Graphic by Gemini AI

From the “Nextdoor” app for my city:

From Jerry E.

I’m one of the neighbors whose curb was painted red and I was not notified at all. They just showed up and painted it without any warning…

Has anyone else on Tulare Ave dealt with this or reached out to the city yet? Thank you neighbors for bringing this up and I believe more should bring this up before this becomes a bigger problem.

It irks me (a bit) to see things like this pop up in various forums. People get worked up about a project in their neighborhood, and complain that “I was not notified at all”. Well, yes, you were, you just weren’t paying attention (Unless you moved into the city and that neighborhood in the past week or so).

The City of Visalia is in the process of repaving most of Tulare Avenue. In that project, they’re changing the bike lanes, from ‘class 2’ to ‘class 4’. This improves safety for bicyclists by putting the bike lane next to the curb, and moving parking spaces out from their previous location at the curb to left of the bike lane. This puts parked cars closer to the traffic lanes, and people are freaking out. The redesign also eliminates some parking spaces on the street. People are not happy. Well, some people are not happy. People who ride their bikes are pleased with the changes. It moves them from having cars rushing by at 40 mph right next to them to having parking spaces or parked cars between them and the traffic. It’s a big improvement for safety, especially for children riding their bikes to school or elsewhere.

The complaints are three-fold.

The most vocal are those losing some or all of the on-street parking in front of their residence. They’re really not happy about that, and I can at least understand that attitude. I’ll be losing one of the two available spaces in front of my house when the project reaches me in August. I’ll adapt. Those that lose all of the parking have a legitimate complaint, but it is public property, and the project will improve biking safety. They’ll adapt.

Second are those who worry about parking their cars “out in the street”. The new configuration puts parked cars away from the curb, and closer to the traffic lanes.

They’re worried about the increased chance of a passing car drifting over and hitting their parked cars. This has happened already, but ‘side-swipe’ accidents already occur throughout the city on narrower streets. This is a legitimate concern, also, but you have this risk on many streets you might park on throughout any city. Some also worry about the heavy fog we sometimes get in Visalia.

The third complaint is about having to exit the driver side of the car into a traffic lane. This, too, is something we often have to do when parking in many areas of Visalia. Downtown is particularly bad about this condition. You simply have to be careful.

So that’s the background of the situation. Some nitty-gritty about the process:

The City of Visalia has been sending notices in the mail to residents living on and near Tulare Avenue for years. I first became aware of the project in 2021 or 2022 when a flyer arrived in my mailbox. I filled out an online survey about it at that time. I’ve attended three public information meetings about the plans, one at the Senior Center, one at Christ Lutheran Church, and one at Veva Blunt School. There have been those mailers, social media posts, and numerous discussions (fully noticed 72 hours in advance) at City Council meetings. I’ve spoken during the public comments sections several times about it. The newspapers in the area have carried articles about the changes.

It’s been thoroughly announced, but some folks simply pay no attention to such things until the work crews are tearing up the street in front of their house.

To see people complain that they didn’t know something was happening, and blame the city for not informing them, is just perplexing. I think to myself, “geez, what do you want? For them to spoon-feed you stuff you should already be paying attention to?”

The information has been out there for a long time. It’s not the city’s fault you ignored it.

<end rant>