California Highway Headlines for June 2016

I had hoped to finish the updates to the California Highways pages by the end of May. Thanks to an auto accident after the Science Festival led to having to replace a car, that didn’t happen. I then hoped to have them done by mid-June. Thanks to the Hollywood Fringe Festival (FB) and seeing (and writing up) 17 shows, that didn’t happen. The plan is now to finish everything by the end of the 4th of July weekend. But we have two shows booked for that weekend, so let’s see if it really happens. Meanwhile, news keeps popping up about California Highways; here’s what popped out in June (those items that have not yet been processed into the pages are shown with ♦):

• Caltrans wants public input on Highway 17 plan. There are now 60,000 vehicles that drive Highway 17 each weekday. That’s up from 54,500 just two years ago. And by 2040, that number is expected to soar to nearly 80,000. Bracing for the increase, Caltrans wants to improve how motorists get on and off the congested corridor in Santa Cruz County. And the transportation agency is asking for public to weigh in.
• Roundabouts are coming, but do they work?. On key Napa-area roads, the shape of things to come may be a circle. City and state officials are moving toward replacing a set of busy intersections with a trio of roundabouts to link Highway 29 with downtown Napa. Engineers have offered another circular hub – or two – to replace a convoluted five-way junction on the east end of town. Even outside the city limits, a planned high-speed connection between Highways 29 and 221 could see a towering flyover ramp replaced by yet another pair of roundabouts.
• Lawmakers unplug a plan to commercialize California’s electronic freeway signs. Lawmakers deadlocked this week on a bill to allow electronic freeway billboards operated by California to show commercial advertising as a way to pay for transportation improvements. However, opponents of the measure said Friday that they would not be surprised to see the proposal brought back next year.

• Roadshow: The mystery of the new median work on Interstate 880. What is the construction on Interstate 880 in the center median from Highway 84 through the Mission Boulevard exits? … In Fremont a stretch of median barrier is being removed. Since there are columns supporting overpasses it won’t work with flexible lanes. … This has got my blood boiling! For at least the second time, I see Caltrans is tearing down a section of the perfectly good rebar-reinforced concrete center divider wall along I-880.
• CA: State Cuts Transportation Money, Putting San Bernardino County Projects in Peril. A funding cut of $754 million statewide means the loss of half of all annual state transportation funds for projects — some underway — in the San Bernardino region, officials said. The missing funds are from the State Transportation Improvement Program. A state commission adopted a five-year plan last month, cutting the $754 million and delaying another $755 million in spending for highway, rail, transit, bicycle and pedestrian project spending.
• The State Route 132 West Alternatives Project. Maps of potential alternatives.
• Linda Mullally, Away We Go: Highway 1’s pact with the Devil. Who could have imagined that a notoriously problematic stretch of Highway 1 could become one of the most significant and scenic stretches in the 1,200-mile California Coastal Trail?
• Toll Debate Next Step In Orange County 405 Freeway Expansion. Preliminary estimates of express lane toll revenue on an expanded Interstate 405 were presented this week to the Orange County Transportation Authority’s board, including several options for pricing. The express lanes are expected to be part of the next phase of expanding the 405 from the exchange with Interstate 605 at the Los Angeles County border south to Jamboree Road and John Wayne Airport. In addition to the new express lane, the carpool lane will be added to the toll package, and another traffic lane will be added from Euclid Street in Fountain Valley to the 605.
• Officials Mark Finish of Two 91 Freeway Improvements. The Orange County Transportation Authority and the California Department of Transportation, along with the cities of Anaheim and Fullerton, today marked the completion of two important Riverside Freeway (SR-91) improvement projects that will improve traffic flow and enhance safety on the freeway. The two projects, which together cost approximately $105 million, improve conditions for the nearly 300,000 drivers who travel the 91freeway daily. They are a centerpiece of Measure M, the county’s half-cent sales tax for transportation improvements, and state funding from Prop. 1B.
• I-405 Project Moves Forward with Initial 405 Express Lanes Toll Policy Approval. At its most recent meeting, the OCTA Board approved the initial 405 Express Lanes toll policy. The I-405 Project will improve 16 miles of I-405 between the SR-73 freeway in Costa Mesa and I-605 near the L.A. County line. The project includes adding one regular lane in each direction from Euclid Street to I-605 and making improvements to freeway entrances, exits and bridges. It will also construct the 405 Express Lanes, two lanes in each direction from SR-73 to I-605. The new express lanes incorporate the existing carpool lanes and connectors that opened in 2014.
• The Road Less Traveled? Not Since Waze Came To Los Angeles . Leon Sturman lives in Sherman Oaks, near the top of a hill that separates the San Fernando Valley from West Los Angeles. His is a narrow, winding street typical of the canyon neighborhoods that usually provide a haven from the buzz of urban life. It runs parallel to one of the most congested corridors in the country: the 405 freeway. By 7 a.m., though, Sturman’s street begins to resemble that freeway.
• Roadshow: San Tomas Expressway Widening. There are signs on San Tomas Expressway in Santa Clara alerting drivers to more roadwork. What’s now being done?
