Palo Alto is considering banning inoperable vehicles from parking on public streets as part of a multi-pronged response to a recent wave of complaints from various neighborhoods about the growing number of RVs in residential areas.
If Palo Alto takes action to limit RV parking, it would join Mountain View, which bans RVs from parking on the vast majority of city streets. In 2020, Mountain View voters approved a measure banning oversized vehicles from parking on streets that are less than 40 feet wide.
Palo Alto has been fielding complaints for months about the growing number of oversized vehicles, some of which reportedly remain in their location for extended periods of time. In May, Mayor Ed Lauing and City Manager Ed Shikada heard from a group of residents. One of them estimated there are more than 40 RVs in the neighborhood and said he has witnessed illegal sewage dumping in the neighborhood.
When Shikada urged the neighbors to call the police if anything illegal is occurring, residents countered they had done so, but have had no success in getting the police department to enforce the city’s 72-hour parking limit.
“The City Council has set a priority to look at additional regulatory measures that can be done to increase regulations while also recognizing that the city has provided safe-parking locations in the city,” Shikada said at the May 29 meeting.
Since then, dozens of residents from various neighborhoods have followed up with their own concerns about RVs. Magrissa Funnie recently emailed the city council and city staff requesting enforcement around Fabian Way, where she said about 20 RVs are causing an increase in trash and rodents.
“There are two schools and senior citizen home and the JCC on this block,” Funnie wrote. “We want our blocks back.”
It’s not just the southern end of Palo Alto that is experiencing the influx. Residents from around Greer Park and from the Ventura neighborhood have also requested more enforcement.
Jay Paul Company, which owns a large commercial property in Ventura, near Park Boulevard, recently requested that the city establish a residential parking permit program in the area that would ban all-day parking for vehicles without permits. This week, Keith Reckdahl recalled the ice cream social that the Ventura neighborhood held last weekend in Boulware Park. He and Councilmember Pat Burt, who also attended, got a “real big earful” about the topic from the neighborhood.
“There are a lot of residents concerned,” Reckdahl said at the Aug. 11 meeting. “Ventura has a lot of parking of RVs.”
The city will start planning its response on Aug. 25, when the council’s Policy and Services Committee consider Shikada’s proposed strategy for addressing the concerns. According to a new report, the strategy would roll out in phases and involve developing an ordinance to prohibit parking of detached or inoperable vehicles on public streets. Another ordinance would prohibit “vanlords,” van owners who according to the city rent their vans for habitation.
“Such a prohibition would prohibit private profit-taking from use of a public resource (on-street parking spaces) and discourage vanlords who take advantage of vulnerable populations by charging rent while failing to provide the infrastructure necessary for human habitation,” the report states. “This prohibition would be enforced against the vanlord, not the renter, and penalties could include a fine assessed per day of violation.”
Palo Alto is hardly alone in dealing with this issue. San Jose has recently adopted a prohibition on vanlording, according to the report, while Los Angeles is currently considering one.
The city’s options for enforcing RV bans are limited by state laws, which govern many parking regulations and establish parameters for cities that wish to adopt their own restrictions. According to city staff, state law allows cities to adopt local ordinances authorizing removal of vehicles that park in the same spot for more than 72 hours. Cities are required to affix a notice to vehicles warning them about potential vehicle removal, according to the staff report.
According to Palo Alto city leaders, the number of complaints about RVs has sharply increased since May of this year. Dozens of RVs had previously parked along El Camino Real but have been forced to shift elsewhere as the state Department of Transportation removed parking spots all along El Camino to make way for new bike lanes.
“The increasing numbers of people living in vehicles on public streets presents a health and safety challenge which leads to an increased demand for off-street safe parking, outreach services, street cleaning and waste disposal,” the report states. “The city received calls and complaints relating to the long-term parking of oversized vehicles, personal property obstructing the steets and sidewalks, and improper disposal of human waste.”
In addition to enhanced enforcement, the city is hoping to add more services to assist residents who live in RVs, including garbage pickup, mobile pump outs to address sanitation needs and additional outreach to the residents. It also plans to explore expanding the “safe parking” program for RVs that is currently in place in the Baylands, near the Geng Road playing fields. Staff has identified several areas that could each accommodate between 10 and 20 RVs.
The new report notes, however, that converting the Baylands areas to “safe parking” sites would require voters to “undedicate” the space, which is currently dedicated parkland. And even if the vote succeeds, the safe parking area would only accommodate a fraction of the oversized vehicles currently occupying public streets, the report states.
Another approach that staff is recommending involves identifying streets where oversized vehicles would be allowed. This would include establishing a process and criteria for designating these streets, with appropriate community engagement, according to the city.
According to Santa Clara County’s point-in-time count, there were 206 homeless people observed in Palo Alto in 2023, with 88% of them living in vehicles. The local numbers from the 2025 count are not yet available, but staff believe that number has roughly doubled over the past two years, with more than 200 vehicles now serving as homes.
This story originally appeared in Palo Alto Weekly. Gennady Sheyner is the editor of Palo Alto Weekly and Palo Alto Online. As a former staff writer, he has won awards for his coverage of elections, land use, business, technology and breaking news.
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