A key stretch of Highway 1, the world-famous coastal highway, would be widened to 6 lanes under a proposed Caltrans project. The Calera Parkway widening project would affect a scenic 1.3-mile stretch of highway above Rockaway Beach.
Here is the before and after:
According to Caltrans, the project is needed to reduce peak hour delay by 5 minutes — in the year 2035. Many residents in Pacifica are not convinced that the environmental impact of the project is worth a hypothetical 5-minute travel savings.
Highway 1 is also a world famous bicycling route. Caltrans has incorporated bikes into its planning, by proposing cyclists use the 10-foot shoulder that would be built as part of the project. I don’t know about you, but riding on a high-speed 6-lane expressway is not very “accommodating”.
The project would be funded mainly by the San Mateo County Transportation Authority. San Mateo County has always been indifferent to the safety needs of bikes/peds, and yet has no problem coming up with money for idiotic highway widenings.
Fail
[…] Trails Blog explains which trails will not be affected by this week’s Supreme Court ruling. Systemic Failure explains the dreadful plan to widen California’s famous coastal highway. And Denver Infill […]
I wonder if the situation in San Mateo County is similar to what we have in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. The province here is building new highways and bridges (with only minimal provisions for cyclists and pedestrians – and transit) in order to accommodate “increased traffic”. In reality, traffic has declined in the region since 2010 because more people are using transit or living closer to where they live. I guess we also have all these vacant-but-owned condos due to the inflated real estate market; that helps reduce traffic.
This looks like a plan for Pacifica becoming a larger San Francisco commuter suburb. Any which way this project needs to DIAF.
There are already two large freeways from SF into San Mateo County (one of which I “reverse commute” daily). This does not need to happen. SMC is split between the dense eastern portion and rural western area by a mountain range. Everything that has been planned assumes these halves continue to differ in character and density.
And how much are they proposing to spend on this pointless atrocity?
There’s got to be some way to stop this.