Month: September 2011

  • Horns a plenty

    Ever wake up at 2am and think, "Why is that train engineer leaning on the horn for so long?"

    Now is your chance to find out. Below is a letter that appeared in the SM Journal with all the details:

    Train horns are a nuisance
    September 12, 2011, 03:30 AM
    Editor,

    If your sleep is being continuously interrupted by the loud noises of the train horn, kindly join me for a meeting with the Union Pacific Rail staff in conference room A at the Burlingame City Hall, located at 501 Primrose Ave. Burlingame  1 p.m. Monday Sept. 19.

    Should you know more people who share the same concern please forward this very important message to them. Please also confirm by writing to my post office box address PO Box 2071 San Mateo, CA 94401 whether you are able to attend so that I may get a head count. The meeting should not take more than one hour.

    I thank you in advance.

    Juda  A.

    San Mateo

  • The Avenue is Ever Anew

    The rapid pace of change on B'game Ave continues.  There is movement among locations by some merchants, construction at some store locations and a couple more retail fatalities including Bonarda which has bitten the dust,

    Bonarda bites 
    I keep meaning to count the yogurt places in the downtown area, but I need to bring a pencil and paper since I may not have enough fingers at this point.

  • Safeway Part 69 – Street Trees In

    The new Safeway and the two companion buildings are moving right along.  If you walk by at night you can see there is signage and shelving going up inside, but the big step forward is the installation of the street trees on Howard and Primrose since our last update.

    Street trees_Primrose 
    These little guys are Acer Buergerianum or "Chinese maple" and the ones on the Howard side are Acer Rubrum or "red or soft or sunset maple".  There are some cork oaks on the El Camino side.  The heritage oak on Primrose that has been a Voice favorite since the printed copy days is looking good and there are some new lights nearby as they get ready to install the small park around the oak.  Nice!

  • Council Campaigns Kick-off

    I missed the Jerry Deal and Terry Nagel campaign kick-off parties.  I was out of town for Jerry's and Terry's invite got lost in the mail.  But I was back for Ricardo Ortiz' kick-off which he held at his parents' house on Vancouver yesterday.  Today, Labor Day, is the traditional start of the Council campaigning and you should expect to see more lawn signs, door hangers, precinct walkers, mass mailings, etc from now to November 8th.  It's a three-way race since the fourth guy never actually filed to run.

    Ricardo Ortiz' kick-off speech was set up like a business person would report their results for the quarter:  what does the City need to do to increase revenue and what does it need to do to contain costs?  It's a nice approach that will play well in this economic environment.  Ortiz endorsed Measure E for school funding and the talk around the event was how Terry Nagel has alienated the school parents that used to support her.  Will that be enough of an opening to beat a candidate who has run strong before?  We'll see.  Here is Ortiz (on the right) delivering the opening salvo.

    Ricardo Kick-off1 

  • Multiple Violations found on Broadway. Evictions occur. House closed.

    The talk of the town up North is the closure and subsequent boarding up of what some coined "a meth house" at 1600 Broadway.  I don't have a lot of details, and like many of you, I don't WANT a lot of details.  I'm just glad it's closed.  Apparently having the BPD, the fire marshall and code enforcement tell everyone to leave because of code/fire violations was not enough, so the City had to have it boarded up to keep former residents from returning.  I do know the neighbors are pleased some action has happened, but it may take awhile to sort out.  Let me reiterate the need for us to just not "move the problem around" as I posted a couple of days ago.  Here's the front porch of a seemingly normal B'game bungalow that apparently had more than six "units" on the property.

    1600 Bway Meth House 

  • Hospital Playing Nice?

    The SF Examiner has an interesting piece on the Mills-Peninula Health Services' assertion that the hospital in San Mateo doesn't really benefit from the Downtown San Mateo Association's work to maintain and improve its downtown.

    Mills-Peninsula Vice President of Communications, Margie O’Claire, said the hospital wants the nearly $80,000 annual fee dropped to $25,000.

    “This program is designed to improve downtown,” O’Claire said. “We’re all for that, but it’s not going to have the same benefit for us,” she said.

    I'm not sure I buy that argument and it certainly isn't very good PR.  I'm guessing the hospital employees also benefit from a healthy, attractive downtown and that may help hiring and retention.

  • Caltrain Smooth Operator

    The news being reported in the Mercury Times that Caltrain is taking the second highest lowest (thanks KH) bid instead of the lowest, thus paying $4.8 million more per year for the next five years for operations isn't necessarily crazy or bad business.  There are often service-related reasons to pass over the low bid.  But if it is going to look for new taxes or more service cuts, it will have to do a better PR job than it's done here to sell the decision.

    What exactly "blew Caltrain's socks off?" 

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