About 150 people showed up for an open house on the afternoon of Wednesday, July 19 at Laguna Seca Recreation Area on Highway 68. Many sat in slow traffic to get there, perhaps fitting for the topic: an update from transportation officials on the Scenic Route 68 Corridor Improvement Project. The project seeks to improve safety and traffic flow during rush hour.
Caltrans and the Transportation Agency for Monterey County are leading the project, which has been in the works since 2016 but stalled during the pandemic. The open house served as public notice this project is once more in motion.
Some potential ideas – like building a bypass or widening the highway to four lanes – have been shelved. Ideas that remain on the table are building one-lane roundabouts at intersections, or enhancing traffic lights and widening from two to four lanes at intersections.
Regardless of which option is selected, the project will include five wildlife crossings – increasing the total to eight – meant to prevent collisions and fatalities with local fauna. The entrance to Laguna Seca would also move, aligning with the intersection of Laureles Grade.
The project would cost up to $215 million.
Some people at the open house voiced concerns. “It’s a whole lot of money and projected to deal with four hours of commute times a day,” says Dwight Stump, a regular user of Highway 68.
Environmental documents analyzing options will be released this fall, followed by a public comment period. “Once those comments are received, we can decide the preferred alternative to move forward,” TAMC Executive Director Todd Muck says.
(3) comments
The idea of doing nothing and keeping it a traffic mess so we keep more people from moving into Monterey County has been the prevailing reason given for doing nothing. It is a bad idea. Why not go back to Hwy 1 as a two-lane highway through Monterey like it used to be, when I was a kid here; that would really snarl traffic to make Monterey Peninsual undesirable.
The solution is to make it four lanes (as was intended when the freeway sections were added at the Salinas and Monterey ends), and install automatic toll readers for single-occupancy vehicles during peak-travel times to reduce overall traffic. Overall, we should also plan to put in a light-rail from Salinas to Monterey, and get people out of their cars and into public transit if they are commuting to jobs, like many cities do.
It would be good to know why widening the highway to four lanes has been shelved. It seems it wouldn't take much to do so, since they will already be widening it at intersections and it's most likely within the right-of-way to do so. -- The idea that this radically changes the highway's impact on the environment seems overblown and just a distraction from certain residents who resent improvements to our transportation system.
I can't imagine options that are worse for the environment and eco-system than miles long lines of cars sitting motionless with their engines running.
I think something that would be worse would be miles long lines of cars sitting motionless with their engines running in four lanes rather than two. Better infrastructure leads to more development which leads to more traffic. It's like when a supermarket opens up a lane.
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