Weather Seems Perfect for a Road-Widening Project

Dear Street Smart:

May I have a progress report on the widening of Santa Rosa Road, east of Gerry Road, near Camarillo?

My friends and I travel this road two or three times a week on our way to play golf. We haven’t seen anyone in ages working on that road.

They have beautiful weather to work on it now.

Marge Kelly, Camarillo

Dear Reader:

Perhaps the Santa Rosa Road workers have been keeping a low profile lately. But Butch Britt, the county’s deputy public works director, insists that they’re out there, finishing this lengthy project one step at a time.

“I was out there last Tuesday, and they were working on the road base, building it up,” Britt says.

Santa Rosa Road is one of the key links between Camarillo, Thousand Oaks and Moorpark, yet for many years it has been a narrow, two-lane country road.

To bring it up to modern traffic standards, the county has been widening the main travel lanes to 12 feet and adding paved shoulders. The road is also getting new left-turn lanes and some right-turn acceleration lanes for drivers who pull onto Santa Rosa from the side streets.

Several years ago, the county finished the first stretch of this project between Moorpark Road and Penelope Place. Road workers are now working their way west to Gerry Road--a project that is costing about $2.5 million and should be completed by late this year or early 1994.

The county recently awarded another $1.5-million contract for the final stretch between Gerry and the Camarillo city line. That work, beginning in October, should be finished by mid-1995.

If you don’t see a swarm of highway workers each time you travel Santa Rosa Road, perhaps that’s just the nature of the project. “You can only work on a certain section at a time,” Britt says.

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Dear Street Smart:

Shasta Avenue, the main entrance to a housing tract in Moorpark, has been blocked off by a road crew working on California 118 (Los Angeles Avenue).

By closing Shasta, they have cut off about 120 homes, leaving only one exit. Residents have to drive up to Poindexter Avenue and take that to Gabbert Road or Moorpark Avenue--a long detour.

In an emergency, they’ve cut off 50% of the access. Why do they do such stupid planning? They should make other arrangements in the future.

Eloise Brown, Moorpark

Dear Reader:

It does sound a bit frightening to find that the main entrance to your housing tract has been sealed off.

The shutdown of Shasta Avenue was ordered by Caltrans, which oversees California 118, and it is endorsed by Ken Gilbert, Moorpark’s public works director.

“For a variety of safety and construction reasons, it was necessary to close the street,” Gilbert says. “You would never build a development like that, but as a temporary, unavoidable situation, it’s something they can accommodate.”

The project involves the installation of a new, larger storm drain pipe along Los Angeles Avenue. It is needed to carry runoff from the Mission Bell Plaza, being constructed just east of Shasta.

Before the drain could be installed, a road crew had to relocate underground gas and sewer lines. That required the closure of one westbound lane on Los Angeles Avenue.

Caltrans did not want homeowners to slow down in this single lane, turn onto Shasta, then cross a trench where the pipes were being placed. So the road was blocked off.

Firefighters and ambulance crews were notified so they could enter this neighborhood through an alternate route, Gilbert says.

The storm drain project is being financed by an assessment collected from commercial-property owners in the area. The good news is that the work should be finished within two weeks, when Shasta will be reopened.

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Dear Street Smart:

When did the city of Simi Valley decide that 1st Street, at least south of Arcane Street, was almost going to be a freeway?

In recent weeks, the speed limit signs have been replaced. They now proclaim that it’s OK to go 50 m.p.h. When we moved to Simi Valley in 1987, the posted limit was 40.

It’s not that the street goes anywhere. It eventually dead-ends at a hillside.

It only serves residential areas. Many people walk and ride bicycles along 1st Street, but it’s no longer safe. In addition, there’s a marked horse crossing at Carefree Drive.

What’s the next step? I guess it’ll be 55 m.p.h.--the same as the posted speed on the Simi Valley Freeway!

Melinda J. Brown, Simi Valley

Dear Reader:

Bill Golubics, Simi Valley’s traffic engineer, has been bracing for complaints like this since the City Council approved a series of speed limit changes in May.

The new speed limit signs were posted on 1st Street within the past few weeks, and yours is not the first complaint he’s received.

The problem, Golubics explains, is that under state law, speed limits must reflect the rate at which most drivers travel safely on a street. A recent traffic study showed that most 1st Street motorists are moving faster than in the past. The result was a hike in the speed limit.

If the city did not raise the speed limit, its police officers could not legally use radar to nab speeders.

Bike lanes and horse crossings could be used to justify a lower speed limit, but only if there had been a rash of crashes on this road.

But Golubics says, “There have been no demonstrated accident problems there, related to speed. Both the drivers and the equestrians appear to be using the proper caution.”

Here’s another thing to keep in mind: 1st Street won’t be a dead-end indefinitely. When home-building picks up at nearby Wood Ranch, the developer must extend 1st Street to provide more access to that community.

When that happens, you can expect many more cars to use 1st Street in your neighborhood.

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Street Smart Update:

After 11 weeks of work and having spent at least $220,000, the county recently reopened South Mountain Road, just east of Santa Paula.