporate your ideas. Next. That's my presentation. Questions?

Thank you. What I'm gonna do there's an echo out in the hallway. Okay. What I'm gonna do is I'm gonna go straight to public comment first. And then after the committee hears everything, then we're gonna come back and then ask questions. But we wanna first hear from, the from the neighborhood.

But before we start, is anybody cold

in this room? I just wanna

get a quick check. Okay.

Maybe I'm just, like, direct me in front of the AC.

I got it. Thank you.

Just a little bit down. A little

Okay. And before before I go to comment cards, I I I just wanna just sort of make some introductory remarks just real brief. One is I appreciated director or our airport manager, McNeely, for emphasizing that we we don't have a project. The prod you know? And we're still listening to people.

This is a list a listening sec session. We're not starting construction tomorrow. We're not starting construction next month, and what we are doing is listening. There will be more meetings after this one. And and so I just really wanted to emphasize that because, I have observed some, you know, online activity where, there is comment out there.

There's a myth that we're starting to build something, you know, in January or something. So we're not. Secondly, what I wanna say about public comment, I know that this is a spirited item that's confronting the neighborhood. I get it. We all get it.

We've been listening to feedback. We have been listening to the neighborhood come to meetings and and address us. What I would like for us to do is please be respectful. We understand that, you know, all of you many of you feel very passionate about this. But I also just wanted to emphasize that we're listening.

We're human too. And so when, you know, when people say things to us, we feel it. And and I just I just wanna emphasize that, you know, we we really wanna keep this spirit of collaboration, spirit of working together, and and let's do something right. I I do believe something can be done, and and and I'm hopeful. And so okay? So with that said, I will go to our first speaker, and it would be Steve Wiley.

Thank you. My name is Steve Wiley. I live in Hayward. And I just wanna ask you and who are any anyone else who will listen to leave this as open space. Open space is precious. Once it's lost, it's gone forever. To to develop this space is gonna increase the effect of the heat island impact, and cutting down the trees that are there and not adding more will will create a carbon debt. And I just wanna let people know that.

Thank you. Thank you. And, thank you for not taking all three minutes. Next speaker is, is it Yadi Gomez? Yari? Yari. Okay. Yari, come on up.

Hello. My name is Yari, and I'm a junior in high school currently, and I live in San Lorenzo. I have lived in San Lorenzo all my life, and, I've been and I walked in SkyWest all throughout my childhood. I cherish SkyWest very much so. And I don't want SkyWest to be under put under development because not only does it hold memories, not only for me, but my family and as well as the San Lorenzo and Hayward community as well.

And it holds, natural wildlife and environments that I feel like our community should be able to experience as a whole, and destroying it would just remove that ability that's open to our entire community. We should keep it preserved for our community, for families, for people who love SkyWest and who have been through it like I have. And we just want, SkyWest as an open space. Thank you.

Thank you. Great job. Our next speaker is Liz Dennis.

Yeah.

Welcome.

Hi there.

Speak you. Thank you.

Hi there. This is my not my nature to get up and speak, although I have been at meetings before. And I have

passed this

came off the podium. I have passed this out before. This is my son, a wild lamb firefighter. The second photograph here, I have lots that my son has showed me to the point where I don't wanna see them anymore. Okay. Park fire, photo taken by Joel and his crew. Toll, complete, echo, nothing. No insects. No birds. Everything is gone.

This fire burned 429. 603 acres were burned. California in '2 2024 had 8,110 wildland fire heights. The total for just the year of 2024 was 1,077,711 acres burned. I am really passionate to see this acreage, 126 acre with the Monarch butterflies that I've been walking there and they're beautiful remain.

It's wilding and leave it wild. I did one. You can go to mytree.itreetools.org. I did one pine tree and the effect of that one pine tree and what it's doing at SkyWest that's over 20 years old. And that's some information that's in there.

I just wanted to say that the airport, you know, does community benefit things and it will continue to do this community benefit things, whether SkyWest is wild, whether it builds something there, which I hope you don't. We need the open space and not just the park. We need it to remain wild. I want to ask you guys, how much does it cost for you to cut that lawn there?

Ms. Dennis, staff cannot comment on questions from public comment. Sorry. But question noted.

Okay. Thank you very much. That's it. Please keep it. Let it remain wild. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Our next speaker is Jade Ocampo. Yeah.

Good evening. I'm Jiro Campo, a junior at Arroyo High School, and I'm also here representing SOS SkyWest to speak on saving SkyWest's open space for our community. Our online petition has over 2,000 signatures and a strong group of people of all ages from youth to adults fighting for this land to be open space. And there are professors and college students from Chabot and Cal State East Bay, even teachers and high school students from Moreau, Arroyo, Kipp, Hayward High, Eslazy, and other high schools who are who have, like, showed up at this meeting currently, if you look in the crowd, who want to save this land as open space. And we are gonna continue fighting for this land to stay as open space for our community because we feel we have many memories memories that we cherish in this land, and we wanna preserve the wildlife living there as well.

So please safe sky with open space. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker is, Kelly Abrea. I

looked at this report, and it is beyond belief. It is numbers are just ludicrous. Anyone who's read numbers for example, we heard the constraints that are being issued, like as if the FAA tells you how to run your airport. FAA doesn't do that. Is very permissive.

That's all over the country. The constraint that, oh, we only have secondary treated water. Your council just approved, or at least your planning commission just approved, a data center with 77 megawatts at Eden Landing, and you had to put in a 12 inch water line to fill it up with Hetch Hetchy water to pump to the data center. Why don't you make them take secondary treated water? You why'd you give them the best water in Northern in on Earth?

Why why are they getting because they'll pay is probably why. Let's talk about what what are the wrong with the numbers in here in this report? Why am I making casting illusions, criticizing your your crazy accounting methods? You know, you in here, it says that you've got $77,000,000 worth of potential revenue from a lease, And that would be spread out over fifty years. And that's 1 and a half million dollars a year. A times b equals c, you know, 1.5 times whatever. That's not how you do math. Have you guys ever heard of of time value of money? A present value? Do you have any accountants?

If you do that, do run it into run it pull out a calculator, find an accountant, put put in the interest rate, put in the fifty years, do an amortization. What are you gonna find? Is it gonna be $50,000,000 or no. $77,000,000? No. It's gonna turn down to 28,000,000. 28,000,000 and the per year value is, of course, a lot a lot less because this is not you you don't just take your house payment and then multiply it out and say, oh, I I have a $10,000,000 house. No. Your house is $1,000,000 or whatever it is because you have to pay interest on this and there's a thing called time value of money. That's how you do these calculations.

This idea of just throwing out the raw numbers without amortizing is insane. And that is it's like the accounting one zero one, the first sin. And then another classic thing. $54,000,000 for a park, a 100 acre whatever, 40 acre park. There is a park district here and there are people here who work for the park district or represent the park district. The Hayward Area Recreation District, they've got parks all over the place. They've got probably more than 40 acres worth of parks. They've got employees. They've got expenses. They've got a budget.

You know how much money they spend in a year for their whole operation? They run a whole city several cities worth of parks for $44,000,000 a year. And you're telling me that one park is gonna cost 54? Are we gonna is this Disneyland? What this is this is an unbelievable, the numbers that

are in this report. Maria.

Thank you.

Yeah. Thank you. Our next speaker is Melissa Milliman. Melissa? Oh. Yeah. Of course. From the KeyPay with Cleaning Green task force. Or Commission. Commission. That's right.

I'm still doing the cage CJ versus CBC myself. Hi. Thank you. Melissa here. Thank you, council members and mayor and directors and managers for, hearing us tonight.

First, I would like to say I am actually really thrilled to because the previous, infrastructure meeting I was at, mister Mary did say that he would get us an update report. So I'm really glad that this is happening tonight to be more informed. And that there's a possible, gonna be another, community forum to look at this plan. Because, yes, this is from 2021, and I'm telling you, I think about this a lot and think about designing my own site plan. SOS SkyWest.

Of course, I am a proponent as well of keeping the whole 126 acres green. But if there had to be a compromise, I think that with community input, SOS SkyWest, our desires to keep I don't think, people that are supporting keeping it fully green have ever thought of it as being a manicured park like Kennedy Park or Vista Park, that it's gonna be, more of a wild natural environment supporting the habitat that already exists there. And that is is coming back to that area because it isn't a manicured park anymore, because it isn't a golf course. So I think there are possibilities and I mean, of course, I don't want to compromise. I want it to stay all green, But if we have to collaborate, let's do it.

And I am actually happily reassured that you are listening and you have told us you're listening. And let's be the heart of Hayward that I know it to be, and be an example of the human race that can collaborate and listen to each other because we got a lot of that not happening right now. I would like to see these numbers where we have a business development, 47 acres, reverse, and open space be that number instead of 24. But that can all come out in community a community event. Please let everybody that signed up tonight, mister O'Meary, mister director, please let us know when that community forum is happening.

Because I think you will have a lot of thoughtful, intelligent feedback. And, you know, I think we can I think we can make it happen and sort of satisfy everybody's goals? So, anyway, thank you for hearing me.

Thank you. Our next speaker is, is it Maria Potts? Yeah.

Hello. I'm Maria Potts, and I'm a student over at Chabot College. I'm also a part of SOS SkyWest. Our we're really hoping to keep this space open for everybody. I have had the opportunity of going out and actually speaking with community members and interacting with people all around Hayward, and I have never once heard anybody tell me that they don't wanna see this as open space.

Expanding the airport would really just not be beneficial for the community that lives nearby. It would increase noise pollution and just pollution in general, which would harm their health. Keeping an open space would really benefit their mental health and just health in general as well as the environment that lives there. So we are just really hoping to keep an open space. Thank you.

