Carmageddon: Amid West Cliff Drive overhaul, city begins to plan next 5 years

Even as West Cliff Drive undergoes extensive change and “unprecedented” roadwork, the City of Santa Cruz is already looking forward to the next five years.

The city hosted a West Cliff Community Conversations session at London Nelson Community Center last Monday, when more than 50 Santa Cruzans came to view the work currently underway along the scenic coastal road and provide feedback on potential projects that could be implemented over the next five years.

The five-year roadmap for West Cliff Drive is a project implementation plan that draws from and aligns with the 50-year community vision that the city unveiled earlier this year. That vision was developed over the course of a year with the help of community feedback, and includes plans to preserve natural beauty, prioritize bicycle and pedestrian access and improve climate resiliency in the area, and the potential for roadway relocation and one-way vehicle access.

Both the 50-year vision and the five-year roadmap include projects relating both to transportation and habitat and coastline preservation.

Assistant City Manager Michelle Templeton said the city began with 155 projects or activities on the table for West Cliff, which were narrowed down to eight over time by excluding work in progress, consolidating some of the ideas into larger projects and considering community feedback. Those eight projects were on display Monday evening.

“It’s really building up with a 50-year plan, looking out for the next five years, and really honing in on what projects we need to prioritize in the near term to help achieve that 50-year vision,” said City Manager Matt Huffaker.

Huffaker also clarified that, although some alternatives have been discussed, West Cliff Drive will eventually be reopened to two-way traffic for “the foreseeable future,” and that the city hopes to fully restore two-way capabilities by the end of January 2025.

Some of the projects featured at Monday’s meeting have been either in progress or discussed for some time, including the Bethany Curve culvert repair, sea cave erosion mitigation, and a possible road relocation near Lighthouse Field that would entail shifting part of West Cliff Drive into the state park — an idea public works assistant director Kevin Crossley said is moving forward. Last Tuesday, the Santa Cruz City Council gave Crossley’s department the green light to advertise for a design team for the project.

“We’re hoping to spend the next year working through the design and property elements of the project to start environmental clearances, and summer 2026 would be our target window to construct the road,” he said.

Crossley added that shifting the road would greatly benefit the future of access along West Cliff, as the 100-year erosion projection shows the roadway getting substantially damaged if no adjustment is made: “This gets us into a much better position long-term, and that’s what it really boils down to.”

Given the popularity of the coastal road, parking has long been an issue, and the city is considering hiring a consultant to weigh options for managing parking resources. City of Santa Cruz Public Works Director Nathan Nguyen said that while losing parking to erosion is a real concern, this proposed effort seeks to address parking as it exists currently.

“It’s more about how parking fills up quickly,” he said, adding that the city could approach this problem in a number of ways. “Whether we consider doing paid parking or some types of restrictive parking, the idea is that we hire consultants and work with the community to determine where we should potentially implement some managed parking.”

Potential projects that seek to mitigate erosion impacts and preserve the coastline outside of transportation infrastructure include exploring nature-based solutions — projects that combine natural features to protect, conserve and restore the coastline and the habitats that come with it. One possible project is stormwater outfall rehabilitation, which includes assessing existing stormwater outfalls and planning, designing and implementing repairs to the outfalls. That includes adding landscaping to provide habitats and reduce erosion risk. 

Even broader is a possible coastal change monitoring program that includes tidal gauges, drone monitoring and still camera stations to track erosion, flooding and other changing environmental positions. While the project is not considered an emergency, it is deemed “critical” for the long-term management of West Cliff and the coastline as a whole.

The next community conversation is Nov. 19 from 5:30 p.m. to 7 p.m. over Zoom. Those looking to provide feedback on the potential projects may do so on the city’s five-year roadmap web page.

Latest news

Check out our Carmageddon road delay list here. This week, pay particular attention to:

• The on-ramp to southbound Highway 1 from Bay Avenue in Capitola will be closed for two months to allow construction crews to adjust the roadway elevation in line with the bus-on-shoulder lane. Drivers can take a detour north on Porter Street to Soquel Drive, then east to Park Avenue, where they can rejoin Highway 1. They may also head south on Bay Avenue to Park Avenue, and rejoin southbound Highway 1 there. The Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission expects the ramp to reopen on Nov. 29.

• Through the end of 2024, various sections of Soquel Drive between State Park Drive and Paul Sweet Road could be reduced to one lane of traffic as the Soquel Drive Buffered Bike Lane and Congestion Mitigation Project moves forward. It includes new bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure, adaptive traffic signals and updated sidewalks and curbs. The sections of road will be intermittently closed as work continues at multiple sites. Specifically, look out for intermittent single lane closures between 8:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m.

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