• Talks begin about 3-lane system on Tahoe’s Hwy 89 for winter 2016-17. It’s no secret: On peak ski days at Truckee-Tahoe — especially like this past season when legit amounts of snow fell — motorists navigating Highway 89 between Truckee and Squaw Valley are slowed to a crawl. With that in mind, the Truckee North Tahoe Transportation Management Association is starting discussions for a potential three-lane program on Highway 89 for the 2016-17 winter season in an effort to ease traffic congestion.
• High Desert Corridor environmental docs to be released June 20. The final environmental impact documents for the 63-mile High Desert Corridor, connecting the Victor and Antelope valleys, will be released by Caltrans next Monday, marking the next major milestone in the ambitious multi-modal transit project. The final Environmental Impact Statement/Environmental Impact Report will include the corridor’s route and factor in the integration of the private XpressWest high-speed rail, as well as Gov. Jerry Brown’s legacy bullet train initiative. The reports will be sent to those who participated in the public comment period and also will be made available on the Caltrans website, according to Caltrans spokesman Patrick Chandler.
• HOV lanes opening on 805. Two new car-pool lanes will open on Interstate 805 near its merge with Interstate 5 later this month, as state transportation officials continue spending hundreds of millions of dollars on a high-occupancy vehicle network, even though commuters continue to prefer riding solo. Census data shows that in 2010, an estimated 10.6 percent of San Diego County commuters carpooled, while 75.3 percent drove alone. In 2014, 9.7 percent carpooled while 76.1 percent went solo.
• Bay Bridge: Changes boost bike path cost by $6.3 million. A committee tasked with overseeing seismic retrofit work on the Bay Bridge on Wednesday approved $6.3 million in additional changes to the bridge’s pedestrian and bike path. The changes are the latest in a series of difficulties for the path, which has already seen more than $24 million in cost overruns for redesigns, adjustments and repairs to the railing, including $13.5 million in work on railing that had been previously installed, according to Caltrans documents.
• Santa Ynez Valley Residents Share Stories of Near Misses On ‘Scary’ Highway 154. A small number of Santa Ynez Valley drivers talked about the large number of near-misses they have had on the busy Highway 154 as residents renew their call for safety improvements. “I can hardly think of a time where I’ve driven to Santa Barbara or up north on 154 where there hasn’t been something that I go, ‘uh oh” either for my sake or somebody else’s,” resident Teresa McNeil MacLean said. “There’s always near-misses.,”
• Motorcycle lane-splitting bill moves forward in California. A state Assembly bill that would allow motorcycle lane-splitting in California has moved closer to a vote. California’s AB 51, sponsored by Assembly member Bill Quirk (D-Hayward), intends to create guidelines for safe lane-splitting, a practice the proposed legislation describes as a motorcyclist passing other vehicles “by riding between them along the lane line.”
• Community meeting set to discuss Highway 20 improvement plans. A community open house to discuss improvement plans for a section of Highway 20 in Sutter County west of Yuba City is set from 5 p.m.-7 p.m. Tuesday at Sutter Union High School, 2665 Acacia Ave.
• Before-and-after maps show how freeways transformed America’s cities. Between the 1950s and the 1980s, cities across the country undertook massive freeway construction projects. In many cases they decided to run the freeways straight through downtown, bulldozing thousands of homes and businesses in the process. At the time, this was seen as a sign of progress. Not only did planners hope to help people get downtown more quickly, they saw many of the neighborhoods being torn down as blighted and in need of “urban renewal.”
• Another I-5 lane shift coming soon. Another traffic shift is scheduled on Interstate 5 in Stockton, another in a long process of roadwork designed to eventually make the highway a smoother and faster ride. About 4 a.m. June 27, two southbound lanes from Alpine Avenue to Fremont Street will be detoured onto the northbound traffic lanes of the interstate. There will be temporary barriers between the northbound and southbound traffic. The No. 3 lane southbound will remain and will allow access to Monte Diablo and Fremont streets.
• Meeting set for Rio Vista bridge work. California Department of Transportation officials have scheduled an informational meeting for 7 p.m. Wednesday to discuss two projects on the Helen Madere Bridge near Rio Vista and how that work will affect motorists and river navigation. The meeting will take place at the City Hall, 1 Main St. The first phase of the work would be cleaning and repainting the steel Highway 12 bridge, which crosses the Sacramento River.
• Marin’s ‘insane’ logjam at 101-580 won’t get connector ramp any time soon. Dreams of easing traffic with a concrete connector from northbound Highway 101 to eastbound Interstate 580 and the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge won’t be realized anytime soon, transit officials say. Drivers heading north on Highway 101 who want to get on the bridge to get to the East Bay have two options: use East Sir Francis Drake Boulevard in Larkspur or take the Bellam Boulevard off-ramp in San Rafael.
• Highway 29 roadwork continues. Hwy. 29 roadwork continues. Caltrans and its local stakeholders are continuing construction of the State Route 29 Channelization Project near St. Helena. This week, the work is roadway excavation and storm drain installation between Dowdell Lane and Charter Oak Avenue in the southbound shoulder.