Thank you. Our next speaker is is it Dolan Moss? Dalen. I'm sorry. Apologies.

I can barely say my own name.

So

Sorry. Hi. I don't do this often or at all. I just wanna say that SkyWest, we've walked walked around it a couple times. And every single time we've been there, there has been multiple people walking with their kids or with their dogs or just by themselves singing to themselves. That's happened a couple times too.

And it just seems

that every time we talk, we've also been to different flea markets that Hayward has done and to have signatures done for SOS SkyWest. And every time we've had people come up to us and be like, What is this about? And when we explain, they're all for it. They're all for keeping this in open space and they want to see it stay this way for their community because it's so different from a park that's has concrete and different plastics in it too that make up, these playgrounds. But SkyWest in itself is just nature. It's just nature. And I think we should try to keep it that way. Thank you for listening. Sorry.

Thank you. Next is Mimi Dean.

Hello, everybody. I'm Mimi Dean, and I'm here to talk a little bit about SkyWest tonight. So I really appreciate the fact that I got taken on a very lovely tour yesterday by somebody that they drove me around in their truck, and we got to see what was going on at SkyWest. So that was cool. But I have to say that there's a lot of things we really need to talk about with SkyWest, right?

Like the fact that we're talking about getting more public outreach, that's totally incredible. But I want to remind us that the old public outreach, almost every single person that put in public outreach last time said they wanted open space. Nobody said they wanted any more asphalt or development. And I get it. It looks like the airport is doing really good things. How can we argue with a plane load of puppies? Come on. I can't argue with that. Right? But it's not about for us, it's not about making the airport into this evil entity.

For us, it's about the things that we have here, the beauty of the open space, the habitat, the number one overwintering site for monarch butterflies in the whole East Bay, number five site in the state of California. That's pretty ding dang important in my book. Then we've got the western pond turtles, California's only native turtle. And I know that they are not ready to sliders because I am working with the resource conservation district, and I send them pictures of the turtles. And we know that they are Western pond turtles.

So preserving the open space not only for the butterflies, for the turtles, for the people in this community. I know we did a study. I saw the study about the open space the other night, 57 acres of open space per thousand people. Well, maybe that's true. But when you count, like, the water at Eden Landing and you count the Pleasanton Ridge and all these regional parks and you count it as a whole entity of Hayward, but you don't look at it by census tract.

And we know that this census tract here, the A Street Longwood corridor, we know that this corridor has less than a third of an acre of open space per thousand residents. And you know what? We might not have all the money that the people in the hills have, but you know what? We deserve to have open space too. So we'd like to keep it in open space. I love the idea that we're gonna get hard at the table. Right? This is Hayward's Park District. They're the unincorporated communities park district. We've been working with East Bay Regional Park District as well.

I know there's some philanthropists interested in giving us money to help make this into open space. I'd like to say before we go to the FAA with any more plans, I really think we need to do some kind of environmental review. We need to do CEQA. We can't just be going to the FAA before we do a total analysis of what's out there and what there is to save. Not the the habitat, the humans, all of it. I'm done. Not Thank really.

Thank you. Next speaker is Alejandro Ojaso.

Hi, everyone. Thank you so much. And I'm Alejandro Haso, a local resident. I'm also part of Bike Hayward. And part of our goal, when we advocate for, bikes is about making sure that we use our space efficiently so that we can have, you know, more space for people, for nature.

And so this is a a very important problem for us. I mean, I do understand that here, the core of the problem is the the requirement by the FAA to lease this land as a market value. So that's the root of the problem here. And, however, like, I think we can, like, do a better compromise, versus instead of the 50 acre business park that is proposed, we could do more of, a hybrid recreational model. And we have a an example which is across the bay by the San Francisco Airport.

There's a there's a there's a top golf, and that's that land is leased. It's thirteen thirteen acres, and it's leased for $1.1500000.0 dollars. So that could be a compromise, which does not require the same amount of land as is proposed in the plan, but still generates plenty of revenue that could meet that requirement of leasing this at the market rate. So we you know, potentially, you could also add other mixed uses that could generate more revenue to meet that 2.2 2,360,000. But, yeah, I just you know, putting in a business center there, it would make it impossible to ever recover that land if we put a top golf or something like that.

Maybe once the federal government looks into this requirement and perhaps in the future, if they add an exemption for public parks, we could recover that land just by the Topgolf. But putting there a business center, that would definitely eliminate any chances of recovering this precious land. So I just make sure you consider this option. And, you know, we have an example just across the bay by the San Francisco Airport. So that's an that's another alternative to make sure that we meet these requirements. So thank you.

Thank you. Our next speaker is Aileen Mangan.

We silenced.

Couldn't hear you. Sorry. That's okay.

Hello, everybody. My name is Aileen Mangan. I'm currently a high schooler at Kip King, and I would like to submit a statement on behalf of SkyWest. So first of all, I just wanna say that this space means a lot to me. I want people to have access to the space so that, like, families, communities, kids, they can play.

And I don't believe that infrastructure is needed or should be used as revenue as that as somebody just said. And, also, it shouldn't it shouldn't be places where western pond turtles and monarch butterflies are put at risk. And then I want us to prioritize our community. Instead of private jets and people who don't live here, if we don't protect the space, then we'll be facing an environmental disparity. From someone who grew up having to drive 20 miles away just to access open space, I know that youth will be discouraged from this inaccessibility.

We must vote on future generations and for families and and yours to go and exercise and have fun in this open space. Let's look at Oakland. They currently have 3.7 acres of land per thousand residents, and we only have 0.33. That should say something. We have people, families, and species that we could be protecting. Haywood will be a place of friendship and livelihood. Let's make policies that preserve our home. Thank you.

Thank you. Our next speaker is Luis Andrade, director Andrade.

Thank you. This Lou Andrade. I'm with the Park District. I'm a board member, and I've been in the Park District for a while. This the the cost estimates of of a park. And the question is, we haven't been at the table as to is how you derive the park cost of development. I think the using the well, this the park as a as a model, I think, is way off because it's a hilly side with lots of seismic problems and water problems. And it's been nine years and nothing's been built there yet. And this is a flat site, has its own problems, but it's a different animal. And the other question is what kind of park do you want?

People are asking for what you might call a rustic park. We don't have too many examples of that, but we can do a rustic park, which has fewer amenities and more wildlife values. That site has potential for trail connections that they wanna build across the way. The levee, what do you call it? The horizontal levee. Right? And there may be some opportunity to connect with that. Also a trail, bicycle trail between San Lorenzo and directly to the industrial park where people wouldn't have to go through Hesperian. There's potential for that. And also a trail to Kennedy Park.

So there's there's some potential there. So I don't see though that we're gonna pay a dollar 18 a square foot as an annual lease for the for the parkland. And I don't I think if you wanna do a park, it's just gonna be it's gonna be a cost. You know? That's what it is.

And it's meeting the constituents' needs if that's what your value is. You know? But I'm not gonna take a position on the development of it, but there may be a way to compromise and get some good park value out of that and also some value or some with Kennedy Park or some really nice coexistence that could really happen, can help each other out. So we'll be happy to to speak with with you and and help develop the estimates and such. Okay. Thank you.

Thank you. Okay. That's all the cards I have here, and I know there are there any speakers online?

I do have one, mayor, or two right now.

Okay. First speaker?

Let me allow him to talk. Tyler? Go ahead, please. Can you unmute yourself?

Yes. Hi. I hope you can hear me. Yeah. Hi, everyone. You know, puppy propaganda, how could how can we compete? Thanks for including all those, you know, nice cute dogs. But there's someone else that had a cute dog, if you remember, and that was the Grinch. And so it doesn't necessarily mean that the destruction of SkyWest is altruistic. I think that we need to really know that SkyWest is this once in a lifetime opportunity to preserve four generations.

And I really want us to think about I mean, we've we've been sold this before. Right? Like, citizens of Hayward have been told this. Just build a gas plant. That's gonna help city finances.

Right? The data center. Well, now now that's gonna be really the thing that is going to solidify city finances. You know, back a couple generations ago, was like, well, you know, if we destroy Russell City, that's gonna be the ticket to wealth for the city of Hayward. So just like over and over again, these what turns out to be empty promises by the Hayward bureaucracy and and this and the city council, I mean, like, how many times do you expect us to believe, like, this is gonna be our golden meal ticket to forever financial, wealth?

Right? So, I mean, Alex, you say this is an enterprise. The the airport is just so important and it's so important. It makes so much money that the only way it could survive is if we bulldoze the entire portion that includes a a an endangered, an endangered species. Like, it it doesn't make any it doesn't make much sense.

Right? So if the airport is so lucrative, why do we why do we actually need to do this? So what I want us to think about is, like, respecting Hayward Shore. We need to do that, and we need to put that as first priority. And also, council members, I would like you to direct your staff to more creative solutions for budgetary woes.

I mean, what's happening at at Southland? Right? Like, Southland is literally a a block north of Hispereum Boulevard and Winton Avenue, which used to be called Russell City, Boulevard, by the way. So, I mean, there is development space. Taking this away from, residents of the city of Hayward, there will be election consequences for it.

I'm done. Thank you. Next speaker.

Carl, can you unmute yourself, please?

Sure. Hello. My name is Carl. I live in Hayward, Downtown Hayward, Cog Orange. Imagine Hayward having its very own Golden Gate Park. That's what I like, the sound of of the space, what I think of the space. We already have amenities at nearby parks, so let's keep it keep this area all green and natural. Please don't pave it over. Please do add bike a bike route to the Bay Trail, and, let's have our own very own Golden Gate Park. Let's work with East Bay Parks to keep it green. And as far as I can tell, the community has spoken unanimously in favor of keeping it green. So thank you.

