6/26/2024: Lowered difficulty from 1.5 to 1. Terrain is 1.5 because cache may not be quite reachable from a wheelchair, but otherwise it is wheelchair accessible.
Note: None of the info below helps with finding the cache
The College Terrace neighborhood has a long history of differentiating itself from nearby Stanford lands. Leland Stanford wanted to buy the area to add to his farm, but the owners instead sold it to a developer, who subdivided it into smaller lots. As a result, the neighborhood is surrounded on three sides by Stanford-owned land but is distinct from them.
Cornell Street is distinct within College Terrace for being out of alphabetical order. College Terrace was originally part of the town of Mayfield, and Cornell Street was originally Washington Street. However, when Mayfield was absorbed by Palo Alto in the 1920s, Washington Street was renamed Cornell Street, as Palo Alto already had a Washington Street. Perhaps Cornell wasn't included as one of the original street names as it was still a relatively young university in 1887, when College Terrace was created (though Washington University in St. Louis, the presumed eponym, isn't much older).
Another way that College Terrace is separated from the nearby Stanford lands is through a series of barriers that create no-through streets from the previously connecting street grid. In the early 1970s traffic started driving through the neighborhood on the way to Stanford University. Neighbors banded together to convince the city to put up barriers to make cutting through less convenient.