Headlines About California Highways – July 2024

What an eventful July it has been. Far from the usual lackadaisical summer doldrums, we’ve had a lot of pent up excitement and energy released in the last couple of weeks.  It’s something I’m glad to see; youthful energy is great. I wish I had some. I see good things ahead, as I gaze through my windshield. If you feel that energy too, feel free to follow me on Facebook (I only friend folks I know in real life).

I’m pleased to say that it appears the Westhost issues are in the rear view mirror. The site is updated, the certificates are fixed, and the RSS feeds appear to be working. If you are still running into problems with either cahighways.org or caroutebyroute.org, please let me know. The poor technical support from the time of the transition still sticks in my craw, and I am exploring transitioning the site to a new provider. I have some recommendations from Reddit; I’m open to others to add to the spreadsheet.  It isn’t a rush, as things are already paid for a while, and things are working.

In any case, it is the start of a new month. We’re entering the political silly season in the US, and I’m entering the JO silly season at the Ranch. The transition into silly season means headlines. For those unfamiliar, this post generally contains headlines about California Highways that I’ve seen over the last month. It also serves as fodder for the updates to my California Highways site, so there are also other pages and things I’ve seen that I wanted to remember for the site updates. Lastly, the post also includes some things that I think would be of peripheral interest to my highway-obsessed highway-interested readers. Speaking of updates to the California Highways site: I plan to start work on the next round of updates to the highway in the next week or two, when I finish writing the next episode of the podcast.

So what has happened in July? In terms of shows, we had two: Peter Pan at the Pantages, and The Sound of Music at 5-Star. Both are closed (although Peter Pan is presently at the Segerstrom in Orange County and will be soon in San Diego); this weekend brings both Clue at the Ahmanson and Company at the Pantages.

I’m also still looking for opinions on Medicare Advantage plus Medicare Supplement Plans: specifically, the Anthem Medicare Plus PPO with Senior Rx Plus Medicare Advantage Plan (as Implemented for Aerospace Retirees: See (1) Get to Know Your Group Plan; (2) Plan Summary; (3) last year’s Open Enrollment Guide) vs. a Medicare Supplement Plan.

The podcast continues apace. I’m still writing the Season 3 episodes, and I’m up to the last episode on I-5. We’ve also got some bonus episodes. The first is a two-part interview with Joe Rouse of Caltrans on ExpressLanes, Tolling, and Fastrak. Part 1 went up at the end of June; Part 2 a few days later. We just recorded the second bonus episode on auto trails; it will be up in August.  Please tell your friends about the podcast, “like”, “♥”, or “favorite” it, and give it a rating in your favorite podcatcher. Yes, the sound quality of the episodes does get better — we were learning. As always, you can keep up with the show at the podcast’s forever home at https://www.caroutebyroute.org (once it comes back) , the show’s page on Spotify for Podcasters, or you can subscribe through your favorite podcatching app or via the RSS feeds (CARxR, Spotify for Podcasters) . The following episodes have been posted this month:

• CA RxR 2.13: Bonus – Fastrak and Tolling (Part 1). In this episode, we have the first half of an interview with Joe Rouse of Caltrans, talking about HOV Lanes, Express/Toll Lanes and Bridges, and Fastrak.  (Spotify for Podcasters)
• CA RxR 2.14: Bonus – Fastrak and Tolling (Part 2). In this episode, we have the second half of an interview with Joe Rouse of Caltrans, talking about HOV Lanes, Express/Toll Lanes and Bridges, and Fastrak.  (Spotify for Podcasters)

Well, you should now be up to date. Here are the headlines that I found about California’s highways for July.

Key

[Ħ Historical information | ＄ Paywalls, ＄＄ really obnoxious paywalls, and ∅ other annoying restrictions. I’m no longer going to list the paper names, as I’m including them in the headlines now. Note: For ＄ paywalls, sometimes the only way is incognito mode, grabbing the text before the paywall shows, and pasting into an editor. See this article for more tips on bypassing paywalls. ☊ indicates an primarily audio article. ↈ indicates a primarily video article. ]