Thank you. Are there any more calls?

Next speaker, Lana.

Go

ahead, please.

Hi. This is Lana Cross. Thank you for the time today. Thank you to the Hayward City Council for representing the people here today. I'm a San Lorenzo homeowner. I was born and raised in the city, left to San Francisco, and bought my first home here with my husband about five years ago. Just really want to congratulate all the people here today and the young folks for speaking out to represent your community. I know that we have two different folks here today. We've got the city council that represent the people, and we've got the airport that your stakeholders, they're looking for revenue. So what my hope is is that city council members, the mayor, that you truly do represent the people, your constituents.

You're hearing it all today. I hear it walking around San Lorenzo at the coffee shops. We don't want this space developed. I live toward the duck pond, and I could hear the private jets at 2AM. I understand they're not supposed to fly over the community, but they do. They have no problem with the fine. It's no issue. I know that Hayward Airport, you all are here doing your job. I get it. Revenue at the end of the day is what keeps you guys employed and what keeps you operating. But Hayward City Council, we do not want this. The mayor of Hayward, we do not want this. No one in the community does. And so I love hearing about San Francisco Park. Let's think of Central Park.

Yes. Maybe there's more revenue there that can be driven out, but the community is more important. So please preserve this. For all the kids that spoke up today, way to go. You guys are incredible. Let's keep advocating. Thank you all for letting me speak today.

Thank you. We

have four more, Amir. Let's see. Let's go to Joan, please.

Hello. My name is Paul Spector. I'm in that parking lot. I wanna remind everybody that that kind of area is where children need to go to communicate with their own environment and the entire system we live in, and it's missing in most places. It's a real gem.

It's undervalued. The airport produces a lot of problems in the local neighborhood. I think they owe it to the neighborhood to be a positive influence on life, not just for the next year or for the next ten years. That'll be there for a hundred years, hundreds of years potentially. This affects everyone's future. The quality of life of people around us in San Leandro and the entire area is at stake with this. I don't see why anyone would harm a single blade of grass in that beautiful place. Thank you.

Thank you.

Alright.

Next we have

Eric.

Go ahead, Eric.

Hi. Good evening. Sorry. I'm not there in person. Thanks for for having this meeting and bringing us these updates. It's very helpful and and, encouraging to continue to to talk about this. I wanna just echo a few sentiments that were already stated and suggest some new creative alternatives that we might consider. I agree. I think it was Mimi who said this. Maybe it was Melissa.

I don't think anyone's the villain in this. I think this is just a amazing opportunity to collaborate, to work together, to create opportunities for for our youth and our our community. And I'd like to just offer I can't speak on behalf of Chabot College itself, but as a faculty member there, I'd like to offer my capacity to support community engagement efforts. I teach hundreds of our community members every year, and I have very passionate students who would love to to participate in in these conversations and support these efforts as well. And as you know or may not know, but we recently purchased the Moore Fry property, and we intend to build a sustainability program and a sustainability center there where we can train the next generation of sustainable leaders, many of whom I could already tell are in that room, which I wish I was there.

And this would be an amazing opportunity to have a space for them to go out, do ecological studies, you know, with all of the the marsh land that's being restored, the horizontal levee, the St. Lawrence Of Creek Way, there's real opportunities to make Hayward a leader in sustainability and environmental justice. And if anyone's the villain here, like, let's turn this into an opportunity to push back against Trump, who's cutting everything, anti climate. Like, this is this is our moment to to rise up with all the other cities that are presenting at COP thirty, in Brazil right now, all the amazing work that cities are doing across the world. We can we can situate ourselves and position ourselves to be one of those leaders.

So thank you very much. I look forward to further conversations and engaging my students in this work.

Thank you. Next caller.

We have Elena. Go ahead, please.

Hi. How are you doing? My name is Elena. I'm resident of Hayward and homeowner and voter of my entire household, as well. And we are you know, we're similar to what we've just heard before. Every single one of us want an open space. We wanna be able not to drive far away from our homes than go to recreate and drive the bikes and walk our dog and see the beautiful puppies not only being rescued, but just walked around and ran around and just throwing his sticks around. Not many places look like that. If you would walk in Hayward, there's so much concrete. You know?

And we have to drive in the traffic. And I I just wanna say I agree with everybody who said that they are for open space. I would like to see a better plan and more specifics on that and also how the future plan future park maintenance costs were evaluated because that is kind of just a number. I mean, I love puppies, but that's just a number. It didn't make sense.

I would like to see clarification and how that was calculated. I'm really to see I'm really happy to see that Howard is joining, and I'm really happy. I just wanna see state another example as probably everybody knows that there's Palo Alto Airport Executive. And while being a very successful airport, guess what? They have next to them.

They they have a golf course and open space where people love to come. So, you know, there's there's still a shore available for people where people can enjoy, do the bird watching, do recreate, swim, sailboard, and there's still airport, and there is still golf course. So this is totally possible without much of the compromising. And I think that the business park being that close to the shoreline, which supposed to belong to public, is actually just it's not nice because as soon as the, you know, business park close off, that area becomes injured. If you will try to go to Coyote Hills and, access one of those trails in Hayward business area, that's kind of scary because nobody's there.

It's absolutely abandoned. I don't think anybody would enjoy to recreate close to the business center like that. I'm sorry. So but, yeah, thank you for everyone speaking out, and I'm happy to see Hayward coming together. You.

Thank you. Next caller.

I have one more. Caitlin, go ahead, please.

Hi. Good evening. My name is Caitlin True, and I'm I am a resident of Union City. However, I do go to school at Chabot College. And the reason why I wanted to speak today is because I've had the privilege to have amazing professors and amazing classes.

Like, for example, professor Eric has opened my eyes about why it's really important that we should protect the environment and why it's important that we should think of ourselves as coexisting together. And I've also had the opportunity to be a student for professor Salinas who teaches ethnic studies, and I believe that both of their values has also shaped my advocacy. And, going back to me being a resident of Union City, I had the privilege to go to Coyote Hills as a kid and go on all these different field trips to recreational parks. And I think that that's something that I would want other generations to have even if it's just not in my area. I still believe that we're all part of a greater community and not just with people, but also coexisting with our animals and the plants that live there.

And I hope that this plan can be reconsidered and that the voices of the people, are gonna be heard out today. And I just hope that, everybody will have a different view on how we can create a better, environment with ourselves, with each other, and, for the future. Thank you.

Thank you. And I hope you're well, Caitlin.

That's all I have. Great.

Yeah. We're good.

Okay. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. That was good. Appreciate that. Now I'd like to come up to counsel and see who wants to go first. You

go? Okay.

Thank you all for coming out tonight. I'm happy that we were able to coordinate this meeting as it was requested in a previous infrastructure meeting. Also, thank you to all the callers that called in. Just wanted to talk a little bit about some of the the comments I heard. Didn't think puppies would be controversial tonight, but apparently, are.

So just wanted to acknowledge the the canine companions. They do a lot of great work across the country. So that is simply the reason why it was mentioned. I've actually adopted did a foster of one of those puppies and had to drop it off at Hayward Airport. And so I just wanted to say that's the reason why it was mentioned.

It wasn't to discourage anyone, okay? Wanted to also talk a little bit about some of the comments I heard. I felt like a lot of the comments were a lot more collaborative tonight. And I think that is the key that we need to start thinking about is collaboration. I just wanna remind everyone that this is a closed golf course facility. And I keep hearing that it's a park. And I understand it's open space, yes. But I am concerned about minors entering this facility unauthorized. And I get this is public space. I totally get it.

But just if the parents or the guardians of these children are walking in this facility to please just coordinate with the city staff. I do not want anything bad to happen to anyone. There's there's things that are not being maintained. There are people who are unauthorized in there. And I just wanna make sure you're getting escorted if you are looking at this facility.

So I wanna reiterate, if there's children walking around this location, to please work with the guardians and work with the city staff. I just don't want any liability issues to happen. Okay? The other comments that I heard was one was very specific of mentioning a top golf, so I don't know where that idea entered the psyche of some folks, but I know that it is something that I've been interested in terms of looking at as recreation space, but also a way to benefit in terms of attract bringing more attractions to the city and looking at different types of uses we can use instead of some of the things that we've been reviewing previously. I also want to talk a little bit about coordination with HEART.

I see there's a few HEART board members here tonight. We have director Lamney. We have director Andrade. We have director Hatcher was here earlier. He's still here? Okay. Yep. There. Here you go. So I just I I do I am concerned about the estimates that we're receiving.

I am concerned about just budget in general and just making sure that we are working with our agency partners in terms of costing. I am interested in hearing more about wild the the term wild and what does that look like. I think the city has done a great job on linear park and creating native landscaping, but also I'm concerned about the cost of even native landscaping. Some people are looking at native landscaping as more intensive in terms of maintenance. So I do think we should just figure out what that balance is in terms of cost for native versus the other types of spaces.

Because I'm also concerned about putting in a dog park and an astroturf park because that's also a lot of maintenance, and that can also cost the city a lot. So I think there could be a possibility of keeping it more nature based, so I am interested in that. There was also another comment about the Monarch Colony, and I do want to see more of that research come to the infrastructure committee. If even though they're migratory, I wanna make sure that we are not doing anything that's gonna impact the any kind of colony. I would like to see more information of is there a way we can design around it?

