On August 10, 2026, the San Carlos City Council approved the last open piece of the Crestview Drive Pilot Improvements Project, the redesign of the intersection at Los Vientos Way. The whole 2.2-mile corridor is now in final design, from just north of Edgewood Road to Hallmark Drive at the Belmont line. What residents get next year is paint, flexible posts, buffered bike lanes, about 20 marked or new crossings and a roundabout at Edmonds. Before any of it is installed, the city has also written down the speed and yielding numbers the road has to reach once it's in place.
That second part changes how to read everything else. The Crestview you drive in 2027 is a trial with a scorecard. It is not the finished road.
Why the hill gets paint instead of speed humps
Crestview Drive is a designated arterial and an emergency response route. It has a steep downhill grade and wide travel lanes, and the city's own project page says those lanes contribute to persistent speeding. The city has already put up permanent and temporary radar feedback signs. They produced useful data but didn't solve the problem.
The usual tools don't apply to a road like this. Federal guidance and the city's Neighborhood Traffic Management Plan both advise against speed humps on an arterial. Stop signs have their own limits. The city's FAQ says the intersections studied don't meet state criteria, and that unwarranted stop signs can lower compliance, increase crashes and slow emergency response.
That leaves narrowing the road. The bike lanes are the main way the city plans to do it. In the FAQ's words, bike lanes "help narrow the roadway, which reduces speeds and improves safety for all users, not just cyclists." So the bike lanes are a speed tool first. That explains why they're on a hill that some survey respondents said hardly anyone bikes.
What the road will actually look like
The typical cross-section in the April 2026 conceptual plans has these dimensions:
- 11-foot vehicle lanes, one in each direction
- 5-foot bike lanes
- 3-foot painted buffers
- 8-foot parking lanes along the curb
The bike lane runs between moving traffic and parked cars. The city's project page calls them Class IIB buffered bike lanes, and the Daily Journal's coverage describes them as unprotected. One later news report described the buffers as 30 feet. That's a typo. The drawings label them 3 feet.
The biggest change for drivers comes between Brittan Avenue and north La Mesa Drive, where the second northbound lane is removed. Along the corridor, 18 existing crossings get marked crosswalks. Two new crossings get curb ramps and rectangular rapid flashing beacons, and one of those is a midblock crossing serving Vista Park. The named crossing locations are Club Drive, Vista Park, Melendy Drive, Brittan Avenue, La Mesa Drive north, and La Mesa Drive south at Crestview Court.
At the south end, Crestview and Edmonds Road/Drive get a single-lane roundabout. A 2024 study and preliminary design found it would improve both safety and traffic operations there. Fire trucks have been the obvious worry. The design includes a mountable truck apron, and the city says it has been tested with fire apparatus.
The intersection the council sent back
The council's May 11 vote approved almost the entire corridor. Los Vientos Way was the exception. The April concept had put a traffic circle there. Councilmember Sara McDowell opposed it, saying drivers might not yield and accident risk could go up. Councilmember Neil Layton said speed reduction had to stay the priority.
Staff and the city's traffic engineering consultant, Kimley-Horn, studied alternatives and came back in August with a design that drops the circle. The new design includes:
- A concrete bulb-out with directional curb ramps to shorten the crossing
- Painted bulb-outs with flexible delineators, plus green bike-lane striping through the intersection
- A high-visibility ladder crosswalk with a pedestrian-activated RRFB
- Red curb daylighting at every crosswalk approach
- A mountable center median curb inside the double yellow line to keep drivers from drifting into the oncoming lane
The crosswalk has a specific destination. At the August meeting, staff described it as connecting people walking to the Top of the World viewpoint and nearby trail access. The San Mateo Daily Journal reported that the crossing will feed directly into the recently opened Los Vientos trail.
The tradeoff is curb space. At the August meeting, the city's consultant estimated the changes would remove the equivalent of about 21 parking spaces along the east side, plus some parking at the west-side bulb-outs. Council discussion identified three affected properties. Vice Mayor Adam Rak asked about the parking loss, and McDowell said directly affected residents should get a design diagram in future outreach. If you live near Los Vientos and park on the street, this is the part of the project that will affect you most.
