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June 3, 2026 Ms. Rachel Phillips Assistant Planning Director City of Mesa 20 East Main Street Mesa, Arizona 85201 Transmitted Via Email Dear Ms. Phillips: Thank you for the opportunity for Valley Partnership to meet with you and your team last week to discuss the City’s proposed 2026 Zoning Code Refinement. As you know, Valley Partnership, representing 350 Company Partners and almost 2,000 Members advocating for responsible development, has worked for decades in collaboration with municipalities, including Mesa, to craft and support policies that create clarity and certainty in the development process. We want to recognize and thank you and your team for sharing these proposed Zoning Code amendments with the development community. Additionally, we truly appreciate your willingness to quickly schedule a meeting with us to clarify the questions we had, as well as your knowledgeable responses. Thank you for continuing to work with us in partnership. Please don’t hesitate to contact me with any questions. Sincerely, Clark Princell President & CEO Cc: Scott Butler, Mesa City Manager Nana Appiah, Development Services Director This Message Is From an External Sender Use caution when clicking links, attachments, or responding to information requests. Report Suspicious From: Mesa Development Services To: Long Range Planning Subject: Proposed Text Amendments Comment Date: Sunday, June 21, 2026 11:06:47 PM Proposed Text Amendments Comment Name Jacob Cluff Are you submitting feedback as a: Architect / Engineer I have a comment or question regarding: 2026 Zoning Code Refinement 11-30-8(D) - Safety is extremely important and looking at the losses - of life and money - caused by accidents on the ADOT website is sobering. As cars have gotten faster and larger and drivers have become more distracted, looking at how safety can be improved for all is very important. However, I think that there are a number of ways to go about it. Consider an American city and a Dutch city as automobiles were introduced. Both, prior to the vehicles, were walkable and human scaled. Both, as vehicles were introduced, experienced a high number of automobile-related deaths, particularly among children. Residents in both cities organized and pushed back against the large and fast metal machines with limited visibility that were killing their children. In one, automakers flipped the narrative: Streets that had been for people were now for vehicles, and it was the pedestrians' responsibility to ensure safety. Since then, policies that shape our environments have been adopted 2026 Zoning Code Refinement - please indicate the draft code section and your questions/comments using this perspective and 'improved safety' has been achieved by strictly segregating motorists and pedestrians. By creating systems where variables are removed, automobile deaths have decreased, but at the loss of walkable and human scaled cities and the creation of some truly desolate and hostile places for anyone that is not in a vehicle. Also, they only work as long as variables are not introduced. As soon as someone walks into the street, or when a distracted driver strays from their designated space, lives and property are in danger. If it wasn't clear, this city is, unfortunately, the American one. Back to the Dutch one. There, it was decided that safety would not come at the expense of walkable cities or the children who played on the streets with their friends. Streets are designed to accommodate pedestrians, cyclists, and yes, even motorists. They are quieter and have far fewer accidents. How? By having many variables (pedestrians, cyclists, trees, speed bumps, planters, and the reason that I'm writing all this; bollards). These variables create 'friction' and drivers automatically slow down. This principle is seen in our American city too: Imagine a highway that has closed the shoulder or a lane. Cars in the adjacent lane move slower because of the perceived narrowing of the driving area. The closed lane does so much more to lower vehicle speeds than any amount of signs or paint will. However, if I had to pick between the two, I would pick the narrow streets, trees and concrete planter bollards over the traffic cones. The leadership in some cities must feel similarly, because I've seen instances where streets are being modified to be more pedestrian friendly and, in the process, safer. Instead of segregating automobile space and pedestrian space, they've put them on the same level (literally). By raising certain areas of the street and placing bollards on the edges, there is more friction for motorists, but less for pedestrians. This can be observed in our Dutch city (any will do), Madrid, Denver, Tempe, and even Mesa (the parking lot at Dana Park features a gentle slope from the sidewalk to the drive aisle and is separated with concrete planters with flowers in them). Again, I want to be safe. I want Mesa to be safe. And I believe that we can achieve this while also becoming a more walkable and human scaled city. I feel that bollards are a crucial tool for this. So, when I see that bollards are being removed as an option and that segregated spaces that are frictionless for motorists and that we've seen fail time and time again are being further codified in the name of safety, I have to ask: Who is it safer for? Please don't say the cyclists who are getting scythed down as distracted drivers cross a line of paint and maybe a 'candlestick' that was designed to break on impact. Or the pedestrians who understand the inherent danger of stepping down from the curb onto the asphalt and who run to the other side of the street (and around the car that didn't come to a complete stop until it was halfway through the crosswalk) at an intersection despite that a walk sign is on. I hope that we can pause for a moment and look at how other cities (or even our own, as referenced above) have been able to achieve safety for all users on their streets while also making them more pleasant spaces to be, and then refine our code in a way that allows those success to be replicated. Fleet-Based Services & Service Station Text Amendments - please indicate the draft code section and your questions/comments Please provide your general question/comments Would you like a response to your question(s)? Yes Would you like to be notified of future public meetings? Yes Email jacobcluff92@gmail.com Help articles | Support portal Forms & Workflow is a Granicus product.