Road Closed Ahead – Highway One at Alder Creek

No shit, Sherlock… that’s what I was going to call this photo of Alder Creek I took on Mother’s Day. Then I remembered that the titles of my posts go on Facebook, Twitter, Monterey County Weekly, and other places, so decided to go conservative. I love the juxtaposition of the sign.

Road Closed Ahead

Here is one from Cal-Trans showing the work accomplished over a week’s period there at Alder Creek.

Cal-Trans Photo

And here are a couple from Rock Knocker, taken on Saturday, May 7th. One can clearly see rocks falling all the way down the slide area, and in the second one, one can see the splashes into to the ocean of the falling rocks. And you want to know if you can walk across down there? What do you think?

Falling Rocks by Rock Knocker

Falling Rocks 2 by Rock Knocker

Okay, tomorrow we’ll take a look at Rain Rocks and Pitkin’s Curve. The Engineering is fascinating!

bigsurkate

Appointed appellate counsel for indigent defendants (retired.) I have lived in Big Sur since 1984, first on the north coast, and on the South Coast since 1989.

View Comments

  • Great shots from Rock Knocker! That really shows how unsafe it is/was to cross at the bottom. Do you know when they were taken?

  • I wonder how far down the mountain they plan on using the rolls of chicken wire? Thanks for the updates and photos!

  • Oh really? Doesn't look that bad. Can't visitors with SUVs just push the 4WD button and drive over the dirt pile like on TV?

  • We had two European tourists insist that they would be able to ride their bikes over the slide. They wanted a ranger to drive them to the slide and then help them with their bikes! Brains; don't leave home without them!

  • I am planning a bike camping tour through the area in about 5 weeks. It looks like the road still won't be open. Can anyone tell me the shortest route around closure that would be doable on a bike? I have taken a look at the route that the Amgen tour took and it looks to be pretty far out of the way: http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/photos/landslides-re-route-amgen-tour-of-california-stage-5/171984
    Any help from the locals would be greatly appreciated.
    Thanks in advance,
    Joshua

  • Was there a reason why a private contractor wasn't used on the repair of the Alder Creek slide? I get the impression that Caltrans is not exactly motivated to finish this repair in a timely manner, given all the other projects going on. What a tragedy for all the business affected; they are essentially eliminating the SoCal vacationers, unless they want to take the circuitous route up through Salinas and back down through Monterey then Big Sur.

    • Hi, Frank. As I wrote privately, there is a private contractor on this job, as is standard down here. Cal-Trans contracts out all the major work. Cal-Trans is very motivated to get this open, in my opinion and experience, but based on information and personal observation, this is a very tricky slide which has created significant problems for everyone working on it. It is dangerous, as hell.

  • I am a truck driver that was cleaning up the Alder creek slide. I expect to be back at it soon. Cal-Trans has been making things less dangerous for us these past days.

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bigsurkate

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