Is there something that we can do to preserve it? I think that's also a possibility. I think the other comments about connecting with other parks. There was a horizontal levee sea level rise tour that we we did take with East Bay Discharges Authority and save the bay. Maybe we can get their feedback on this area and see what we can do in terms of working with them as a partnership.

There's opportunities to connect with the state for proposition four funding to see if we can do anything with that type of funding to help either preserve the space or look at how to make this more of a nature based have a nature based approach. There was also a comment about Southland Mall. We do not own Southland Mall. I just wanna put that out there. City of Hayward does not own Southland Mall. That is a different

property owner.

Okay? Now it the area is impacted by the airport distances, but I just wanna make sure the public is not misinformed there. And I would say we should have more regular updates on what's happening with this location. I think 2021, obviously, we were in the middle of a pandemic, and I think outreach was a concern during that time. And so now we do have the opportunity to meet in person again.

We have the opportunity to meet with the community more regularly. So I think we should be thinking about a schedule of how often we're going to meet with the community, what does community participation look like? And I think it's a way for us to come together. I do want to acknowledge the initial acres versus revised acres. It has been drastically reduced so far.

I know to some it's not enough, I understand that. But just wanna acknowledge that there have been efforts here into decreasing the runway safety zones, business development space, and the open space has been increasing. So I think, again, if we can continue to work together, figure out a solution, make sure we find some balance, I think that'll be the best pathway. Thanks.

Thank you. Great, man. Thanks.

First of all, thank you to everyone who showed up tonight. I know it's a lot to ask if folks come after a long day of work to share their thoughts on an open space, but this is important to all of us, to our staff, to the community. So thank you to everyone's here and also who's online. I am appreciative as well of the the spirit of collaboration that I think we're we're developing in this moment. And so with that in mind, I I do have a a few questions I wanna work through with staff and a few comments. So the revised acreage, are these new numbers? So the plan that you held up earlier, the revised acres that are in the staff report, that's different than what's in that visual. Is that correct? Yes. Okay. And when were these revised numb is this the first time these revised numbers have been made public?

No. Okay. Yeah.

Can you turn it on?

There you go.

Can you hear me now?

Yes. Perfect. Thank you.

Yeah. We've we've been through at least two iterations, and that plan is is really as as initial as it could possibly get. Nothing's in stone. We can move this around, move that around. You know? And so the numbers, yes, I believe those numbers have been out there, but you raised a fair question. You know? Do they match up with the diagram exactly? And the answer is probably not

Okay.

Because of these different iterations.

Okay. So just so the community, in my, even from my own knowledge, can be on board with what it looks like with this revised acreage, I think a second draft, even if it's conceptual, is is helpful for us to understand the direction the city might be moving in. So we're we're moving the conversation forward.

As stated, you know, we are listening. Yeah. And we you know, when the question was raised about the runway protection zone

Mhmm.

And and is it really that large Mhmm. You know, we we dug in and got the exact dimensions and changed Yeah. The diagram. Yeah. The same with and so that extra space was dedicated to open space

Yeah.

For example. So we're working in that direction. We're listening and and trying to, you know, do what we can.

I I understand, and I'm I'm happy to see

these revised numbers. And I think there's still more work we can do here, but having a visual, I think, would be helpful. Okay. Thank you. And then I'm seeing the percentage of usable space out of 98 acres. Correct me if I'm wrong. The the the acreage of the whole SkyWest is a bit larger than 98 acres. So what's A what

126.

So what accounts for this difference of

The the protection areas there.

Okay. So that's out that's different than the runway zone which is in here.

There's there's there's two things. There's the runway safety area Okay. And the runway protection zone. Okay. And and in fairness, this usually comes up. Mhmm. And and the two are almost right on top of each other.

Understood.

Right? Okay.

So one one is the runway protection zone is a little further away from the runway and so on. They're both 500 feet wide.

Okay. So It's because these percentages are making the assumption that the protection zone is a nonnegotiable with the FAA. Is that correct?

That is correct.

Okay. But the safety zone, it seems like we

do have a little bit of wiggle room.

Not really. I mean, both of those because they're right on top of each other Yeah. I mean, they're almost not exactly, but almost the same shape and size and everything. No. One is intended to protect airplanes should they have an overshoot or an under dispute. They have a place to go. Yeah. And one is intended intended, excuse me, to protect people

Okay.

In in the area.

I I understand that. Just when I'm looking at 36 acres dropping to 28 with the safety zone, it's it does seem like we were able to to make some adjustments there, though.

Absolutely. Well, there is there is let me reassure you. There is written guidance from the FAA. Yeah. That that states exactly what it's supposed to be. Yeah. Again, and I'm not trying to be an apologist here, but, in all seriousness, the diagram was not was never intended to be a a construction drawing.

Yeah.

You know? It's it's just a concept to show people what the thinking was. That's all.

Understood. Understood. So I'll I'll keep an eye out for the updated visual just so we can get a sense of Sure.

Where we're

progressing. Someone had asked earlier what current costs are. In our staff report, it says the annual expenses for maintenance and security from the city are over $200,000 from the airport's capital improvement budget. So this airport sorry. SkyWest is costing the city funds at the moment to maintain water, to maintain maintenance, and, I'm sure everyone understands that's the impetus for figuring out how do we generate some revenue off it, of but I just wanted to answer that question for the community.

One of the airport limitations says that no structure, object, or tree makes see the certain height above mean sea level. So I guess my question is for either the the safety area or the protection zone, does it need to be completely flattened? Or if we achieve this requirement of just making sure we don't exceed a certain height, are we okay? And and if that height is two inches, then, you know, maybe I I just don't know what the height is, and I'm wondering what flexibility we have here. Sure. Yeah.

Let me let me explain. The the what you're quoting Mhmm. I believe was either from the claim deed or the another document. Instrument of release. Customer release. When we what we lose today, and these these standards are always evolving. So in terms of the height around the airport, it comes from Federal Aviation Administration part 77.

Okay.

And that that addresses objects near the airport.

Mhmm.

And I wish I'd known about this because if I had, I would have brought out a a model we have of this airspace, but it's very complicated. Yeah. Different angles and so forth. Yeah. But it's there's a there's a logic to it. Yeah. You know, it has a different shape that comes down differently off the ends of the runways because, obviously, the planes have to come all the way down. Mhmm. And every year, we're inspected by Caltrans. Mhmm. And every year, they go out on the runways with a instrument they call a photo slope. Mhmm. And they take a look and see which which if anything might be going into the protected airspace. Right? Yeah.

The eucalyptus trees that are over here, I'll give you a con an actual example. Mhmm. There are 56 of them, and the reason I know that is because rather than try and cut the trees down, which, of course, we don't wanna do, we were able to we consulted with the city landscape architect, and we were able to crown or top them. We've done that twice Mhmm. In order to preserve the tree. But we do have to observe the the, you know, the, height restrictions that that we have under part 77.

Yeah. I understand that. And I think the intent my question and the comment I would wanna make here is in the same way you were able to, what was the term, crown those trees, you you were taking a creative approach to preserving the landscape while meeting the regulations. I think that's what I'm looking for here as well is if there is a height requirement and there's natural space underneath it that isn't, you know, conflicting with that height requirement, how do we minimize the environmental impact we have on the places that

Well, when we see and and then we've addressed in the diagram where we see opportunities

Yeah.

Is off to the sides.

Yeah.

But, you know, I I don't wanna overpromise here, but I understand. But that's where that's where the opportunities are that we see. Okay. But off directly off the ends of the runways, there are no opportunities there because it's very sensitive. You know? The planes are coming down, and there just can't be Yeah. Any structures or trees or anything like that.

Okay. Okay. And this is where I think, again, the updated visual will help a bit here with moving this conversation forward.

It was said earlier that secondary water was approved for

a golf course, but not approved for other uses. What's stopping us from just approving it for a different purpose if it's to help maintain the open space?

So the only use of secondary treated water is for a golf course because the thinking is that there is not much contact. Children are not playing, are not falling. Any other thing like a park requires tertiary treated water Mhmm. Or if that is not available, drinking water. Mhmm. And that's the distinction.

I see. And then, you know, not all parks are necessarily the same when we're talking about a rustic park versus a park where, you know, kids are playing around in the bushes. I mean, I guess it can happen in both cases. But is there any distinction between the kinds of parks that have to have tertiary? And is that a municipal rule or is that a state rule?

I don't have any expertise in that. I just know that the regulations allow use of secondary treated golf courses and not for parks.

Okay. Because I I mean, there's a way for us to safely if it's unsafe for for kids, obviously, we don't wanna go that route. But if there's a way for us to do that, then I don't see why not.

And council member Syrup, the secondary treated water we get for Oroloma with a very rickety design right now. We keep it going right now. But they have asked us repeatedly to stop using that secondary treated water.

Okay. Under okay. Ab Abda, you said? Is it is it Abda or Ab Ebmud?

Abda. Okay.

Okay. I'll I'll leave it at that. For the design and construction costs, I also have some issues with the numbers. When we're looking at a $53,000,000 price tag and $46,000,000 is from park renovations, when the request is to leave it wild, I think I'm just curious what renovations are warranting $46,000,000 because that's the lion's share of this $53,000,000 price tag.

So that is just for park development. You But

what kind of development, I think, is what I'm looking for.

Grading, know, putting grass, putting some trees. Main

I'm gonna ask I'm gonna ask the audience

to please

let staff answer Okay.

Thank you. So I mean, that cost is pretty flexible because, I mean, this feels like a really high estimate. And then we wouldn't if we let's say we were to partner with an organization, we wouldn't necessarily be the organization that bears that cost.

