Quick Take:
Residents of Cayuga Street in Santa Cruz say that they’ve dealt with unsafe drivers and both accidents and near misses for years now, but that the Murray Street Bridge closure has highlighted those concerns again due to increased traffic through the neighborhood. City officials say that the street is likely to see changes with funds from a new transportation grant.
The full closure of the Murray Street Bridge has led to more drivers using Cayuga Street in Midtown as a way to bypass Seabright Avenue, according to residents on the street. The increased traffic has reignited long-standing concerns about safety on a street with a history of serious traffic collisions.
Resident Rafa Jara-Simkin said that many drivers have long used Cayuga as a way to bypass Seabright in heavy periods of traffic, and now with the Murray Street Bridge fully closed, the concerns are heightened, and the neighborhood is continuing to push for traffic reform.
In 2022, Cayuga Street resident Rafa Jara-Simkin and numerous others met with then-Mayor Sonja Brunner and a Santa Cruz Police representative to discuss unsafe traffic conditions in the Midtown neighborhood. Just a few days later, a man was killed in a single-vehicle crash along the same road.
At the time, it was the latest accident in an area that appeared prone to severe traffic collisions. Sisters Mandie and Carrie Wagner, 16 and 14 years old, respectively, were killed when an intoxicated driver hit their family’s van in September 2001. Then, in 2015, Whole Foods employee Kyle Pape, 25, was killed while crossing at the intersection of Cayuga Street and Soquel Avenue, per a Santa Cruz Sentinel report.
Jara-Simkin said Cayuga Street’s lack of infrastructure like stoplights and medians makes fast driving even more dangerous. “It’s designed [for] slower, neighborhood traffic, but people use it like Seabright,” he said. “And because of the Murray Street Bridge project, the traffic has probably tripled.”
Ben Dorfan and his wife moved to Cayuga Street in 2018, and immediately noticed many unsafe drivers speeding down the road.
“I believe there’s an ongoing trend of increasing congestion, traffic density and driver aggression,” he said. “As time goes on, more people are discovering Cayuga Street as a shortcut, and this has been greatly exacerbated by the bridge closure.”
Dorfan added that just last week, he saw the aftermath of several car accidents that appeared to involve high speeds due to the damage to the vehicles, and that the more it happens, the more it weighs on the neighborhood.
Following the 2022 fatal accident, the city striped the road with dividing lines and bike lanes, as it was previously entirely unmarked. However, that did little to quell the concerns, according to residents. Jara-Simkin said while he initially advocated for the bike lanes, it may not have been the best idea in retrospect. He said the optics make it look more built out and suited for high traffic volumes like a main thoroughfare, which may contribute to higher speeds and reckless driving: “Psychologically, there’s a difference. It almost attracts you to go down it.”
City transportation planner Claire Gallogly, who has met with the neighborhood residents multiple times, said she was aware of the mixed feelings about the striping and bike lanes on Cayuga. She added that more substantive changes could be coming to the road soon, as the intersection of Cayuga Street and Broadway Street is one of 88 locations in the city that staff has identified as needing improvements, both due to aging infrastructure or safety concerns.
Gallogly said that the work would be funded through a new grant that funds a citywide intersection improvement project. The $2.1 million grant was awarded through the California Transportation Commission’s Highway Safety Improvement Program. She said that the inclusion of the Cayuga and Broadway intersection is largely the result of the neighborhood engagement. The city is working to put together a plan and designs for the various changes at the 88 locations within the next year.
Gallogly said that a number of adjustments are in consideration for the intersection. One is turning it into a “bulbout” intersection, which essentially means extending the curb and widening the sidewalk for a short distance. Wider sidewalks means pedestrians would have a shorter distance to cross the road and wider corners improve visibility for drivers and pedestrians to see around parked cars. Tighter turns also make drivers slow down when approaching turns.
Gallogly said that, as of now, the intersection with Broadway is the only one on Cayuga slated for improvements right now, but she added that because the street is wide and has a neighborhood group open to trying different things, the city will consider other temporary installations to test for future improvements.
“The intention is to do something different and get feedback,” she said, adding that deciding what to include will require more input from residents. “The primary thing that we’ve heard an interest in is slowing speeds. Whatever infrastructure demonstrations we look at, that would be the goal.”
Jara-Simkin helped conduct a neighborhood-wide survey to see what changes people would most like to see. The results showed residents support an additional stop sign at Cayuga Street and Windsor Street, a traffic circle at the large five-way intersection at Pine and Cayuga streets, and speed bumps.
Gallogly said that the bulbouts and possibly adding median islands “check a lot of boxes” in solving the traffic issues in the neighborhood, but added that other areas in the city have more urgent safety concerns based on collision data, so Cayuga is unlikely to see extensive improvements at this time.
“That’s not to say the feelings of these neighbors are not real, because they are,” she said. “But one of the things we bump up against with limited resources and limited bandwidth is figuring out where you can do the most good.”
Dorfan just wants the community to feel safer than they do now.
“Everyone’s just always really worried that someone’s going to get hit,” he said, adding that the neighborhood’s proximity to Gault Elementary School makes the prospect of a collision particularly distressing for parents.
“Every time there’s a crash, there are like 20 or 30 people that come out and all the neighbors are like ‘this can’t be happening again,’” he said.