The numbers the pilot has to hit
Most traffic projects get built and then judged by feel. This one has an evaluation memo that sets targets before installation. The city will do a single round of data collection no earlier than 18 months after installation and compare it with baseline conditions.
The memo lists the counts:
- Turning movement counts at Edmonds, La Mesa, Brittan, Melendy and Club
- Seven-day speed, volume and vehicle class counts, bikes included, on four segments: Edgewood to Brittan, Brittan to Melendy, Melendy to Los Vientos, and Los Vientos to Club
- City collision data and an online community survey
And these are the targets the results will be measured against:
| Measure | Target |
|---|---|
| 85th-percentile speed | Within 5 mph of the posted limit, or down at least 3 mph |
| Average speed | Down at least 3 mph |
| Share of drivers speeding | Down at least 25% |
| Drivers 10+ mph over the limit | Down at least 40% |
| Driver yielding at improved crossings | At least 80% |
| Fatal collisions | Zero |
| Severe-injury crashes | Down 50% |
According to the memo, no single metric decides the outcome, and speed and safety carry the most weight. The memo also says the collision results will be read cautiously, because the study period and crash counts are small. The May presentation cites a fatal collision in March 2021 and eight reported collisions, without stating what period the eight covers.
The documents I reviewed don't give a baseline 85th-percentile speed or the posted limit. They show the corridor's speed and volume data was collected in December 2023, between Edgewood and Club. When the post-installation numbers come in, that 2023 count is presumably what they'll be measured against. Residents can ask the city for it now.
When it happens and what it costs
| Milestone | Date |
|---|---|
| Speed and volume baseline collected | December 2023 |
| Turning counts / field observations | September 2025 / October 2025 |
| Council approves corridor, minus Los Vientos | May 11, 2026 |
| Council approves revised Los Vientos design | August 10, 2026 |
| Design completion, per the Daily Journal | About January 2027 |
| Repaving and installation | Spring 2027 per the city; Daily Journal says likely summer 2027 |
| Evaluation window, per city presentation | Spring 2027 to late 2028 |
The May postcard had shown construction in Summer/Fall 2026. Later city material replaced that with Spring 2027, timed to the repaving, and the city notes that dates can still shift. The project page says adjacent properties and all modes of travel may see temporary impacts during installation, and it gives no lane-closure plan or detour route.
On cost, the May staff report estimated about $1.8 million combined for the pilot and the coordinated pavement and striping work, with about $450,000 more needed to fund the full scope. By August, staff said the Los Vientos revision needed no new money. They expect to request about $430,000 for the remaining unfunded pilot work when the contract goes to bid award. That bid award is the next council date to watch.
Why the design can still change
The city chose temporary materials because they can be adjusted. Paint and flexible posts let it test how the design performs and make changes before considering anything permanent. The community survey shows there's a real debate to settle. Results were 58% in favor of the corridor design and 42% against. Supporters pointed to speeding, missing crossings and visibility. Opponents mentioned congestion, light bicycle use, the steep grades and unfamiliarity with roundabouts. Other comments asked for stop signs at Melendy or for physically protected bike lanes. Several supported crossings near Top of the World, Melendy and Edgewood Park.
One alternative was raised at the dais and is already on the record. Councilmember John Dugan objected to using bike lanes as traffic calming and suggested swapping the bike lanes and parking, so parked cars would shield cyclists. Staff and the designers cited visibility at driveways as a concern with that layout. Since the pilot is built to be revised, that idea could come back if the bike lane numbers disappoint. Questions go to Senior Traffic Engineer Hanieh Houshmandi at [email protected] or 650-802-4200.
I've lived in San Carlos a long time and driven Crestview more times than I could count. I'll keep reporting on this one as the bid award, the installation date and the first evaluation numbers come in. If you live along the corridor and want to talk about how the Los Vientos parking changes or the Brittan-to-La Mesa lane removal might affect your street, call me at Bob Bredel. I'm glad to walk through what's in the plans.