It's a ballpark number. So

Okay.

We'll we'll refine them.

I mean, this is where I think conversation with Hard could be helpful too in helping Sure. With what council member Andrew says is in the spirit of collaboration, like, let's talk with our park experts and figure out what a realistic cost might look like. In the next cost section around maintenance costs, you're estimating 3,900,000.0 for annual maintenance costs.

Correct.

But half of that is coming from lease rents. Do we have to charge a market rate rent? Is that a requirement?

It is a requirement. Yes.

And then how do we get around that with HARD in the past? Is it if it's a government agency, do we have flexibility to waive that cost?

It was a forty year lease. And over the course of the years, the numbers were never adjusted to the level that they should be. But now that, that lease is over, Hart decided that it wasn't economical for them to maintain that park. We offered to a golf course. We offered that maybe they can turn that into a nine hole golf course. And they said that, no, they have another nine hole golf course. There is not enough constituent for a golf course Yes.

Understand that. I mean

Yeah.

It is clear that we're not asking for another golf course at this point. Right? And so if Hard is able to help carry or let's say another partner, if Hard's not the I I don't wanna assume the interest here, but we have half the board here. I I think if there's a partner that wants to help carry the maintenance cost of, you know, assuming we help them with the lease, at least $2,000,000 of annual maintenance, I would imagine it's a win win for us to say, okay. We can look at lowering that rental cost. I I mean, do we

have the legal right to do

that for another government agency, or do we have to charge market?

It's not really to the government agency. Yeah. And it's it's a requirement of the FAA. Okay. Market value. Market. Market rent. So that's that's our standard. So it's currently 35¢ for aeronautical.

Mhmm.

And it's a dollar 18 for non aeronautical.

Yeah.

And we we it actually simplifies things for us because we're able to provide hard numbers

Yeah.

And based on appraisals. Yeah. And and you know, we treat everybody the same, which is also important to the FAA that we don't provide what they call any exclusive rights to people Yeah. And give people some people a better deal than others. Everybody gets the same deal.

Yeah. But we're not talking about a private enterprise here. We're talking about partnering with another public agency.

They don't make a distinction like that.

They don't. And then so I guess just to ask my question more clearly, I mean, are we legally allowed to offer a lower rent too too hard? We're not allowed.

We're not.

Okay. Okay. So there is going to be that lease rent cost baked in if another agency wanted to take over the park. Okay. And we have no wiggle room on this this price?

We don't.

Okay.

Okay. I I mean, some other comments I just wanna throw out there, and then I have some questions mixed in. I appreciate the desire to wanna have Hayward maintain its leadership in the life sciences and the biosciences. We do have an entire industrial park that is there for that purpose. So I think we're able to achieve that ambition without necessarily having to redevelop, SkyWest.

I do like the idea of, you know, maybe a hybrid recreational use. We have Mission Hills, as a hard property and golf course in the southern part of Hayward. I think this side of the community might benefit from more recreation like a Topgolf if that is an opportunity for us to not necessarily pave over something but keep it green. So, you know, if there is an interested party, you know, it really relies on that business wanting to come here and do business. But I'm I'm not opposed to that kind of development because it doesn't disrupt the the landscape of the park too much.

But I'm not really interested in paving it over for a business park at the moment unless we're significantly reducing the footprint, it doesn't hurt any of the ecological features of the environment. I just want to be really explicit that we need to have our conversations with Hard as well as, seeing if there's any appetite from East Bay Regional Parks District. Some of their directors have toured the space. They're interested, but they want to know if the city has interest. And I just think that, again, in the spirit of collaboration, there should be some conversations to understand what are the alternatives here.

If if we're not going with the original plan, is there an appetite for another organization to help carry some of this cost and maintain this space that are specialists in it? Because we're I mean, the reason we're having this whole conversation is the city is not a specialist in open park open area parks or just regular parks. So we need somebody to partner with. And so I want the community to understand if we're gonna preserve SkyWest, there's it's gonna have to be a partnership. Somebody else is gonna have to come to the table and help us with this because the city is not prepared to manage a 126 acres of open space.

That's just not our specialty. And it's also costing taxpayers to do that. So we we have an obligation to figure this out, but it's gonna require a partnership. And so that's where we're gonna need you to help us figure out who is that appropriate partner. If private jets are ignoring the fines for spinning up and flying over homes at two in the morning, that fine needs to be increased. And so I don't know what we can do to jack that up to an amount that either helps raise revenue for the airport or prevents them from flying over people's homes at two in the morning.

Well, the airport's open twenty four seven.

Yeah.

Okay. So there are some there's a a perception out there, and and we've I've talked to people many times

Okay.

Where they feel that the airport's closed in the middle of the night or that it's not. You know, one of the one of the just to name one that one of the companies that goes out of here, it's a freight company Mhmm. That carries medical Mhmm. Vital medical stuff. So for example, during COVID, a lot of the masks that came into the San Francisco Bay Area came in through this airport. Yeah. Just as when, you know, air ambulances. The amount of traffic we know I mean, I've got numbers now. We just recently got our minimal at night. It's it's it's very few flights.

But, yes, on occasion, one of those airplanes will depart in in their different hours. We have a Hayward company that provides services to agriculture. Mhmm. And not to go into what they do, but they have an airplane, and they leave every morning about 6AM Mhmm. To go anywhere in the Western States. They have a 100 locations.

Mhmm.

And it provides good jobs for Hayward and and, you know, so forth.

So Yeah.

We do have some flights overnight. There's no question about that.

Yeah. I guess just to get more specific then, because what I what I wanna avoid, and I think the concern or the principle of my concern is if there are people that are just flagrantly breaking the noise ordinance because they just see it as the cost of doing business, that's the behavior I want to discourage. And, you know, I think you've talked about this before where you do a really great job. Your team does a great job of following up with folks if they have a noise complaint. Are there repeat offenders that just see it as the cost of doing business, I think,

is my question, and how do we discourage that behavior?

Well, the answer that I would provide would be stick with the ordinance. Okay. The ordinance is terrific. Okay. You know, it it take checks a lot of boxes. So Okay. The ordinance says that when somebody violates the noise standard we're the only general aviation airport in the entire Bay Area Mhmm. That has its own monitoring equipment, and we have a dedicated employee. Yeah. So that's how we know what the noise signatures are. And the ordinance says that we we warn them.

Mhmm.

And then I can start fining them. And Pam or any of the any of the people here of the of our team

Yeah.

Will tell you that I absolutely, positively Mhmm. Have levied some fines in the past. Yeah. In an extreme case, we can bar people from the airport Mhmm. Which is a little problematic as far as the FAA is concerned.

Yeah.

But those are the tools we have. I can tell you Mhmm. That when we write people these letters, and they're pretty strongly worded, I think. Mhmm. I would say at least half the time, and Pam, speak up if you disagree with this. I'd say about half the time, the letter takes care of the problem.

Okay.

And they just don't come back.

Okay.

Occasionally, they do and we'll find them. Yeah. And then then they don't come back.

Okay.

The idea that it's minor cost to some of these folks

Mhmm.

Believe it or not, some of them are trying you know, they're watching every penny on these flight departments, believe it or not.

So they

do care about getting fines and just the general thing about getting letters after letters and so forth.

So it works. Okay. Thank you for the refresher. I think you're here just to keep an eye on anyone that's maybe abusing the ordinance because they see it as an easy cost of doing business. And

I don't I don't believe it. I do not play favorites.

Okay. That sounds good. I'm really pleased to see that we're going do additional community outreach, so thank you for coordinating that. As some of the commenters and councilor Andrew's mentioned, this was back in 2021. The last batch of outreach we did, this was during a pandemic. Half of the city council and our mayor is new in this role. Like, this is our first time in these particular and respective roles. And, obviously, the community is mobilized in a completely different way now that we're outside of a pandemic. So, I'm really interested in how we move this conversation forward, and that's why I'm requesting new visuals. And I'm really pleased to see that we're having these meetings is let's, let's not get stuck in a loop where we're pointing fingers.

Let's let's move to to a resolution. And, let's see. Almost done with my comments. Just for my having towards SkyWest myself and seeing a a jet spin up on the current edge of the property, the noise is quite loud. I understand it's an airport. You know, people are living next

to an airport, airports are going

to make noise. That's just a reality of of of this this service that exists in the city. I'm a little bit worried about the current plan's desire to move aeronautical development further into the park because I worry about the increase in noise that'll create. My assumption is those aren't for private jets. Those aren't hangars. Are those are just?

They're actually shade hangars. So they they they're designed for very small airplanes. We hope to attract I mean, they're starting to produce electric airplanes.

Yeah.

And we're we're hoping to attract that kind of airplane.

I I understand.

Yeah. That's

Okay. Yes. I I understand. So I'm just commenting on this concept that that part of it gives me heartburn because that's bringing noise closer to people's homes.

What we were trying to do, you know, because the FAA gets to pass on this too Yeah. Was to put something in there that had some aeronautical use, be more likely for them to accept the rest of it. But as the director says, any everything's on the table.

Yeah. Okay. Well, those are the lines here of my comments and questions. Thank you for bringing this forward. I know the community's been requesting for a long time, and thank you again to the community for continuing to show up. Keep showing up. Yeah. I mean, we're we're in we're having this conversation because all of you have asked for it, and I think we're gonna find the right resolution with time. Thanks.

There were there was a question about secondary treated water, tertiary treated water, and I wanted to make a clarification that East Bay Discharters Authority manages the water that goes out to the outfall and to the bay, but also manages the recycled water for or with the water for the ponds. Right? That's so I

just name second one treatment.

