Humboldtian

Hi Andy,

I am grateful the median barrier is being installed. A good friend of mine was killed when he lost traction in the rain near loleta and crossed into oncoming traffic.

It's doubtful he would have been killed had he just kissed the barrier.

Thanks for sharing that. Perhaps I am wrong about not needing a divider. I wish Caltrans would do a better job of managing the project though. Having those lanes shut down for such a long stretch of miles and time is unsafe, especially in winter.

I can explain why Caltrans took the entire fast lane in both directions. Because it saved Caltrans a lot of traffic control money to not require the contractor to put out a lane and pick it up everyday. Plus since the butt ends of the rails and equipment they left in the roadway was more than 15 feet away from the travel lanes they didn't have to worry about protecting the public from hitting these dangerous objects. The public is just damn lucky not more people got killed during this "safety" project! They got the great idea to close the left lanes entirely from the last barrier project that was built from 12th Street to the Finch Creek Road off-ramp. Basically Caltrans traded the safety of the traveling public for savings in construction costs. Only problem is three teenagers lost their lives because one, they didn't have the full roadway to negotiate a curve and two, the striping has still not been applied even though the paving was done last summer making it very difficult in the dark to determine where the edge of the roadway is. This unsafe condition being left untended for so long is a criminal act of negligence and the DA ought to convene a criminal grand jury investigation of Caltrans and just as in the EPD case the grand jury should find the District Director, the Senior Construction Engineer in charge of the construction of the project, the Senior Construction Engineer in charge of the design of the project, and quite likely even more pesons responsible for this tragedy all guilty of criminal negligence!

"Only problem is three teenagers lost their lives because one, they didn't have the full roadway to negotiate a curve"

Those kids were going 90-100 miles per hour. At that speed it's unlikely they were going to negotiate anything successfully when they lost control of their vehicle.

Sad and tragic, yes, but to put this on Caltrans is placing the blame on the wrong party.

Actually had the completed barrier been there they might not have sailed into the on-coming traffic, though at the speed they were traveling that is not a certainty.

Nevertheless, this is exactly what these barriers are designed to do, and they work well, I suppose only Caltrans can answer the original question, but the method they used may actually have been safer than short stretches of orange barrels with the resulting merge that proceeds them. Actually being slowed from 65 to 55 wss not a big deal, and they kept the single lane fairly wide so it was not that difficult to navigate.

Was this a "colossal waste of money"? I somehow doubt it. That stretch of highway was actually pretty dangerous, and the example we have been discussing where the teens crossed the median to slam into an oncoming car is a case in point. If lives are saved as a result of this work, it may have well been worth the inconvenience of the construction.

The post claiming the teenagers were driving at excessive speed has no basis in fact. There were no skid marks. I've personally observed the paint marks by the CHP tracking the vehicles path. The fact of the matter is this barrier project should have been completed two or three years ago but was held up by environmental review by the Department of Fish and Game and the National Wildlife Refuge because of their concern that animals running across the road had safe access to cross. Concern for animals led to the delay of this project that resulted in the loss of life. Period.

"The post claiming the teenagers were driving at excessive speed has no basis in fact"

From the Times-Standard, 10-15-07:

" A witness reported that the Lexus was travelling 100 mph prior to the collision."

anon10:10, I would call that very much factual. In fact, there were more than one call to 911 reporting these kids travelling at a high rate of speed, between 90-100 mph.

Regardless ummmm, I wonder how well a layperson can estimate the speed of a passing vehicle? If both lanes were open and the roadway striped those kids would be alive today because they would have been able to negotiate the curve safely even if they were traveling at higher speeds. That freeway is designed for 70 mph meaning the road can be driven at a higher speed. If Caltrans wouldn't delay a safety project because of a worthless environmental review those kids would be alive today. I hope you don't have to suffer a tragedy at the hands of
Caltrans.