My vision for Petaluma is a future of less cars and for driving slower. We spent the past 70 years building for more cars driving faster. But times are changing. Towns, cities and even Caltrans are building Complete Streets and preparing for a variety of transportation modes, not just one anymore.
Note that over the past 70 years we have planned and built for more cars and the result has been even more cars. You can’t build for more cars and reduce traffic. We’ll be hearing more, this election year, about how wonderful the Rainier Connector will be, for example. Then it will go away only to be dusted off yet again for the next election.
The population of Petaluma will continue to grow. Hasn’t stopped growing in over 200 years. More housing will continue to be built.
Meanwhile, let’s rebuild complete streets, encourage bicycle riding, support public transit and figure out what we have to do to make it easy to not have every trip in and out from the house be in a car. Its been done elsewhere. Take a look around. We can do it here. We are doing it here.