Second center? Yeah. Okay. Just wanted to clarify that. And then was concerned about the discussion of having secondary water for this type of park because if we don't have tertiary water if we don't have secondary water going straight out to the bay, then we can't have this type of water for a park where there's activity. Right? And recycled water is used mainly for for landscaping. So I just wanna make sure that we're not discussing secondary for any other uses. Right? Just wanna clarify.

Okay. Alright. So so for the I do have another question about the the how much water would be used in this type of design versus a future design is something that I also want us to to think about just in type of water usage just because we are all concerned about water. Is that something that can be done in the next phase of conceptual design?

We can get some information from heart. I'm sure that modern design for parks Mhmm. Pay attention to water usage and water conservation. We can definitely do that. Alright. Thanks.

Okay. So while while I might be a few years in this chair, I have quite a few years on the dais. And I No disrespect. I know. I know.

And and I know when this came to us, when this started to come to us, particularly, the we started to have this conversation, when, we started talking about, you know, hard and sort of the trouble that the golf course was in. Mean, this has been a conversation that's been going back for some time. Anyways, I say all of that because, I remember, you know, I was the guy on the council, then, when we were talking about outreach. My central concern was what kind of outreach are we doing, and what kind of input are we getting from the city, from folks and neighborhoods that are south of the airport and south of a street, particularly. And so, I know that as we begin to ramp up, more and more input and outreach, I'm glad we have students from Chabot College here.

Thank you for being here. But there are quite a few you know, a number of neighborhoods

Yes.

That are south of us that we absolutely need to get feedback and, you know, and comment on this.

Absolutely.

And so that that was the first point I wanted to make. The second point I wanted to make is, you know, it was, over the, you know, over the last several years, I know, Hard has certainly you know, they, you know, we have Kennedy Park, the Salarenzo Duck Pond, is is now open, not all the way yet, but it's it's almost completely open and and redone. And, of course, there's the you know, we took the tour, the horizontal living levy that is being planned out there. And I so I guess what I'd I'd what I'd like to see is an inventory of open space acreage maybe within a three mile, five mile radius of this site, how much open space do we have right now, you know, acre per person? Right?

Yes. I would be interested to see that.

We can get that. Definitely. Yeah.

The the other thing and I just wanted to sort of, you know, I'm glad this issue has, sparked a lot of discussion and and and interest, particularly particularly along, this area of, Hayward and unincorporated Hayward and Salorenzo. But I also wanted to encourage all of the neighbors out here that there is also another big project being planned along the shoreline right now that I have not seen as much advocacy and input on, and that is you may or may not be aware that Amtrak is considering moving its line from the current track to the track that's right here behind the Duck Pond. And, you know, and and I should, all you have to do, is go to the council meeting. Go back and list watch the council meeting, where the, where the the the planners of that project came and presented to us. I can assure you how the council feels about that.

And I didn't really see a whole lot of public commenters, in that, in that meeting. And we're talking about literally changing an entire line of Amtrak and moving it from where it is now right along the shoreline. And and you know? So, you know, if we're talking about environmental impacts, negative environmental impacts to this area, You know, the airport is, is just one part of the discussion. This is a multi a 100 hundreds of millions of dollar project, if not a billion dollar project that is gonna be that will cut right through this neighborhood.

And so I think that is absolutely important that we, start to look at, because, no doubt, that project will impact this project. Mhmm. Right? And and I should also say just a little caveat. Every mayor along the corridor, this this JPA corridor, is against the Amtrak realignment.

That's what they're calling it, the the re the realignment project. But, anyways, so there's that. The, I wanted to I'm just I've just been writing some random thoughts here. I just wanted to, so they're not in order. I also wanted to thank, acknowledge that the the different tone in today's meeting is much more collaborative. I agree, and I appreciate that. It's good to see Hard here, and, and I'm glad, Hard is here. And and I also deeply appreciate the conversation the the comment about, yeah, we are not a park district. The city of Hayward is not a park district. We have a park district, and that's hard.

And and I'm you know? And then so it's it's great it's great to see, you know, the directors here. They're listening. Yes. And and and Nicole is here. I I mean, we're you know, we are, you know and and anywhere you see Nicole sitting in the room, that means the general manager is sitting in the room. And so, you know, we're listening. So I get you know, that I I wanted to reiterate that. We are listening, and and I think we are emphasizing collaboration. And I and I and I wanted to appreciate that and and just highlight that point.

The other the other point I wanted to make is now I understand that this is just sort of draft and, you know, and and and at times, you know, I I know it it's it's, sometimes there's no good deed goes unpunished because, you know, when you put something there to visualize something, everyone thinks that that's what we're gonna build. I get it. But I guess the question I have is, at what point of this process will we actually begin to drill down on the economics of this project and the actual plans of this project?

So when the project is finally decided at the conceptual level, it goes to planning department, environmental studies are going to be done, economic studies will be done by our staff to make sure that you have all the information available to you before you make a decision.

Great. Okay.

Do you wanted to add?

And and and rough timeline?

Well, we have to have more input, more discussions with the neighborhood and get A year? Yes.

Two years?

I would say a year.

A year? Okay. Yes. Alright. Good. I just wanted to I I just wanted to make that point because, you know, I I, you know, I I it's important, and I don't want, you know, folks you know, they see a map. They see us talking, and, you know, I don't want folks to think that, you know, we're gonna start breaking ground, you know, next month. No. So I appreciate that. Thank you.

The other the other point I just wanted to highlight is, I I wanted I I did pick up on it, and I'm glad, council member Cyra brought it up. It it appears that when we do change the acreage, it's always in favor of open space, I think. So if that's the observation that observe observation is correct. So I appreciate that. And because that tells me, and I hope that is communicated to the community that, you know, staff is looking at open space. They are mindful of open space, and they are listening. Right? And and I think you know? So which is a good thing. And so okay.

That's I I don't wanna repeat everything that my other two colleagues mentioned. They were all very good comments. Those are my comments. And Yeah. I just wanted to conclude by saying we need to include more neighborhoods in this process. We need to talk to more neighborhoods in this process, and, and I think that's it. Yeah.

I was thinking, can we also work with Hayward Unified in the the schools located in the area for potential outreach locations? Maybe Longwood. I know Kipp was mentioned. So some of the schools in the area. Southgate. Southgate. Yeah. Okay.

Thank you.

Okay. Do you have what you need?

We have what we need. Okay. Appreciate it.

Thank you. Thank you. So I will close this item, and I will move on to the next item

Okay.

Which is the safe streets safe streets Hayward update. And I believe the it has a, b, and Tennyson, I guess, that you'll be focusing on those four doors. Eight. Thank

you.

Okay.

Bye. Thank you.

Thank you, mister Mayer.

Hold on. Just give a second till

You know what I'm saying?

You know, this next part is

This is the fun stuff.

This is the fun stuff here. I mean, when when when the engineers come in and talk, that's mister Tang. I apologize. Mister Mary.

Thank you very much, mister mayor and the committee members. As you know, the city had received a

Push it.

Pretty soon, we'll be sitting at that table.

So

the city had received a $3,200,000 grant from federal government to develop a speed management plan plus a high injury network safety plan.

Hold on. Can we we have the conversation out in the hallway, please? Director Lamnan? I'm kidding. Go right ahead.

So

the safety plan for A, B and Tennyson and A and B outside of downtown is part of the high engineering network safety plan. Byron Tang, our principal transportation engineer, is here to present the report.

Okay. Morning, participants and community members. My name is Byron Tang. I'm the principal transportation engineer from the Public Works Department. I'm joined with Adam Blankberg and Zachary Escovel from Kingney Horton and Associates. They are the consultants for this project, and they will be here to help answer any questions. The agenda today, I'm going go over the project introduction and background. Then I'm going talk a little bit about the outreach we've done this summer. And then I'm going to talk about the proposed alternatives for further study that we are going to be recommending. And I'd like to get feedback and next steps from the committee.

Next slide. In 2020, Hayward adopted our local road safety plan and also our Vision Zero by 2050 policy. The important thing about our local road safety plan is we identified a high injury network and that's 14% of the city's road miles are on this network, but 75% of all reported fatal and severe injuries happen on these roads.

Sorry, what percent?

Fourteen percent of the city's road miles and 75% of all fatal and severe injury collisions. One zero by 2050 policy is the adopted policy of producing two zero the fatal and severe collisions by 2050. So right after this, staff went and sought grant funding from Safe Streets for All grant to study and look at these roads to see how we can, you know, enhance safety. We got that grant and this project is phase one of that project, which is looking at A Street, B Street, and Tennyson Road. Next slide.

The project started earlier this year where we collected data and looked at the collisions that have been happening. In addition, we did some outreach starting around the beginning of the summer. That included a road safety audit where the project team walked all the quarters, took observations. And in the summer to now, we developed these recommendations and alternatives that we are going to be presenting today.

And I'll talk about the

later parts of this project in a future slide. Next slide. Some of the data we looked at kind of really reinforced what the local road safety plan was telling us. And that is since 2019 there have been three eighty five crashes on AB Streets and Tennyson Road. Of those crashes, thirty one were severe injuries and fatalities.

Of those, it's disproportionately to vulnerable road users. At least six percent of them were from involved someone walking or biking. Next slide. So we had a very comprehensive outreach process where we used surveys, location based social media posts, postcard to communities, business canvassing, project staff were at nine pop up events and cabling to talk to people. We also canvassed 14 different locations where we engage residents directly using intercept surveying and interviews.

