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For the past two decades, Mountain View has been wanting to make improvements for bicyclists and pedestrians at the Middlefield Road and State Route 237 interchange, a major intersection at the eastern edge of the city with a history of vehicle collisions. The project is now a step closer to reality after City Council members gave their stamp of approval last month.
In a 3-0 vote, the Council Transportation Committee backed a staff recommendation to move forward with a concept design for bicycle and pedestrian upgrades on Middlefield Road, from Logue Avenue to the eastbound SR-237 offramp. The project would also include portions of the westbound and eastbound frontage roads that run along SR-237.
“The intent of the project is to reduce collision conflicts and improve pedestrian and bicycle mobility and activity,” said Senior Civil Engineer Joy Houghton, who presented the design to council members on June 16.
Some of the proposed upgrades include protected bike lanes, widened sidewalks and traffic calming measures.
The improvements are expected to cost $24.8 million and are fully funded, according to the city staff report. The bulk of the money comes from a sales tax measure that Santa Clara County voters passed in 2016.
The City Council is expected to vote on the interchange design in the fall. If given the green light, the plan would then need approval from the California Department of Transportation, which oversees SR-237.
Caltrans is not the only agency involved in the project. The city is also paying the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority up to $4 million to provide project management services.
The Council Transportation Committee, composed of Alison Hicks, Ellen Kamei and John McAlister, expressed support for the proposed upgrades, noting that major housing growth is expected in the area. There are plans for an eight-story apartment complex down the street at 490 E. Middlefield Road as well as a massive office and housing project at 675 and 685 E. Middlefield Road.
“It has been a place where people just drove to the office and then drove away,” Hicks said. “We’re trying to transform it into something else.”
The Middlefield Road/SR-237 interchange
Currently, the junction of Middlefield Road and SR-237 is a tricky one. The area has four traffic signal intersections within a roughly 1,000 foot stretch of Middlefield Road between Logue Avenue and the eastbound SR-237 off-ramp. That contributes to a lot of broadside collisions, Houghton said.
The Middlefield Road and SR-237 intersection also operates as a “partial interchange,” only having an eastbound off-ramp and a westbound on-ramp. The other access points to SR-237 are at Maude Avenue, which also is a partial interchange.
From 2005 through 2020, the city collected collision data in the project area. There were 101 collisions recorded during that time period, according to the staff report. Roughly 75% of the collisions occurred at Middlefield Road and SR-237 ramps.
The interchange also is challenging for bicyclists and pedestrians. There are bike lanes in both directions and four-to-six feet sidewalks along Middlefield Road; however, the area is “significantly constrained” and the existing sidewalk widths “do not meet current best practices,” according to the staff report.
The new interchange design seeks to improve safety and accessibility. The proposed upgrades include the construction of protected bike lanes on Middlefield Road, directly around the SR-237 junction. The lanes would extend north of Ferguson Drive and south of eastbound Frontage Road.
The city also plans to put in protected bike lanes and widen sidewalks along the westbound frontage road between Middlefield Road and Maude Avenue. Traffic calming measures are slated for that part of the frontage road as well, including narrowed vehicle lanes, raised medians, radar feedback signs, pavement markings and landscaping.
Other improvements include protected intersections on Middlefield Road at the westbound and eastbound SR-237 ramps and at Ferguson Drive. The intersections will have realigned bicycle approaches, new crossings and modified curb ramps. The new intersections will also include technology improvements, like “modified traffic signal operations with separate bicycle and pedestrian signal phases,” according to the staff report.
If the preliminary designs are approved by the City Council and Caltrans, work on finalizing the design will begin in early 2027 and is expected to be finished in summer 2028. It is anticipated that construction will then take two years to complete, according to the staff report.
Separately, Mountain View also is planning upgrades along a 1.6-mile portion of Middlefield Road from Moffett Boulevard to Bernardo Avenue, near the Sunnyvale border. That project will include protected bike lanes, high visibility crosswalks, modified curb ramps and repaving.
In the image, the purple regions show 237 on/off ramps highlighted, with some bicycle areas shown in red. The bike lanes are to be “protected” possibly. How? The raised white plastic ballasts every couple feet?
At an existing (recent) bike line addition to expressway-to-local-coordor offramp, 85 (expressway) going onto 82 (El Camino Real) in Mountain View, there’s a death trap created by obstructed view caused by those white ballasts that visually but flimsily “protect” the bike lane. Try merging onto 82 and look left to check for traffic. You can’t! (Depending on your vehicle). You can see oncoming bikes but NOT ONCOMING CARS. The death trap is for cars coming from an expressway onto the local road.
From the side (or the birds eye view for the plan designers/approvers), the spacing looks like you should be able to see through the “bike lane protection”. But for the CAR that is MERGING, it BLINDS THE DRIVER OF THE LANE THEY ARE MERGING INTO. Someone didn’t go stand where this was or simulate it in 3D first. Shame.
Please remediate that one, and DON’T DO THE SAME THING HERE, if that’s what’s planned (the description doesn’t say what kind of bike lane protection AFAICT).
Those are bollards, not “ballasts.”
Thank you for the correction. Indeed.
You’re driving too fast. The ramp onto el Camino is plenty long if you are coming off the ramp at 25mph.
No. You must be thinking of a different merge, probably the merge coming from the other direction at the same junction. I’m talking about being fully stopped (0 mph) and waiting for oncoming traffic to be clear. Definitely, the one merging on to ECR is not “driving too fast” if they are fully stopped, in the scenario and location I’m talking about.
To improve the safety at ECR and SR 85 they should signalize the intersections and get rid of the slip lanes/merge lanes on ECR. That helps both vehicle and vulnerable road user safety.
Middlefield and SR 237 is already signalized.