Supplemental No. 8 AGENDA ITEM #6.B Distributed 9/19/17 18 Sept, 2017 To: Los Altos Hills Mayor Waldeck and Members of the Los Altos Hills City Council Re: 27333 Ursula Lane request for pathway removal Dear All, Please note that I am a member of the Pathways Committee but the views expressed below are my personal views and not intended to represent those of the Pathways Committee. I would like to ask you to stand by the ordinances, plans, and recommendations of our Town with regard to the request for removal of the path at 27333 Ursula Ln. This path has been a longstanding goal of the Pathways System and was approved on the 2005 Off Road Path Plan and the current draft of the Master Pathways Plan. It also existed as a well-used native path for decades, and provides an important connection from the outlet of the Stegner Path on Edgerton Rd to Ursula Ln and Westwind Barn. It was a condition of development for the property. Please do not undermine the Pathways System and process by granting an exception to building this important path. What is this about? The property at 27333 Ursula Lane is currently under development. When reviewed in 2016, the Pathways Committee and Planning Commission both requested an off-road path to be developed on the property at the time of construction. This connection is important to hikers and equestrians since it effectively connects Westwind Barn/Byrne Preserve to the Stegner Path, one of the longest and most beautiful off-road paths in town. The Stegner Path in turn connects to the NW side of town, where there are numerous backyard pastures, as well as connections to the Town Arena and Arastradero Preserve. There is also a planned path along Ursula in the Master Path Plan, which would connect the path in question to Black Mountain near Westwind. These pathways connections are integral to the Pathways System as a whole, for recreation and for connecting areas of town. The house on the property is under development and the currently proposed path was designed along the NW border, but per the current property owner, the cost to install it would be prohibitive. The owner requested that the pathway requirement be removed. Both the Pathways Committee and the Planning Commission declined this request and voted to keep the path requirement for the property under construction. However, the issue is now up for your consideration by appeal. A connection through this property has been part of the Pathways vision for decades, and existed as a popular native path until quite recently, so the terrain is clearly not too steep for a path. (In fact, areas of the very popular Stegner Path are much steeper). The prior property
owner was given a choice of where to build the path, and had a change of heart with regard to the pathway after the house was mostly built. Pathways are an important requirement for developing properties in our town. The requirement was well known to the developer, and to my mind, failing to honor the path commitment at this point, (especially when it was a condition of development) is not acceptable. Our Pathways System requires everyone to give a little to create a network of paths that all town residents can enjoy. We should not undermine the system and years of hard work and planning by allowing individual owners to avoid fulfilling the requirements of development in our town. Why can t horse riders just use the road on Edgerton? The best analogy I can come up with is that it s like walking on ice. If you re coordinated, the surface of the ice is rough, you have shoes with good traction, and it s not too steep a grade up or down, you can certainly walk on ice with no problem. However, if any of these factors are sub-optimal there is a much higher risk that you will slip, and when you do it is likely to result in serious injury. This analogy applies to horses trying to navigate Edgerton, which is slippery for shod horses, steep, and a challenge for some horses that are not as coordinated as others. As a result it is dangerous for some horses and riders, both of whom may be seriously injured in a fall. Horses vary in coordination and ability. Some are more coordinated than others. The surface of roads also varies. The rough older roads give more traction, and the newly paved, very slippery ones do not. Many horses (I would hazard a guess of 50%) wear shoes, which is a metal plate nailed to their foot. These protect the feet from wearing down, but give much worse traction on paved surfaces. This is why it is not safe for horses to have no option but pavement on a hill like Edgerton. While riding my current horse I use it only to go uphill, which I find safer, but it is really not ideal in either direction. Edgerton Rd also has no path, so equestrians are stuck riding in the road itself. It has a blind turn just before the Stegner Path outlet. Although there s not a lot of traffic, I have certainly surprised (and been surprised by) fast moving cars cruising around the turn, not expecting to see horses in the road. Either the connection to Ursula or a path on Edgerton is absolutely necessary for safe thoroughfare. Our Pathways System is designed to allow for safe non-vehicular travel. Currently the Stegner Path ends abruptly with no further path connection at all. I believe this seriously undermines the value of one of our nicest paths, as well as other paths to which is should connect.
View of blind curve from Stegner Path outlet View of Edgerton after turn no path and steep hill Was there really a path there before? I rode my horses on the native path connecting Edgerton to Ursula since I was in my tweens, so I can personally attest to its existence for well over two decades. It was never a built, or IIB path, but rather a native dirt path. The path started on Edgerton just across from the Stegner Path outlet, and if you look carefully you can still see the outline of the path there. It went straight (parallel to the creek bed) for a short way, then angled right up the hill, and then took a left turn up out of the trees into what was an open field. At that point it went through the area where the house currently sits. Roughly 3-4 years ago a fence was placed around the perimeter of the open area, which effectively blocked the path at the point where you came out of the woods into the field. For this reason the path has not been in use recently. The connection just across from the Stegner path worked very well, and made a long length of safe, off-road pathway connecting those in the rest of town with Westwind Barn. It felt safe enough that even as a small child my neighbor rode up there weekly for her Pony Club lessons, and my friends and I certainly used it regularly it to access Westwind Barn and the Byrne Preserve paths. The path came out near the bottom of Ursula Ln, and there was another native path along Ursula on the East side of the road. This took you to Black Mountain at the turn just before it connects with Altamont and Westwind Barn.
Red line: Estimate of the location of previous path (looking from Edgerton opposite Stegner outlet) Red line: Estimate of previous route along Ursula
Red line: Previous route from Ursula to Black Mountain Path (Altamont intersection at Westwind Barn at green arrow) Are there alternative options for the path location? Since it was a well-functioning native path that would cost almost nothing to install, the owners could reinstate the original path from Edgerton at the North end of the property. Obviously the house now in construction blocks the section where the path used to cross the open field. However, once out of the trees there is still enough space to place a path around the South side of the house, and even room for landscaping as a screen. It would cut close to the back of the garage, but in my opinion this option [blue line below] would have significantly less impact on the house overall, since the house faces North. Another option [black line below] would be to utilize the original path from Edgerton but have it angle East, across the conservation easement, to meet up with the currently proposed path along the North side of the property. A native path here could meander around trees without great amounts of grading or harming tree roots. In addition, if it started where the prior path met Edgerton, it would be a much clearer connection to the Stegner Path. This option would need to go over a culvert directing water from the next-door property, but I believe this culvert is planned regardless. The currently proposed location (staying along the north-west side of the property) is not as desirable because it does not meet up with the Stegner Path directly, but is also very feasible from an equestrian perspective.
Any of these options would be good candidates for trail builders to shape manually, since they could meander and have lower impact on trees if built as native paths. Red line: Previous native path (continuation to Stegner and Black Mountain paths shown) Blue dotted line: Rough estimate of option for path around south side of house Black dotted line: Rough estimate of option for path using currently proposed line from Ursula but cutting across conservation easement to meet Stegner Path and avoid unnecessary grading. In Sum Many of us have been waiting for years for this path to re-open. Wherever the final location, as long as it connects Edgerton to Ursula it will be of great use and value. Please stand by the vision, town ordinances and plans developed over many decades, and require that this path be developed to provide the essential connection from Westwind Barn to the Stegner Path. There is absolutely no reason that this property should be the exception to the rule, and it will make a mockery of the planning system and conditions of development (not to speak of the work invested in the Master Path Plan) if the path is forfeited at this point. If you ve gotten this far I really appreciate the time you have taken to read this Kind regards, Alisa Bredo, Los Altos Hills resident