We received over 400 surveys taken and people can access what you see in the bottom left there as an online map where they can actually pin a location and put comments on what their concerns were. Next slide. So some of the summary of the outreach for round one takeaways of A And B Street. One of the top priorities we heard were the residents wanted to improve bike and bus infrastructure and wanted safer crossing for children and elderly. And then they also mentioned ways of slowing down drivers using speed humps.

We received over two seventy surveys for A And B Street and over 50% of people were either walking or biking along the corridor. And just by percentage of those people who said that, over 50% walk and about 6% bike. Next slide. For pacing mode, there were some similar top priorities, but also different. Cycling safety and reduced conflicts between bikers and pedestrians on the sidewalk was mentioned.

A need for better lighting at crossings and parks. And also similar to A And B Street, splitting was an issue, but heavier traffic enforcement was mentioned. Over 150 survey response received and similar percentages of people walking and biking along the quarter. Next slide.

So now I'm going go over some

of the alternatives that we have. And for each quarter there's going to be three alternatives. One that is we're calling a low impact alternative. There's going to be a medium impact alternative,

and there's going be a

high investment alternative. And we're doing this because we want to provide a spectrum of different alternatives so that council has an option to choose from in the future. So I'll talk a little bit about these alternatives for each quarter. Next slide. Okay.

So by A Street, A Street is a four lane roadway, two lanes in each direction with Class II bike lanes, but the bike lanes are not continuous. With low impact alternatives, we would not change much of that. We would instead add pedestrian scale lighting, lights for crossings and protected signal phasing. For the medium impact alternative, we will look to make continuous bike lane throughout the whole quarter and provide some protection. The impact though is that there would be some parking impacts, not as much.

So the parking impact would be around Montgomery and walk ins and approximately about 16 spaces could be impacted. Now for the high investment alternative for every quarter, we're looking to provide maximum safety. But with that, the trade offs are there could be more impacts. And for this, there would be more protected more protected bike lanes, but either lower or a lot more parking impacts. Then we can move on to B Street.

Thank you. What street? This street is a two lane roadway, one lane each direction with bike lane and a parking lane. With open impact alternatives, similarly, we would look at traffic circles, speed homes, and curb build outs, but we will not change the cross section. For the minimum impact alternative, will look to add buffers to the bike lanes by no longer travel lanes.

We also look at options and bring to the community potentials for traffic diverters that would divert cars and not make this through lane through the road. And for the there's something very different here. In order to keep both parking lanes, two of the cycle track could be implemented on the south side of the road. We're recommending this because if you do one protected one lane cycle bicycle lane on each side, you would not have enough space to keep both parking lanes. This is West Of Montgomery For B Street.

Slide. East Of Montgomery For B Street is a little different because it's the section that goes right up to downtown. In this, there's two westbound lanes and one eastbound lane in parking lanes. That would not that would be kept in the low impact option. And the medium impact alternative, removing

one of

the westbound lanes would create room more freedom to add a a continuous bike lane or a lane. And then for this one we have an alternative to that is instead of a buffer bike lane, we remove some of that parking on one of the sides. Next slide, please. Now for Tennyson Road, Tennyson Road is a four lane corridor with a median, two lanes in each direction. It has bike lanes and it has parking lanes.

But a lot of parking is signed right now as no parking. The low impact alternative would keep all that, but add specific improvements like curb bump outs, protected signal phasing and lights for the crossings. And then for the medium impact alternative, in order to create that continuous bike lane across the whole quarter with some protection, we would look at kind of narrowing the traffic of travel lanes to create that extra space. For the high investment alternative, we would look at more even more protected bike lanes as you see this concrete and landscaping between the bike lane and the travel lanes. But in terms of there's some options here in terms of the impacts, and we could preserve a lot of the parking by instead narrowing the width of the median.

Next slide.

There will be also a lot of other corridor wide improvements we will be looking at in our next outreach phases and analysis, which includes targeted closure of certain movements, protected phasings, leading pedestrian intervals, just a lot of other things we can do corridor wide that aren't really these aren't really affecting the cross sections, but do enhance safety. As we refer to attachment three for more details in terms of where these are and much more details of the concepts that we are sharing. Next slide, please. So back to the project timeline. Next steps is if the committee is good with the recommendations that we want to further study, we would go to another room of outreach, and then we would flush those alternatives out even more from those.

From that outreach, we do a second phase of outreach after that. And that's when we would return to SEAC with all our analysis done to give you the full analysis and pros and cons of each alternative so you can make a really informed decision. Alright. Next slide. And thank you. That is the presentation. Looking forward to hearing feedback.

Thank you. Since, most of the high injury networks are in District 1, I'll let the council member from District 1

kick it off.

I think these ones might be in District 2, but I'm happy to happy to weigh

in here.

Yeah. Still still technically at large for the next year. Would you mind taking us back to the the A Street slide? Great. Okay. You know, before we get you might have to do public comment first just because I wanna consider, you know, what folks are gonna have to contribute.

Is that

okay with you?

Okay. Public comment. I don't have any public comment cards. Oh, okay. Oh, well, that's right. Yeah. Oh, okay.

Thank you.

Well, thank you thank you for working on this project. This is really important since we've seen a lot of fatalities in these on these roads, on the streets. And, yeah, we looked into, the plans, and, you know, we found some of, like, critical flaws, particularly, you know, when looking into the medium medium impact, you know, I think it seems like it's mostly flex post. But as we as we've seen on Orchard Avenue and on industrial, you know, those get destroyed, like, by drivers, like, super easily. So I would, we we would like you to look into concrete barriers, like, the ones that can, like, be installed or removed, like, more easily, but, like, they're more solid than, than just plastic flex post because that adds, it might be it might be cheaper to do the flex post in the beginning, but it adds maintenance cost in the futures.

But, also, you know, we're extremely concerned about Tennyson in particular. There's been nine people that been that that have been killed on Tennyson Road or, near Tennyson Road. As, you know, major signers, you were in the memorial, for the most recent fatality. It was a block away, but not even the trees were enough to protect this pedestrian that was on the sidewalk and who got killed. So paint is not enough.

For the medium impact, we need some type of physical barrier, like like I said, concrete barriers. And then for the high impact ones, you know, all of them need to be protected by claims. On the sec segment four, we're extremely concerned because that segment is by Tennyson Park. We had a lot of people that were at the more at the recent ribbon cutting for the new pump track. It's the only pump track within a ten minute bike ride, in the whole, BART network and, just besides the Richmond there.

So this is a bike destination. It's a there's a skate park as well. And the East Bay Greenway is also another project that's planning to implement protected bike lanes. So we need to ensure that that has a safe route, and that is protected. We were also doing these free bike repairs. At Tennyson Park, we have a lot of, people show up with their bikes, with their kids. So we need to ensure that these are protected by claims. Most of all the businesses there have their own parking in this segment four, so there's no need to compromise on that on street parking. Also, in the 880 Overpass, there's been three people that have been killed there on the on on ramp or off ramps. Two of them were cyclists.

One of them was a 21 year old mother that got killed while while crossing with her kid. She died, her kid suffered major injuries. She was just crossing with a stroller. The other two people were just biking home from work. So we need to ensure that, you know, we don't do paint. We need to do protective vitamins on the medium and the and the high impact. And, yeah, I sent all the comments by email. But, yeah, thank you to thank you for looking into this, and, you know, let's save lives, please.

Thank you. Is there anybody online?

I do have a few, Amir. Let's go to Carl. Go ahead, Carl.

Hello. Thank you. I'm Carl Gorringe. I'm also a bike rider and part of Bike Hayward. So I'm really happy to see proposed improvements in bike infrastructure.

I just have a few comments, for a Street. You know, it's a major traffic quarter, so I I think we probably should not do the road diets along a street, but I definitely would like to see protected bike lanes. Either, you know, the flex post, but definitely look at the concrete dividers, which I agree with, Alex on that. So, basically, I would support continuous bike facility option or high investment option if, it's available. There, as an aside, there's a little section that's at, on Meekland at the, a Street overpass.

It's it's underneath the overpass of a Street that doesn't have, bike lane stripes. We would like to add some some striping under that overpass that connects to B Street. For B Street, I frequently ride my bike down the section of B Street, and I'm generally pretty happy as it is from Martin Luther King to Grand Street. So I'm fine with not even any changes. I don't think it's really necessary.

But for segments three and four, which are from Grand to Watkins, I'm definitely wanna add some continuous bike facility, option one with the traffic lane road diet. In that case, we can reduce the the lane and add some protected, bike lanes there. Tennyson Road, I haven't looked at too deeply, but, I definitely explore the the use of concrete dividers. Definitely want continue continuous bike facility options or high investment option. In any in any section where there's street parking, but there's already existing parking I would support protected bike lanes instead because I don't think we need the extra parking on the road when there's already parking lots.

And definitely in sec in Segment 4 from Russ Road, the Whitman needs better protected bike lane options. I don't think we need to preserve the parking along the parking lots there. Alright. Well, thank you for listening.

Thank you. Next caller.

Okay. Next, we have, Tyler. Go ahead, Tyler.

Hi. Thank you, staff, for the presentation. I just think that there's a lot of parking in downtown. I mean, if we if we're taking inventories, think, like, inventories of just how many parking lots and garages and on street and off street parking there is, just my opinion that that's probably why downtown struggles. It's not as walkable because it's it's still built for cars.

There's just there's just so much excess parking. So what I want to spend the rest of my, public comment is, reciting the names of those that have died as a result of vehicular violence along the Tennyson Corridor. An unnamed man, 56 years old. Dinesha Turner, 21 years old. Valerie Martinez, 58 years old Lydia Grera, 26 years old Richard Leon Heard, 55 years old Christopher Castle, 29 years old.

