The tower, approved by a single Conditional Use Permit in 1960 and currently owned by American Tower Company (ATC), is host to over 60 antennas that have been installed over the past 50 years without the required permits. ATC’s failure to live up to the conditions imposed by a 2009 CUP that allowed T-Mobile antennas on the tower played a major role in the Board’s decision to deny Clearwire a permit at this location.

Before its vote on the CUP appeal, the Board rejected residents’ request for environmental review of Clearwire’s project under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA).

According to local advocate Doug Loranger, “While there was a strong legal case for CEQA review, the resulting delays in Clearwire’s build-out of its network across San Francisco would have cost the company millions of dollars and it therefore brought in some powerful local lobbyists to stave off a vote in favor of CEQA. Nevertheless, local Bernal Heights residents did an outstanding job of bringing ATC’s various permit, code and tax violations to the attention of the City and organizing their neighbors to achieve yesterday’s result.”

This Friday, November 19, Oakland, California residents plan a demonstration and march against Verizon antennas scheduled to be installed directly across the street from an elementary school. They raised $1,000 to appeal the installation, and lost, but are not giving up. The San Francisco Chronicle reports today:

The parents have two options left. On Friday, they will appeal to Verizon’s “corporate conscience” with a march from the schools to the wireless provider’s local retail store, said Jen Schradie, whose two children attend the charter school.

They also will seek to arm themselves with science, conducting their own health study – a costly, time-consuming endeavor, but one that could provide the proof they say they need to stop such placements in the future.

“It’s going to be a long-term process, but we’re definitely going to be involved in conducting the study,” said Schradie, a sociology doctoral student at UC Berkeley. “We’re not willing to sit back and cross our fingers.”

The program for improving mobility and safety of bicyclists and pedestrians is off to a running start in a very short time:

• A website is up and running

• Outreach to several community groups got only positive responses on the program and its goals

• Several city departments and commissions are coordinating with Bogart on the grant work

• Public Works is coordinating Federal Recovery Act funded street improvements with Safe and Healthy Streets to create pedestrian and bicycle enhancements along Riverdale Drive and Maple Street, linking Pacific, Maple, and Carr Parks

• The city’s Safe Streets Initiative, UC Berkeley’s pedestrian safety initiative in Glendale, and Safe Routes to School are progressing in tandem and raising visibility of these issues in the city.

In the fall, the program will conduct a baseline count of bicyclists and pedestrians, hold public input meetings, develop pedestrian walking maps, and assist in an update of the city’s Bicycle Master Plan.

Bogart’s report (beginning at 1 hour into the meeting – video link here) was very well received by City Council. Traffic Engineer Tom Mitchell presented the next agenda item, an update on Glendale’s Safe Streets Initiative established at Council member Ara Najarian’s suggestion, which held a half-day fully-booked pedestrian safety training seminar for residents and a three-day Pedestrian Safety Action Plan training seminar for city staff, both in May.

The three-day staff seminar dealt with engineering, design, and land-use tools to create safe environments for pedestrians. Mitchell praised the seminar and its presenters effusively, saying that staff were very impressed both with the material and the professional approach to these issues. Council member Laura Friedman urged all city staff to incorporate the seminar’s “policy-practices-design” elements into their evaluation processes for all proposed projects.

On Monday, Glendale city council member Laura Friedman told Northwest Glendale Homeowners Association members that current state law was written to discourage municipal “speed traps” but has ended up posing traffic safety problems, and Krekorian’s new bill is a positive step in addressing those problems.

LAist reports Los Angeles city council members Wendy Greuel and Richard Alarcon’s comments in support of the bill.

The California Highway Patrol and the Teamsters Union both oppose the bill, but their leaders don’t drive, walk, or live in Glendale. The News Press story continued:

Last year, there were four pedestrian-related fatalities and 82 pedestrian-related accidents in Glendale.

In just the past week, several more pedestrian-related accidents in Glendale show the problem just isn’t going away.

Glendale is moving aggressively to turn the situation around, and citizens are responding. A UC Berkeley May 16 workshop on pedestrian safety proposed by city council member Ara Najarian is fully booked. In response to my (late) attendance request, Assistant Traffic and Transportation Administration Tom Mitchell wrote:

This seminar is only the beginning of the city developing a program and process to reach out to, among others, the schools (students and parents) to improve safety of travel for both pedestrians and drivers of motorized vehicles and non-motorized vehicles.

He’s right: the Safe Routes to School program is underway, and a new three-year “Safe and Healthy Streets” grant to Glendale through the LA County Department of Public Health is also getting started in Glendale.