Caltrans sticking with present design for Highway 26 work

Dana Nichols

Business owners say it will wipe out landscaping and part of La Contenta’s 10th fairway

A California Department of Transportation spokesman last week held out little hope that a safety project on Highway 26 near St. Andrews Road could be redesigned to avoid slicing off a chunk of the 10th fairway of La Contenta Golf Course.

In addition to the golf course, several other businesses would also lose strips of property that now buffer them from the highway. A golf course representative estimated it could take $700,000 to erect netting to protect passing cars from flying golf balls if the project proceeds as planned.

Nevertheless, Caltrans spokesman Rick Estrada said Thursday that “This is the design we are working with right now,” and that construction is scheduled to begin this summer.

When asked specifically whether there is any hope that engineers could redesign the project to avoid impacts to businesses there, Estrada neither offered any assurance nor ruled it out.

“We can’t speculate on what’s to come,” Estrada said.

Marty Davis, the director of golf at La Contenta, said he does believe that CalTrans officials will make an effort to reduce the harm to businesses in the area, and will even pay the $700,000 cost to erect the netting to protect cars from golf balls, if necessary.

Estrada said in a phone message Monday that Caltrans has no record that the agency has agreed to pay for the netting.

The project will add a center lane to provide a safe spot for westbound vehicles to wait for a chance to turn left off the highway at St. Andrews Road, or for eastbound vehicles to turn left onto Country View Drive.

Property owners and others in the area agree that the safety improvements are needed. However, many are dismayed that it may come at substantial cost to the golf course, the 10th Green Inn, and the adjoining Thomas Center commercial building.

Estrada said that the project would not cause either of the latter businesses to lose parking spaces. But Jean Fox, owner of the 10th Green Inn, said the project will impact parking lots, at the very least by eliminating landscaping that had served as a protective buffer between highway traffic and her business.

Critics of the design have asked that the widening instead use property on the opposite side of the highway, where there are no trees, buildings or parking lots.

Estrada said that the project was designed to fit within the existing right of way in order to save money.

Purchasing additional land “would add cost to this project,” he said.

Davis said he remains hopeful that Caltrans engineers will modify the design, and said that he is not disheartened by Estrada’s statement.

“They are paid to be ambiguous,” he said of public information officers employed by large organizations.

Neither Supervisor Steve Kearney, who attended a brief meeting March 5 between property owners and Caltrans representatives, nor Supervisor Cliff Edson, whose district includes the project site, had heard any assurances by late last week that Caltrans might modify the project.

“What’s cheap to them could be very expensive to us,” Kearney said of the explanation that Caltrans did not want to buy the additional land that would be needed for a different design.

Kearney said he intends to pursue the matter with state officials. “We are not in a situation in this county to hurt what is prosperous. We need to build on that.”