Jose Hernandez, 26 years old. So, I think you're, right, Mayor, when you say, we're all human, and that's how you started the meeting. So are we going to put that into action with the direction that you give staff? Thank you.

Next caller. Okay.

Next I have, Robert.

Hey there. This is Robert Prince, advocacy director with Bike East Bay. I just really want to thank staff so much for, taking this project on and getting it to this point. All three of these corridors are really critical with regards to street safety in the city. I'm really happy to see this level of thought and action being brought to these projects.

I did want to call out some wording in the presentation that I think is a little inappropriate. I'd like to really encourage you to not use the term low impact option for future communications on this. It assumes that the status quo is the norm and okay. And a lot of people who have been themselves seriously injured or have lost loved ones due to traffic violence in this corner, I'm sure, feel that the current conditions are very impactful. So just think about that as you're comparing the options.

I'm really happy that you'll be taking all these options to the next stage, you know, for further design. As was mentioned by Alex, the Section 4 in Tennyson Road really needs to be a continuous separated bikeway. There was a mention of completing bikeway gaps, closing bikeway gaps in this project, which I think is really important, but that can't only be paint a number of those fatal bike crashes that have been mentioned happened on sections that already do have pint painted bike lanes, including the death that Tyler mentioned, Richard Heard Junior, who was was killed in 2021 while he was biking home from his FedEx job. He was in a painted bike lane on on Tennyson, and it wasn't enough. So please the the main change that I'd like to see here is to add in that, separated bikeway segment for Section 4 of Tennyson Road.

It looks like it can be done with the roadway clearance that's available, and so I'd love really love to see you take that, to the next stage of development. I'd also like to second the comment that Alex made with regards to higher level of quality of separation. We are working with a lot of different cities that have been working through these problems and finding that it is actually more cost effective in the long run to spend a little bit more upfront for higher quality materials. There's a lot of experience that our neighbors have with using materials, and I'd be happy to coordinate with staff on some of those experiences and connect them with with other jurisdictions for to share expertise. So thanks so much. I'm looking forward to seeing the next stage.

Thank you. Next call?

That's all I have, ma'am.

Great. We're done.

Yeah. Council member.

Thank you. And thank you for the report. Thank you to the public commenters, for helping inform this discussion. I think first comment I'd want to make here is, please do take by keyword's feedback into account as it relates to Tenison in particular. They have a number of good notes, and I'd like to see that reflected in the next time these options come before us again just so we know that we're we're addressing those safety improvements. I also agree that, you know, I think people are getting kind of sick of the plastic pylons. I mean, I think a commenter in the past that it's kinda it's become our unofficial mascot. I don't know. I wouldn't go that far, and I hesitate to even say that because I don't want that to become a thing. But, you know, if this is infrastructure that we're investing in, let's make it look like infrastructure.

And I know for a long time, a lot of these traffic calming projects are pilots, and we're trying to feel out whether or not they work. So I get it. Let's graduate from that, I think. If we're gonna make some of these changes, I wanna I do wanna invest in that infrastructure, especially if it'll save us money in the long run from having to send maintenance folks out there and staff time to go and replace those pieces on a regular basis. So I'll defer to your department as to what that cadence should look like, but I would like to see us invest more in those in legitimate separation, not just plastic separation.

We've been giving folks a suggestion of not running over a bicyclist. Now we should not let them run over a bicyclist. I also agree that of a lot of these options, you know, this is a lot to take in for one meeting. There's several segments, but I'm really impressed with the thoroughness of this work. I agree that, you know, I don't even want to talk about low impact options because they're so similar to the existing conditions. I think if we're going have a conversation about the right way to proceed, let's let's focus on the the non low impact options because that's where we're actually starting to think about how do we slow traffic down here. I don't have a comment for a Street at the moment as to what I prefer there. But for B Street, West Montgomery, I'm very interested in the high investment option. It doesn't get rid of any parking. There is a school there.

There's a park there. It's next to the Cannery Housing Complex. When we think about how we're trying to fix the loop and expand footprint of downtown, I see this as a bike highway for students and families to be able to get to downtown super easily. On the East Side Of Montgomery, I'm I'm leaning more interested in the medium investment option. I think that doesn't disrupt the the flow too much. And then on Tenesin, I'm I'm currently leaning towards medium, but it sounds like we're just kinda I mean, what what is the ask of staff tonight? Because it sounds like you're gonna bring back something in the future. So I'm trying to understand, like, what role do you want me to play tonight besides okay. Okay. Got it.

And then I just wanna say, like, I I thought this slide, even though it was quick on quarter wide improvements, you know, all the kinds of changes you can make to improve traffic even without, you know, pouring any concrete is exceptional. I mean, that's the kind of thinking we want. And, you know, full steam ahead on that, do you have a timeline of when we're implementing those changes? Have you already implemented those quarter wide improvements outside of these safety adjustments?

Oh, well, this is we're in the planning stages of this project. After when we bring this up next next year Okay. We will still need to do detailed design and then construction, which will be separate phases.

Got it. Because there's a slide that was talking about signal timing, for example. Right? Like, there's adjustments that I I'm sure that's kind of the bulk of your job is taking a look at how the traffic is is flowing and making the so you had suggested some adjustments that would be part of this. But I I guess I'm wondering if that doesn't require building out anything, how soon can we make those kinds of adjustments that you've identified?

Some of those can be made sooner. We still want community out outreach to be done to make sure we're doing the right changes.

Yes. Okay. Great. And, I mean, on that note, I just wanna say, you know, great work on the outreach around this. I saw Kimley and city staff all at the Hayward Night Market talking to dozens of residents getting their feedback. I've really appreciated the approach that your division has taken and going out into the community and actually talking to folks and saying, you know, what makes sense. I I also just wanna, like, triple, double, quadruple underscore, the feedback we're hearing from the communities. They want better pedestrian and cyclist safety. And I think sometimes there's a lot of, noise, on particular online pockets where, you everyone know, gets a little frustrated when they see things change, I understand that. I can feel like something's being taken away.

That's not the intention of any of these projects. It's to save lives and be responsive to the community. There there are people that live in these neighborhoods. And I know everyone here knows that this is more for the public, but there are people that live in these neighborhoods that are asking for these changes. And I hope that as a council, we are not daunted by some of the noise that we see online and really responding to the folks that live in these communities. So, keep up the good work. Let's remove low impact options from the conversation. Let's focus on making safer streets. I could not believe that stat that seventy five percent of our injuries and fatalities are on these three streets. That is ridiculous.

Clarif, there's a the high energy network, there's more streets, and we're gonna study more of them in the future for this grant.

Yeah. Okay. But you said seventy five percent of our injuries and fatalities are happening on these three streets in particular?

On the high injury network. Oh, on the There's more streets these three streets are a part of that, but there's there's a lot more streets that make up the

high injury

network. It's in our local road safety plan.

Yes. So these are the biggest offenders of the biggest offenders?

Yes. Some of these are the biggest offenders.

Okay. Got it. Got it. Okay. Well, yeah, that's still shocking nonetheless. So I just really appreciate this work. And the last note I'll end on here is, you know, really thinking comprehensively about these changes. We had a great conversation about how we might reapproach the loop last conversation, tying all these pieces together. Right? We don't want to make these changes with one hand and then do loop changes on the other hand if they don't connect properly. Think about the larger vision of, you know, expanding the footprint of the loop and how these plug into that. And last sorry. Keep thinking of new things. Tennyson, the reason why I kind of advocate for the medium versus the higher investment is because it is a commercial corridor. In a lot of ways, I can see Tennyson becoming the second downtown for Hayward because in some ways has a higher building fill rate than our than our current downtown does.

I wanna make sure that, you know, people that wanna frequent those businesses can frequent them in the same way that they do downtown currently. Yes. We need better bike infrastructure there, but we also want people to be able to stop by and and support those businesses too. Thank you. Going to the restroom.

Thank you. Very comprehensive report. And I wanna say this the last page is the page I've been waiting for almost ten years, which is looking at the Tennyson exit. I've been advocating for this for a very long time, and it's been a a huge concern as there are some folks that I know that just won't take this exit because they're too scared that they're gonna hit someone when they exit or when they enter. So I don't know if what we can do to expedite this portion.

I don't know if that's a possibility, but I think it's an urgent need. For the for the outreach, I really liked all the outreach efforts that you all you all did. It was very extensive. I would like this kind of meeting, though, in the area where these bike lanes are going to happen because that's why we're getting these these comments on Facebook. That's why we're getting these angry emails is because we're making decisions at city hall, SkyWest, and they may they may not go to that night market.

And so I wanna see if there's some locations for the next meeting where we talk about this, whether it's Rutz Elementary, if it's Mount Eden, Matt Jimenez, go where the people are at. And I know that you all have done that in previous projects. So with this type of this this is very comprehensive. These streets are very busy. I think you're gonna see more folks come out to those meetings than you've you've had in the past because I know it might seem like those efforts are are wasted because you might not see a lot of community members here, but guarantee if this gets out that, oh, we're gonna hit Tennyson.

We're gonna hit, you know, these very crucial areas. You're gonna get a lot of feedback. In general, I would say that I'm I'm all about pedestrian improvements, bike improvements, points of of conflicts, and and definitely crossings. I wanna see that effort. I love that you have these spot improvements, the actual items we can see where you're gonna put here.

The visuals are just very excellent for or or just excellent for this presentation. I just have concerns when it's in front of people's homes because I think in previous presentations, I've seen where we do a lot in front of people's homes, and I don't think people really understand the impact of that space. Yes. They don't own that street. Yes.