HIGHWAY 1/PITKINS CURVE BRIDGE AND ROCKSHED PROJECT—NEARING COMPLETION
MONTEREY COUNTY — Highway 1 Bridge and Rockshed at Pitkins Curve (post-mile 21.5) is nearing completion, Caltrans officials announced today.
The ¼ – mile project limits extends from just north of Limekiln Creek Bridge to south of Lucia. The project includes a rockshed, a bridge, and a retaining wall.
Some of the most significant benefits of this project include:
The project will severely reduce motorists’ encounters with a falling rock and/or a land slide.
The project should greatly reduce any period of closure of the highway at this location due to a major slide.
The cost of maintaining this stretch of highway will be greatly reduced as a result of this project.
The ride will be much more pleasant than it was before (smoother ride, unique structures, more impressive view).
“We are excited to see this project approaching completion,” said District 5 Director Tim Gubbins. The entire project is scheduled to be completed in January, weather permitting.
The contractor for this $29.5 million project is Golden State Bridge Inc. of Martinez, CA.
Enjoyed watching this unfold from start to finish. Tip ‘o the hat to all involved. Wish I’d made the effort to set up a time lapse camera somewhere up above. Congratulations Cal-Trans and Golden State Bridge.
While I admire the work involved to improve our access, I must say it looks like something out of a bad movie set and does nothing in my opinion to improve our view shed.—–Painted cement to look like rocks on Highway One with netting in the background? —–Not my idea of a scenic highway—-I’d rather they held the paint and extended the whole project further South to clear the worst of the vertical cliffs, then took the netting away. But they didn’t ask my opinion,——
even though I’m full of them.
I actually asked Steve Price about extending the rock shed further south and he gave me two reasons they didn’t: 1) that section is of a different geological make up, and would not be conducive to the lock shed; and 2) it costs some outrageous amount like a million a foot or something!
bigsurkate, on a mountain top in Big Sur
My car’s broken or I’d go look and offer my opinion, Without looking I have an opinion: Frequently with major construction such as this where the scenery gets altered by some other guy, nobody in town likes it for the first fifty years. After which it’s THE place to get your picture taken and have a picnic. And the grandkids won’t believe you were alive and young when it got built.
It’s a nice tunnel & bridge & all that … but. It seems like the road north of the tunnel is sinking & the rocks are falling south of the tunnel. Like they almost finished & somebody came up & said “ok, looks good for now” & everybody went home. Or did I miss something ?
Great to imagination at work especially on a rode that was so inspired to begin with. I do wish the old radiator/picnic areas could be restored as well.
Holycowgirl, you make me laugh 🙂 🙂 🙂