Palo Alto, California
Palo Alto (/ˌpæloʊ ˈæltoʊ/ PAL-oh AL-toh; Spanish for 'tall stick') is a charter city in the northwestern corner of Santa Clara County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area, named after a coastal redwood tree known as El Palo Alto.
"Palo Alto" redirects here. For other uses, see Palo Alto (disambiguation).
Palo Alto
United States
April 23, 1894[1]
City council
- Mayor Greer Stone
- Vice Mayor Ed Lauing
- Pat Burt
- Greg Tanaka
- Vicki Veenker
- Lydia Kou
- Julie Lythcott-Haims
Greer Stone
26.00 sq mi (67.35 km2)
24.10 sq mi (62.41 km2)
1.91 sq mi (4.94 km2) 7.38%
30 ft (9 m)
68,572
2,871.52/sq mi (1,047.35/km2)
UTC−7 (PDT)
The city of Palo Alto was established in 1894 by the American industrialist Leland Stanford when he founded Stanford University in memory of his son, Leland Stanford Jr. Palo Alto later expanded and now borders East Palo Alto, Mountain View, Los Altos, Los Altos Hills, Stanford, Portola Valley, and Menlo Park. At the 2020 census, the population was 68,572.[5] Palo Alto is one of the most expensive cities in the United States in which to live,[6][7] and its residents are among the most educated in the country. However, it also has a youth suicide rate four times higher than the national average, often attributed to academic pressure.[8]
As one of the principal cities of Silicon Valley, Palo Alto is home to the headquarters of multiple tech companies, including HP, Space Systems/Loral, VMware, and PARC. Palo Alto has also served as headquarters or the founding location of several other tech companies, including Apple,[9] Google,[10] Facebook, Logitech,[11] Tesla,[12] Intuit, IDEO, Pinterest, and PayPal. Ford Motor Company and Lockheed Martin each additionally maintain major research and technology facilities within Palo Alto.[13][14]
Politics[edit]
In the California State Legislature, Palo Alto is in the 13th Senate District, represented by Democrat Josh Becker,[41] and in the 23rd Assembly District, represented by Democrat Marc Berman.[42][43]
In the United States House of Representatives, Palo Alto is in California's 16th congressional district, represented by Democrat Anna Eshoo.[44]
According to the California Secretary of State, as of February 10, 2019, Palo Alto has 40,040 registered voters. Of those, 20,857 (52.1%) are registered Democrats, 4,689 (11.7%) are registered Republicans, and 13,520 (33.8%) have declined to state a political party.[45]
Utilities[edit]
Palo Alto has a city-run and owned utility, City of Palo Alto Utilities (CPAU), which provides water, electric, gas service, and waste water disposal within city limits,[75] with the minor exception of a rural portion of the city in the hills west of Interstate 280, past the Country Club, which does not receive gas from the City. Almost all other communities in northern California depend on Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) for gas and electricity.
Water and Gas Services (WGS) operates gas and water distribution networks within the city limits. The city operates both gas meters and the distribution pipelines. Water comes from city-operated watershed and wells and the City and County of San Francisco Hetch Hetchy system. The city is located in Santa Clara Valley Water District, North Zone. Hetch Hetchy pipeline #3 and #4 pass through the city.
The city operates its own electric power distribution network and telemetry cable network. Interconnection points tie the city into PG&E's electric transmission system, which brings power from several sources to the city. Palo Alto is a member of a joint powers authority (the Northern California Power Agency), which cooperatively generates electricity for government power providers such as the City of Santa Clara, the City of Redding, and the Port of Oakland. Roughly the same group of entities operate the Transmission Agency of Northern California (TANC). TANC transports power over its own lines from as far as British Columbia through an interconnection with the federal Bonneville Power Administration. A local oddity is a series of joint poles; those primary conductor cross arms are marked PGE and CPA (City of Palo Alto) to identify each utility's side of the shared cross arms.
Palo Alto has an ongoing community debate about the city providing fiber optic connectivity to all residences. A series of pilot programs have been proposed. One proposal called for the city to install dark fiber, which would be made live by a contractor.
Services traditionally attributed to a cable television provider were sold to a regulated commercial concern. Previously the cable system was operated by a cooperative called Palo Alto Cable Coop.
The former Regional Bell Operating Company in Palo Alto was Pacific Telephone, now called AT&T Inc., and previously called SBC and Pacific Bell. One of the earliest central office facilities switching Palo Alto calls is the historic Davenport central office (CO) at 529 Bryant Street. The building was sold and is now the home of the Palo Alto Internet Exchange. The former CO building is marked by a bronze plaque and is located on the north side of Bryant Street between University Avenue and Hamilton Avenue. It was called Davenport after the exchange name at the introduction of dial telephone service in Palo Alto. For example, modern numbers starting with 325- were Davenport 5 in the 1950s and '60s. The Step-by-Step office was scrapped and replaced by stored-program-controlled equipment at a different location about 1980. Stanford calls ran on a Step-by-Step Western Electric 701 PBX until the university purchased its own switch about 1980. It had the older, traditional Bell System 600 Hz+120 Hz dial tone. The old 497-number PBX, MDF, and battery string were housed in a steel building at 333 Bonair Siding. From the 1950s to 1980s, the bulk of Palo Alto calls were switched on Number 5 Crossbar systems. By the mid-1980s, these electromechanical systems had been junked. Under the Bell System's regulated monopoly, local coin telephone calls were ten cents until the early 1980s.
During the drought of the early 1990s, Palo Alto employed water waste patrol officers to enforce water saving regulations. The team, called "Gush Busters", patrolled city streets looking for broken water pipes and poorly managed irrigation systems. Regulations were set to stop restaurants from habitually serving water, runoff from irrigation, and irrigation during the day. The main goal of the team was to educate the public in ways to save water. Citations consisted of Friendly Reminder postcards and more formal notices. To help promote the conservation message, the team only used bicycles and mopeds.
Palo Alto has seven sister cities, as designated by Sister Cities International:
In 1989, Palo Alto received a gift of a large, whimsical wooden sculpture called Foreign Friends (Fjärran Vänner)—of a man, woman, dog and bird sitting on a park bench—from Linköping. The sculpture was praised by some, called "grotesque" by others, and became a lightning rod for vandals. It was covered with a large, addressed postcard marked "Return to Sender." A former Stanford University professor was arrested for attempting to light it on fire. It was also doused with paint.[121] When the original heads were decapitated on Halloween, 1993, the statue became a shrine—flowers bouquets and cards were placed upon it. Following an anonymous donation, the heads were restored. Within weeks, the restored heads were decapitated again, this time disappearing. The heads were eventually replaced with new ones, which generated even more distaste, as many deemed the new heads even less attractive.[121]
A few months later, the man's arm was chopped off, the woman's lap was vandalized, the bird was stolen, and the replacements heads were decapitated and stolen.[121] The sculpture was removed from its location on Embarcadero Road and Waverley Avenue in 1995, dismantled, and placed in storage until it was destroyed in 2000. Ironically, the statue was designed not as a lasting work of art, but as something to be climbed on with a lifespan of 10 to 25 years.[122]
