During a Sept. 21 Monte Sereno City Council meeting, council members listened to Sohrab Rashid, a public engineer with Fehr & Peers transportation consultants, who also works contractually for the city of Saratoga. Rashid presented a bicycle lane and pedestrian facility and feasibility study. The study was not supportive of adding a multiuse path on the sides of the road for equestrian, athletic and outdoor use. However, it did illustrate the possibility of enhanced bike lanes, separate pedestrian paths, better crosswalks and the overall need for improvements to the corridor. The state route runs about four miles from Los Gatos Boulevard to Saratoga Avenue and is maintained by the California Department of Transportation.

Council members adopted the study and authorized a letter to Valley Transportation Authority requesting project funding for the improvements. Monte Sereno City Engineer Gordon Siebert said he's also working to obtain accident history on Highway 9 from the California Highway Patrol. Siebert said the purpose of the feasibility study was not to reach a definitive conclusion on how to improve safety on Highway 9, but to generate many potential solutions, collect data and pursue grant funding for the project from VTA.

Siebert said the next stage of the project is to obtain public input on what citizens hope to see in the outcome of the project and to install three electronic radar signs—one each in Saratoga, Monte Sereno and Los Gatos. Quoting Winston Churchill, Siebert said the project is not near its end; it is not even the beginning of the end.

"This is really just the end of the beginning," he said. "We've really just started on this."

Siebert commended Monte Sereno staff for being the "catalyst" to get the town of Los Gatos and city of Saratoga on board with the project. City Manager Brian Loventhal said road improvements to the highway are expected to cost about $1.7 million, but additional studies will allow this amount to be revised.

"There may have to be subsequent grant funding to this," Loventhal said.

Rashid recommended widening and narrowing the road in certain places, adding retaining walls, tree removals, speed limit reductions and median modifications, among others. The study also emphasized the benefits of narrowing parts of the road from four to two lanes to provide additional width on the shoulders, which would require the approval of Caltrans.

Rashid said he and one of his colleagues conducted a field review of the entire corridor on bicycles to determine locations with physical constraints that impede bike travel.

"Cleaning the shoulder would provide immediate improvement," said Rashid, adding that landscaping and maintenance is the responsibility of Caltrans.

Monte Sereno officials said they'll be pressuring Caltrans to take care of this as soon as possible.

"We're pleased the feasibility study has been completed," said Lana Malloy, co-founder of Citizens for Highway 9 Safety, stressing the importance of immediate, comprehensive shoulder cleaning. "The amount of debris covering the side of the road makes it dangerous."

Malloy and fellow Monte Sereno resident JoAnne Peth started the organization after accidents on the highway recently killed two people.