Quick Take
The long-awaited Murray Street Bridge project will break ground next Monday, March 24, bringing significant traffic impacts to the crosstown artery. Here is the plan and schedule thus far.
The City of Santa Cruz will officially break ground on the Murray Street Bridge retrofit next Monday after years of buildup. The massive undertaking is expected to disrupt traffic in the area for years to come.
The construction work will affect traffic for the next nearly three years. Starting next Monday, March 24, commuters heading toward Seabright can expect the westbound lane to be closed to all vehicles and bicycles until the project’s expected January 2028 completion date. The eastbound lane will remain open for drivers and cyclists heading toward Live Oak.
Those traveling west will detour onto 7th Avenue and take the street to Capitola Road, then to Soquel Avenue, and then to Seabright Avenue, which will bring commuters to the other side of the bridge. Cyclists can follow the same route, or they may detour into Arana Gulch at the intersection of 7th Avenue and Brommer Street, take it to Broadway Street, and then to Seabright Avenue.
Pedestrians will be able to continue crossing the bridge on the walkway on the eastbound side. City of Santa Cruz Public Works Director Nathan Nguyen told Lookout in December that the plan is to maintain eastbound traffic “for a majority of the project.”
However, there will be two stretches where the bridge is closed completely. The first is scheduled for 4½ months and could begin as soon as June or as late as November. The second is scheduled for three months, in early to mid-2026. Kevin Crossley, the city’s assistant director of public works, said the city is still working on details for those full closures.
“That second closure can potentially be folded into that first one, so more details to come on that,” he said.
The roads running under the bridge to and from the harbor on both the east and west sides will be fully closed for about six months each as well, but that’s not happening for a couple of years. Currently, the road on the west side is slated for closure from January 2027 to June 2027, and the east side from June 2027 to December 2027.
In discussion since the 1990s, the Murray Street Bridge retrofit aims to strengthen the structure with additional pilings and an improved foundation to better withstand earthquakes. Along with new piles, columns and new barrier rails, crews will install a new bridge deck with 6-foot-wide bike lanes and a 7½-foot-wide sidewalk along the ocean side of the bridge, providing a two-way pedestrian travel path.
About 60 people came to a community meeting at the Live Oak Community Center last Tuesday to hear a more detailed schedule of the anticipated closures. Most of those attending the meeting were boat owners who will need to move their vessels from the docks underneath the bridge.
Harbormaster Blake Anderson said that he matched boat owners’ home addresses to the side of the dock that would be the easiest for them to access. That means people who live on the west side of the bridge will have their boats moved to the west side of the harbor, and those that live on the east side will have their boats moved to the east side.
Anderson said he’s ready to see the project finally begin. “I’ve been thinking about this for the last five years. We’ve been having meetings about this since I first became interim harbormaster in 2019,” he said. “Let’s just get this done.”
Latest news
Check out our Carmageddon road project list here. This week, pay particular attention to:
- Striping work will prompt overnight closures of northbound and southbound Highway 1 off-ramps at Park Avenue, Bay Avenue/Porter Street and State Park Drive between 9 p.m. to 6 a.m. from Sunday through Friday.
- Striping work will shut down northbound and southbound Highway 1 between Bay Avenue/Porter Street and State Park Drive from Sunday through Friday between 9 p.m. and 6:30 a.m.
- Tree work and slope repair will close down sections of Highway 9 from Monday through Thursday from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. Those sections are between the Henry Cowell Redwoods Vista Point and Glengarry Road and Prospect Avenue and Lorenzo Avenue.
- In Watsonville, a single lane on Green Valley Road from Holohan Road to Casserly Road is closed for the Multi-Use Trail Improvement Project. Lane closures occur from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Monday through Friday. Additionally, a single lane is closed on Buena Vista Drive and Ranport Road for overhead tree trimming on weekdays from 8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m., causing potential delays.
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