Carmageddon: Capitola City Council moves to reallocate funding from Bay Avenue corridor to Capitola trestle planning

The Capitola City Council wants money originally allocated for Bay Avenue corridor improvements to be reallocated to further study whether the Capitola trestle could be redeveloped into a bicycle and pedestrian bridge.

At its previous meeting, the council voted against pursuing roundabouts on the Bay Avenue corridor, which leaves some money leftover from the project’s available funding. The city originally secured that funding through the Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission’s regional transportation improvement program. The city is requesting that the RTC reprogram $200,000 of the $500,000 currently allocated to the Bay Avenue project.

The council approved the move by a 4-1 vote at its Thursday meeting, with Councilmember Melinda Orbach the only dissenting vote. She expressed frustration that the council voted down roundabouts on Bay Avenue for something that was not part of the original grant application and which has not received any public input or review from the community. She also suggested that the move to vote down roundabouts at Bay Avenue was orchestrated to free up funding for the trestle study, and had she known the trestle proposal was going to come up, she would not have voted with the rest of the council in rejecting roundabouts.

“I understand that several of my fellow councilmembers identified planning for the trestle, which is not even owned by the city, as their top budget priority, but killing a grant-funded, evidence-based and publicly vetted roundabout plan that would have improved the safety of our residents in order to achieve that goal is not the way we free up funds,” said Orbach.

Mayor Margaux Morgan and Councilmember Joe Clarke, however, said that the move was not pre-conceived.

“I think that this is a way to rework something that didn’t work, unfortunately,” said Morgan.

The trestle is located within the Coastal Rail Trail project area, particularly Segments 10 and 11. The trestle is not included in the project scope, though, because the existing structure is unable to support a multi-use trail without substantial repairs. That means that there is currently a gap in the trail system spanning Capitola Village. According to an agenda report, advancing preliminary planning for the trestle is identified as a key city goal for the upcoming fiscal year. The goal would be to use the trestle to close the gap within the trail segments as the passenger rail project moves through development.

“The bridge needs to be replaced anyway for rail. Either it sits there and it isn’t used, or it can get repurposed in the meantime,” RTC executive director Sarah Christensen told Lookout on Friday, as any potential passenger rail operations are decades away at this point. “This would be a separate phase from the segments project.”

RTC commissioners would have to approve any reprogramming of grant funding, since it is the granting agency. Christensen said it’s likely the reprogramming process would be fairly straightforward, given both the Bay Avenue project and the goals for the trestle aim to approve active transportation. She said a 2021 study looked at the possibility of repurposing the trestle into a trail bridge, which concluded that it could be, but only with repairs.

“The study recommended doing additional analysis like geotechnical testing and seismic analysis,” she said, which is part of what any reprogrammed funding would likely go towards. 

Commissioners will consider reprogramming the funds at either their June meeting or their August meeting, as the commission does not meet in July.

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Here’s what’s happening this week on our roadways:

• Electrical work, tree work and utility work are shutting down one lane of Highway 9 between Hihn Street and San Lorenzo Valley Elementary School, Kirby Street and San Lorenzo Valley High, Mitchell Drive and Stapp Road, Clear Creek/Pacific Street and Irwin Way, Grove Street and River Street and Two Bar Road and Mitchell Drive from Monday through Friday between 7 a.m. and 5 p.m.

• Striping will shut down the northbound Highway 1 on-ramp at 41st Avenue in Soquel overnight between 8 p.m. and 5 a.m. from Monday through Friday.

• Roadway excavation is shutting down the southbound Highway 1 on-ramp at Park Avenue in Capitola until Aug. 19.

• There is a six-week closure of the southbound auxiliary lane on Highway 1 between Soquel Drive in Live Oak and 41st Avenue in Capitola due to guardrail work.

• Emergency sewer work in Soquel Village could occasionally block access to driveways, sidewalks, on-street parking and interrupt sewer service on weekdays until June 30, on Soquel Drive, Porter Street and Main Street. Work on Soquel Drive will be overnight from 8:30 p.m. to 5:30 a.m. and from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Porter and Main streets. Shorter-duration pothole repair work on Porter, Main and Center streets and Daubenbiss Avenue will take place from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

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