Menlo Park considers regulating newspaper boxes

The homeless people that congregate near Starbucks use these as their personal lockers. Go open one of the free ones up and see for yourself.

Please do not allow newspaper boxes to line the sidewalk on the street side near a crosswalk as it blocks the driver's view of pedestrians. A good example of this is Santa Cruz and El Camino in front of the store that sells artwork on the corner. Cars making a right turn there seem eager to plow down pedestrians. The wide street light placed there in the 80s, I think, doesn't help either.

No, we are not getting rid of newspaper boxes. The Almanac is in one of those, not to mention several other useful publications. These boxes are also a testimony to a lot of low paid journalists doing a lot of work for the lucky good. If there are problems with how the boxes are being used that then needs to change. There can be licensing , registration and monitoring by the city and business owners. The solution is not to get rid of newspaper boxes.

I agree that they should not be removed, but they need to be placed in locations that do not pose a safety hazard like the newspaper boxes located on the street side of a sidewalk near a pedestrian crosswalk that block the view of pedestrians from motorists, such as the boxes on Santa Cruz and El Camino near the art store. Another hazard is the newspaper box on Menlo Ave. against the Applewood Pizza building. One of the box door's is always hanging down and is a definite safety hazard. The hinge seems to be broken and will not close. The boxes need to be maintained.

The newspaper boxes are also unsightly and impede foot traffic and grocery carts next to Trader Joe's facing Menlo Avenue. I think many of the boxes are unused. They should be removed from this location and possibly some can be relocated elsewhere.

I agree that many of the boxes are unsightly and ill-maintained. I support a more uniform appearance.

However, there are first amendment issues in play, and any new system must respect the right of news organizations to have free and equal access to distribution locations. There's a pretty good article on the intersection of first amendment rights and the regulation of newsstands here:

Web Link

steve taffee

I get newspapers all the,time.
Suggestions/comments:
1) Please tell the Daily News to delivered to ALL boxes on Fridays and require the delivery person to remove any trash in. They are pretty unsightly like the in front of Starbucks in El Camino corner of Roble.
2) As others have said there are bins that never have anything in them that should be removed.
3)The vendors probably need to replace most of them. It's obvious they are very old.
Sorry I couldn't make the meeting tonight.

These boxes are unsightly period. These small, as they call themselves newspapers, are a front for real estate advertisement. Newspapers that are nationally recognized, I agree, should remain. But these small advertisement papers, Almanac, and Daily Post, (a gossip format) should fall under a different classification by either the city or county, and be charged high fees for what they are: A spread of advertisements for real estate and a gossip form, here in locally. They should be on line media, and save those trees.

This seems like a Catch 22 issue, that is, NOBODY seems to want to step up to the plate and take responsibility or ownership. As I understand it, the City has NO idea who owns the green colored group racks and the newspapers that use them claim that they are not there's either. Hence, the newspaper racks just sit there month after month and year after year and continue to accomulate graffiti, dirt, grim, disrepair, spiker webs, broken equipment, etc. Perhaps its a problem without a solution. An Ordinance may help, but in the end, it will take the will, committment and determination by one or more people to enforce, repair and be accountable. In the meantime, it's understandable to have a sense of hopliness and despair regarding this long term community and downtown issue.