(UPDATE 5/21/18 11am: Del Rey Oaks Deputy City Clerk Kim Carvalho says the traffic data report won't be ready by the May 22 City Council meeting, and that the item has been pushed to the June 26 meeting.)
For nearly three years, Del Rey Oaks City Council has deliberated about how to slow down traffic on Carlton Drive, one of the few streets that connects the small city to Seaside.
While seemingly a simple problem, an elegant solution has remained elusive, as every course of action comes with a set of downsides.
But finally, it appears there is consensus as to what the solution will be: closing the street’s intersection with Seaside at Plumas Avenue.
On May 22, Del Rey Oaks staff will present traffic data to City Council related to a recent, temporary closure at Plumas Avenue, which City Manager Dino Pick says indicates that more traffic is shifting to streets like General Jim Moore Boulevard, Fremont Boulevard and Hilby Avenue, and has reduced the number of unprotected left turns at Canyon Del Rey and Carlton. (The data has not yet been made public.)
The closure would still allow for passage of emergency vehicles and school buses, as well as bikes and pedestrians. “Whatever the new normal is for a driver, it will be a minimal change from the existing pattern,” Pick says.
City Council has already budgeted $100,000 toward whatever the solution might be, about a third of which has already been spent to get to this point, Pick says.
Seaside City Manager Craig Malin says the majority of about two dozen Seaside residents who have written letters about the potential closure support it, but in general, he thinks closing intersections is a bad approach regionally.
“The late [1950s], mid-[1970s] perspective, is that’s what you’re supposed to do: Move traffic to arterials and collectors,” Malin says. “There are a number of other engineering perspectives that say streets function best as networks, and as you make blockages in the network, you get arteriosclerosis – clogged-up arteries.”
But he’s also sensitive to neighborhood traffic concerns, which “are the majority of concerns expressed in communities nationwide.”