• Paving Work Scheduled on State Route 152. The California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) will begin work today to grind and pave the roadway on SR-152 about 20 miles east of Gilroy from Pacheco Creek in Santa Clara to the image006Merced County line near Dinosaur Point Road. The primary hours of operation during the weekdays will be from 10:00 p.m. to 5:00 a.m. in the westbound direction (two lanes) and 11:00 p.m. to 12:00 p.m. in the eastbound direction (two lanes).
• Rio Vista braces for work on Helen Madere Bridge. John Lira listened as others at Wednesday night’s meeting in City Hall talked about finding ways to keep truckers away from the Helen Madere Bridge once work to repair and upgrade the structure begins in the fall of 2017. Lira, on the other hand, was thinking about how he was going to get his truck deliveries to his supermarket on time.
• Re: CA 86S and CA 111? . Updated information on the routes from AAroads.
• HEMET: Caltrans gets pushback on Highway 74 raised median. Many in the crowd of more than 70 people at the Simpson Center were opposed to adding a raised, curbed median along Highway 74, which is Florida Avenue through the city. They stated concerns about traffic, the effect on business and aesthetics. But Haissam Yahya, a Caltrans engineer, said the effort is for safety, with the stretch of highway meeting state parameters that require the median. “This is a safety project,” he said. “We have to move forward with it.”
• LeBaron: History repeats itself with Highway 37 toll road proposal. Representatives of the four counties that come together at Sears Point, where the infamous, hazardous, traffic-clogged Highway 37 goes east to Vallejo or west to Novato, have been meeting these past months to talk about making it a toll road. Who says history doesn’t repeat itself?
• End date for construction still months away. The latest Thousand Oaks freeway delay isn’t the rush hour slow down near The Oaks mall. It’s the $37.5-million 101-23 freeway interchange expansion. Originally scheduled for completion by spring, the project end date was first pushed to August, and now Caltrans expects to be done in the fall, a department spokesperson said this week. Construction began in February 2014.
• Just scratching the surface. The proposed construction of a wildlife crossing over the 101 Freeway at Liberty Canyon in Agoura Hills has gained popular support. Now comes the task of raising funds to build the $55-million bridge that will be used by mountain lions, coyotes and other animals to cross the freeway and expand their territory from the Santa Monica Mountains to the Simi Hills and Santa Susana Mountains. A campaign launched by the National Wildlife Federation, #SaveLACougars, has so far raised more than $1.1 million thanks to the support of myriad cities, agencies and nonprofit groups. Much of the money will go to Caltrans, the state highway agency that is responsible for the design and construction of the project.
• San Clemente highway could see up to three roundabouts. Traffic roundabouts could be in San Clemente’s future at up to three locations in the north end of town. A Pacific Coast Highway Corridor Study by Caltrans and the Orange County Transportation Authority suggests the possibility of grant-funded roundabouts at El Camino Real’s intersections with Camino Capistrano, Camino San Clemente and Avenida Estacion.
• California’s Crumbling Highways Are the Most Traveled in America. Nearly 2.5 million Southern Californians will hit the road for the Fourth of July weekend, the Auto Club of Southern California says. That’s the highest number since 2002. Relatively low gas prices and a recovering economy are to blame. But as you get out on the highway, beware.
• The Hierarchy of Roads: 7 Axioms on street design. I posit several Axioms about the hierarchy of roads. Axiom 1: …
• At 60, U.S. Interstate Highway System is showing its age. The Road Improvement Program (TRIP) says the U.S. Interstate Highway System is showing its age as it turns 60 this month, suffering from high levels of congestion and too little funding to make repairs and updates. President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956 on June 29 that year. The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) says its origins go back to a report to Congress titled “Toll Roads and Free Roads” submitted in 1939 and subsequently the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1944 that authorized a “National System of Interstate Highways.”
• Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956: Creating The Interstate System . By the late 1930s, the pressure for construction of transcontinental superhighways was building. It even reached the White House, where President Franklin D. Roosevelt repeatedly expressed interest in construction of a network of toll superhighways as a way of providing more jobs for people out of work. He thought three east-west and three north south routes would be sufficient. Congress, too, decided to explore the concept. The Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1938 directed the chief of the Bureau of Public Roads (BPR) to study the feasibility of a six route toll network. The resultant two-part report, Toll Roads and Free Roads, was based on the statewide highway planning surveys and analysis. Part I of the report asserted that the amount of transcontinental traffic was insufficient to support a network of toll superhighways. Some routes could be self-supporting as toll roads, but most highways in a national toll network would not. Part II, “A Master Plan for Free Highway Development,” recommended a 43,000-kilometer (km) nontoll interregional highway network. The interregional highways would follow existing roads wherever possible (thereby preserving the investment in earlier stages of improvement). More than two lanes of traffic would be provided where traffic exceeds 2,000 vehicles per day, while access would be limited where entering vehicles would harm the freedom of movement of the main stream of traffic.