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Published on 07/28/1999 All articles from this issue

Letters to the Editor

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Feeling the loss of John Kennedy Jr.

I was 6 months old when John F. Kennedy was shot to death in Dallas. I was 5 years old the June night in 1968 when Bobby Kennedy was shot and killed in Los Angeles. My sister, 16, was the only one still awake in our house, waiting for the primary results. She woke my parents, telling them another Kennedy was gone.

I was a small child. My memories formed out of things other people told me. Why then, last Saturday morning, did I stand in front of a television and cry?

I cried for a young man, and his wife and her sister, lost in the night. For their family, the people who loved them and for the things they will never do. I thought of his mother, grateful that she didn't have to endure this, too. I prayed for Caroline, for God has asked more of her than should be asked of anyone in a lifetime.

Then, I stopped. I thought of my emotions, and asked again. Why do I feel this so deeply? How could I grieve for a man I never met and did not know?

Perhaps it was because my father met his father, in a very different White House. Perhaps because I was a child born to Camelot, but raised in Watergate, and his family - unfairly, perhaps - bore the burden of America's expectations as the last vestige of that majestic, royal presidency. And perhaps it is because over the years, when I saw footage of the Kennedy family gathered, it reminded me of my own large, Irish Catholic family.

Finally, though, I think I cried because I felt like I knew him, and felt like I knew his father, his mother, his sister.

The phone rang at my house on Saturday morning and Saturday afternoon. Family members called; friends left messages. Someone close had been lost, yet how ironic it was someone we had never met.

Something tells me I'm not the only one who stood in front of a television on Saturday morning and cried.

Joanne ByrneLos Altos

City street policies out of the 19th century

Los Altos, like most communities, has a valuable asset in its streets and the use of streets' rights of way for delivering utilities. But it also has outmoded policies relating to those assets in that it looks at each use of the street separately rather than as a unified function. Hence streets are constantly being dug up for water, phone line, cable, sewage and other utility access.

The use of street rights of way has historically been given to individual firms to provide services to residents, with the result that we now have a group of monopolies and semi-monopolies that often supply only the minimal level of service necessary. For example, Los Altos is in the center of the most sophisticated technological area in the world. Yet it has no high-speed fiber Internet access. Its phone service is substantially behind that in other areas of the country. Most phone and power lines are still above ground after streets has been dug up several times for other utilities. Residents have little control over what channels they can access, and electricity and gas are essentially provided by a single firm.

As an economist I see the city as having a patchwork of 19th century policies to deal with 21st century conditions. What is needed is a study to develop a new plan and polices to cover this issue. The city should initiate such a study as soon as possible. If it is unwilling to pay for such an outside study, my guess is that there is enough expertise here that a pretty substantial policy analysis could be created by a volunteer group of residents.

William H. Brickner, Ph.D. Los Altos

Proper materials could greatly reduce noise

Having read the article about the street repaving to be done this fall, I wish to add some comments of my own.

During the 23 years we have lived in our house on South El Monte Avenue, the noise level from the traffic has increased year by year. I feel this repaving project presents an opportunity to reduce the sound level of tire noise by using rubberized paving material, which reduces tire noise by up to 50 percent compared to the asphalt called for in the specifications prepared for contractors' bids by city staff.

Another factor will be the increased traffic noise due to the proposed changes to the No. 52 bus service from Mountain View Caltrain Station to Foothill College.

When the new light rail station opens, the No. 52 route will change from an hourly service to a half-hourly service. Also, the hours of operation will be extended to 10 p.m. This means that instead of hearing the bus go by my house 23 times every weekday, it will pass by 62 times per day. This equals almost a 170-percent increase in cumulative noise due to this one source alone.

I hope our city engineering and street maintenance staff will consider these factors in deciding on the repaving materials and process. From talking to neighbors, I find that I am not alone in these concerns.

Terence H. HousemanLos Altos

Rubber the way to go

I wonder: Can't we afford a quieter road?

I read in the Town Crier, July 14, that among other streets, South El Monte will be repaved. For 50 years, I've been experiencing El Monte Road's noise, noise, noise - 70 percent of it is tire noise, noise, noise.

Bids will be unsealed next week. Work begins in September. Bid specs call for regular asphalt. It isn't quiet.

It's a window of opportunity. Roll it down, in your car, by Mountain View and Sunnyvale. For four years, they've had a quietly rubberized commercial district along El Camino Real, south from the Highway 85 freeway bridge. Palo Alto will have a rubberized, quiet, light industrial district on Page Mill from El Camino to 280.

Laying rubberized asphalt increases material and labor costs by what? Best case, 50 percent. It reduces tire noise by what? 50 percent? It wears longer by what? 30 percent? It reduces maintenance by what? 20 percent? Is it worth it? For peace? For quiet? For values?

George Hurst

Los Altos