printable versionCommuter-traffic reductions urgent, especially at day’s end
BY MICHAEL PEÑA
If the university is unable to keep peak-hour car trips within allowable limits for two years in a three-year period, it must help pay for modifications to more than a dozen roadway intersections in the area. This would cost millions.
Santa Clara County officials are currently assessing whether Stanford fulfilled its obligation to generate "no net new commute trips" in 2005. But the raw counts for morning and evening trips taken last fall indicate that the university is approaching the trip limit during the critical evening commute period, Provost John Etchemendy said this week.
Official numbers for morning and evening traffic counts taken last year are still being adjusted to take into account factors such as shuttle ridership and the impact of roadwork detours near campus. But at this point, preliminary figures indicate that in 2005 the number of car trips between 4:30 p.m. and 6 p.m. increased above the baseline set in 2001.
"I consider this extremely urgent," Etchemendy said. "We do not yet know whether we have passed the 2005 calendar year count, since it takes many months to get from the raw count to the adjusted count on which the actual measurement is based. But in any event, it is clear we are uncomfortably close."
The General Use Permit (GUP) issued to the university in December 2000 includes a condition that morning and evening commuter traffic during peak hours stay within 1 percent of baseline levels set in 2001. To determine compliance, the county conducts traffic counts twice a year all along the perimeter of campus.
If the university is unable to keep peak-hour car trips within allowable limits for two years in a three-year period, it must help pay for modifications to more than a dozen roadway intersections in the area—a requirement that would cost millions. Moreover, the university wants to be a good neighbor that helps reduce air pollution and traffic congestion, said Stephanie Manning, Stanford's outreach and transportation demand management coordinator.
According to results from an annual commute-mode survey conducted by Parking & Transportation Services (P&TS), the number of university employees who drive alone has decreased significantly, from 72 percent in 2002 to 58 percent last year. About 3,000 employees responded to the 2005 survey, Manning said.
Additionally, participation in the Commute Club—currently at about 4,700 members—showed a 46 percent increase from fall 2004 to fall 2005. The Commute Club is Stanford's main vehicle for promoting alternative transportation on campus—either through mass transit, ridesharing, bicycling or walking, or through programs such as Clean Air Cash and free car rental vouchers for members.
In July, Etchemendy issued a campuswide memo asking university managers to find ways to reduce by 10 to 15 percent the number of their staff who drive alone to campus between the peak commute times of 7:30 a.m. to 9 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. to 6 p.m.
Although reduction efforts are ongoing, most of the schools and academic units on campus have so far reported at least a 10 percent reduction in peak-hour trips by solo drivers—with many reporting a much higher reduction, according to Manning.
But even though decreases are occurring, Etchemendy said more progress is needed to reduce traffic counts in the evening.
"It might be that people are avoiding the morning peak-commute period by coming in earlier or later than usual, but when it is time to go home, they are leaving at the usual time," Etchemendy said. "I can understand this tendency; people have after-work obligations—children to pick up, dinners to prepare—that may make it hard to stay past six. But this is a problem."
In an effort to get more employees than ever to forgo parking-permit stickers, P&TS has launched an ambitious spring membership drive. The grand prize for the springtime Commute Club campaign—all current members will be entered into weekly drawings—has been increased from $1,500 to $4,000. The office also plans to step up outreach by contacting new employees and those with difficulties finding rideshare partners, Manning said.
Also, within the next two weeks, additional peak-hour runs will be added in the morning for the Line U bus, the pilot project with AC Transit that connects Stanford to the East Bay via the Dumbarton Bridge. In addition, select parking-permit holders who live in the East Bay will be offered the chance to participate in a promotional campaign using BART, Manning said.
Another pilot project P&TS hopes to launch within a month will allow individuals to register with a Stanford-only database and use interactive geographic information systems (GIS) software mapping to locate potential rideshare partners. The university also will participate in a Spanish language ride-matching service that the regional transit resource 511.org launched in January.
"Every commute counts, is basically what we're saying," Manning said. She added that employees who must drive to work occasionally may still commit to taking alternative transportation several times a week and win prizes from P&TS.
"If you think about it, if everyone who currently commutes during the peak evening hours were to commit to avoiding this just one day a week, we would reduce our evening peak trips by 20 percent," Etchemendy said. "If everyone avoided commuting during these hours twice a week, we would reduce those trips by 40 percent."
For a complete rundown of the Commute Club's spring 2006 promotion, go to http://transportation.stanford.edu/.