Dear Council Members,
I sincerely wish that I could join today's City Council meeting, but
unfortunately, I am stuck in meetings. Nonetheless, I wanted to briefly
write in ardent support of the measure to designate Quiet Zones in Menlo
Park. Simply put, there is no action the city could take in any arena
that could have a more beneficial impact on the life and well-being of
my family than to pass a measure prohibiting train horns with the
exception of emergencies.
I have lived off of Alma Lane, behind the train station, for eight
years. My wife is an oncology fellow at Stanford and I am a cancer
researcher. Without exaggeration, I can say that I have not had six
straight hours of sleep in years. My wife frequently has to see patients
with minimal sleep. She treats nearly every COVID-positive oncology
patient (she has a high degree of expertise as she was a resident in NY
city during the surge there last March). During meeting and patient
visits that we are able to conduct from home, the train horns are highly
disruptive, to say the least. Yet far and away, the biggest impediment
has been to our sleep and ability to perform during the day, as we both
work nearly every day on-site (including weekends, holidays, etc.).
There was even an instance where a stationary train blasted its horn
long before the crossing signals started or gates came down and my wife
was driving across the tracks. She was so startled that she slammed the
brakes causing us to get rear ended. This is not the end of the world
since everybody was moving slowly, but these types of accidents are
completely avoidable.
My wife and I are trainees, but soon enough will have salaries that
enable us to move homes. Trying to raise children by these horns will be
impossible. We are fortunate enough to have careers that should enable
us to afford to move to somewhat more expensive housing away from the
noise, but this is not the reality for so many residents of Menlo Park.
Our neighbors are truly dear to us. It saddens me to know how much these
factors widen the inequality that residents of the Bay Area face. Most
of the people who live in these environments are barely able to pay
their rents as is; COVID has cost them their jobs. They will never be
able to move to more expensive housing. While the horns might seem like
a small factor, anybody who lives near these trains sounding their horns
all day and night can assure you that it has significant effects on
their health.
It is not in my nature to argue on behalf of these types of changes. I'm
not the type of person who leaves online restaurant reviews or even gets
particularly involved in municipal politics (outside of voting), but as
I said, there is no change the city could make that I believe could have
a more beneficial effect on the residents of downtown Menlo Park than to
institute these quiet zones.
We are truly appreciative of your consideration of this measure and
thank you for taking the time to read my thoughts.
Best Regards,
Nathan Reticker-Flynn
--
Nathan E. Reticker-Flynn
Stanford University
