Car-Free Streets: Cal Ave. & Ramona Street

Uplift Local

Project Description

There are several efforts underway that focus on enhancing the community experience and economic vibrancy of Palo Alto. These efforts also support the City's Uplift Local initiative. The Car-free Streets effort focuses on a portion of California Avenue and a half-block of Ramona Street. This is a Council-supported effort enabling outdoor dining, retail, and personal services in business districts such as California Avenue and the downtown core. Currently, California Avenue is open to pedestrians and closed to through vehicle traffic from El Camino Real to Birch Street. Ramona Street is also open to pedestrians and closed to vehicle traffic for a half block in between Hamilton Avenue and University Avenue. The City Council authorized Car-free Streets early in the COVID-19 pandemic as an economic recovery effort and to provide community members with outdoor spaces to gather.  

Project Status 

The purpose of the Car Free Streets Implementation Plan is to advance the City Council’s November 6, 2023 direction to maintain California Avenue as a car-free street with the current areas of street closure to be made permanent. This effort furthers the first guiding principle of the City’s comprehensive economic development strategy, specifically the first guiding principle which is to “Reinforce each districts’ distinct scale and offerings by…embracing California Avenue as a community and neighborhood serving place.”

The City contracted with Urban Field Studio, a design consultant, to advance this work, focusing on signage and branding, outdoor dining guidelines, circulation and access, streetscape design, legislative and environmental clearance options, an implementation plan and community engagement. 

Action Minutes from the November 6, 2023 City Council Meeting.

Community & Merchant Engagement

Community Engagement

Thank you to all community members who came out to join staff and Urban Field Studio at the May 16 outdoor in-person workshop. More community engagement is being planned, including the launch of an online survey, Summer and Fall community workshops to hear updates and gain input and staff and the design team will be out at community events this summer. Additional details will be added here.

Monthly Merchants Meetings

Staff and Urban Field Studio are meeting with Cal Ave. merchants monthly to address near-term improvements and plan the future design of the car-free portion of Cal Ave. and expanding outreach Citywide in May as noted above. 

February: At the end of February staff and Urban Field Studio met with Cal Ave. merchants to introduce the design team, the project timeline, scope of services and Urban Field Studio’s initial impressions of Cal Ave. Staff presented merchant priorities for near-term improvements. Review the presentation.(PDF, 20MB)

March: At the end of March staff and Urban Field Studio conducted an in-person workshop on place identity, branding, wayfinding and signage, with an update on near-term improvements to replace the temporary barriers. The workshop located on Cal Ave. with 14 Cal Ave merchants attending gained feedback on: what attracts residents and visitors to Cal Ave.; visual preferences for signage; and functional signage needs and desires. Merchants were updated on the status of cleaning, maintenance, and near-term projects.

April: At the end of April, staff and Urban Field Studio meet in-person with Cal Ave. merchants at Gamelandia. Staff updated the merchants on near-term improvement concepts for Cal Ave. at El Camino Real, Ash Street and Birch Street comprised of colored paving, planters, signage and bollards, including an implementation timeline over the next several months with a targeted completion of Fall 2024. Urban Field Studio outlined their design brief and next steps on place identity, signage, and wayfinding. Urban Field Studio engaged merchants on vision, goals and design preferences to inform the design of street concepts for the future of Cal Ave. Review the presentation.(PDF, 17MB)

May: On May 28, City staff, Urban Field Studio and Kimley-Horn conducted an in-person merchant workshop on Cal Ave at Gamelandia. Merchants provided feedback on proposed place identity signage concepts and mapping of circulation needs, issues and opportunities. Staff participated in the 45 annual Evergreen Park neighborhood block party, hearing resident interests regarding vacant storefronts, desire for California Avenue to have neighborhood serving uses, questions on pedestrian safety and how to create a slow-speed bike infrastructure, support for the farmers’ market, interest in having places to go where you don’t have to pay, and other topics.

June: On June 25, City staff and Urban Field Studio presented the approach to framing alternatives for preliminary design to Cal Ave. merchants. This was framed as three potential levels of change for street design and programming to meet City Council objectives: minimal change, focused improvements and reimagining the street. Merchants provided their priorities on draft evaluation criteria covering economic vitality, mobility, and community social and cultural life.

July: On July 30, City staff and Urban Field Studio conducted a Merchant workshop on outdoor patio guidelines and standards. Staff summarized City Council direction and considerations with adapting the City’s on-going parklet program to Cal Ave.'s unique context. Urban Field Studio presented example guidelines from Mountain View and a range of potential outdoor dining design elements. The workshop activity focused on merchant preferences regarding desirable and undesirable design elements for overhead shelter, patio enclosures, seating, merchandising, lighting, planting, branding, safety, customer needs, trash and recycling.

Utilities Project on and around Cal Ave

In December 2023, the City's Utilities Department started a Water Main Replacement project (WMR 29) to replace aging pipelines and infrastructure in and around the California Avenue Business District. Construction is planned to end in August 2024. Specific to the car-free portion of Cal Ave., the project will impact the north side of the street landscaped median at the intersection of California Avenue and El Camino Real, beginning in mid-January 2024 through early February 2024. This is the current site of Putter's Mini Golf. Staff is working with nearby businesses and the mini golf vendor to coordinate and mitigate impacts to all. 

Past Meetings

On November 6, 2023, the City Council voted to make portions of California Avenue and Ramona Street permanently car-free, plus directed staff to implement center-running bike lanes and outdoor dining/patio guidelines on Cal Ave., install signage and a branding program, among other things. For the Meeting Action Minutes, follow this [LINK

Additionally, in late 2022 and early 2023, the City hosted a series of meetings to solicit local stakeholder and community perspective regarding current issues, opportunities for change, and potential near-term projects for Cal Ave. and Ramona Street. Below is a summary of the engagement efforts, plus survey data and meeting materials from past community meetings. 

Locations

Cal-Ave_20231016_Final_Page_1.jpg

Cal-Ave_20231016_Final_Page_2.jpg

Ramona-St_20231016_Final.jpg