Highway Headlines

• Two famous trees marking CA’s midway point will make way for a wider highway. But there’s a silver lining (LAist). To get to the alleged midway point of California from downtown L.A., you’d need to hit the 5 northward and eventually connect to State Route 99. Some four hours and 235 miles later, you’ll see the landmark colloquially known as “The Palm and The Pine,” sitting unassumingly in the median on Highway 99. Blink and you could miss them — these two trees were planted to mark the purported spot that separates the northern part of the state from, ahem, the better sunny Southern part. For as long as anyone can remember, they have stood at that location — the state’s reputed center — like an odd hitchhiking couple as vehicles of all manners zip between the state’s two halves. No plaques, no markers — meaning most Californians and drivers might even not know about their existence, let alone their symbolic significance.
• ＄ Deadly car crashes are up in California. Speeding is often the cause. (Los Angeles Times). During the pandemic, California officials noted a worrying increase in driving deaths even as fewer people used the roads. Now, as more drivers are back on the roads, there are signs that the dangerous driving has continued. Car crash deaths rose 17% from 2018 to 2022 in the state, according to a new report from ConsumerAffairs, a platform for consumer news. And the deadliest stretches of California roads were all in Southern California, the data showed.
• ‘Long time coming’: Busy Bay Area intersection converts to roundabout (SF Gate). In another move to bring more roundabouts to the Golden State, Bay Area transportation officials have approved a roundabout to solve traffic problems and reduce crashes at a popular intersection. On April 4, Caltrans and the Sonoma County Transportation Authority broke ground at the intersection of State Route 121 and State Route 116 in Sonoma County. Officials expect that the $24 million project will “improve circulation and avoid stop-and-go traffic,” according to Caltrans. “This is a long time coming — I’ve been having conversations about this roundabout throughout my tenure as Supervisor,” Sonoma County Supervisor Susan Gorin told Bay City News.
• Detour for Highway 156 access planned for end of summer (KSBW). The section of Union Road between San Juan Hollister Road and Highway 156 will be closed for eight weeks or less. The exact days for the closure will be announced within a week of the closure, said Caltrans. This closure is needed to rebuild the intersection of Union Road and Highway 156, to help with the Highway 156 widening project, and to improve access to and from the highway.
• Highway 154 Will Partially Reopen This Week (Noozhawk). Residents who rely on Highway 154 will see some relief as officials plan to partially reopen the roadway this week. Caltrans announced that it will install a reversible traffic signal allowing one-way traffic in the emergency repair area between San Antonio Creek Road and Painted Cave Road. That’s on the Santa Barbara side of the highway, which has been closed to vehicles since June 22. The agency is planning to partially reopen with the traffic signal on Thursday.
• Scenic highway route to reopen one lane on Fourth of July (SF Gate). One lane of Highway 154 in Santa Barbara County is slated to reopen on July 4 after the road closed for more than a week because of cracks in the road. The lane will use a temporary signal for “one-way reversing traffic control” to allow traffic to alternate through the area, officials said. “The movement on the road surface has slowed considerably and stopped for the area traffic will use, thus allowing the return of public traffic,” Genelle Padilla, a Caltrans spokesperson, wrote in an email to SFGATE. While the popular “shortcut” is expected to be open for holiday traffic, Caltrans still recommends that travelers use Highway 101 or state Route 246 to avoid delays through the section of the road that was closed, between San Antonio Creek Road and Painted Cave Road.
• Removing a Detroit highway is easy. Reconnecting the community is harder (NPR). In the 1950s, When Regina Lawson was a girl on Detroit’s east side, she would walk along Hastings Street every day with her father. “From the barber shop to the grocery store to the pharmacy, everything was right on that strip,” she says, in the lobby of the senior apartments where she lives now, not far from where Hastings Street used to be. But Hastings Street disappeared some 60 years ago, and there’s a highway, I-375, in its place — a one-mile sunken expressway that has grown expensive to maintain and doesn’t get as much traffic as it used to.
• Work Continues On Cabrillo-Los Patos Roundabout in Santa Barbara (Noozhawk). As the next phase of the Highway 101 project is set to begin in August, the City of Santa Barbara’s parallel projects continue to make progress. Construction for the Cabrillo Boulevard-Los Patos Way Roundabout Project began in February and is set to finish in spring 2025. It’s the first phase of a larger project along East Cabrillo Boulevard between Los Patos Way and the Cabrillo interchange, which includes the construction of a single-lane roundabout at the intersection of East Cabrillo Boulevard and Los Patos Way. The second phase will include replacing the Union Pacific Railroad bridge over East Cabrillo Boulevard and pedestrian and bicycle improvements.

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