Date:	Friday April 28, 2023
District:	05 – Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, Monterey, San Benito, and Santa Cruz Counties
Contact:	Kevin Drabinski or Alexa Bertola
Phone:	(805) 549-3138 or (805) 549-3237

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

BIG SUR MARATION TO CLOSE 27-MILE STRETCH OF HIGHWAY 1

4 AM TO 1 PM THIS SUNDAY

MONTEREY COUNTY – The 36^th Presentation of the Big Sur International Marathon on this Sunday April 30 will result in the closure of just over 27 miles Highway 1 on the Big Sur Coast this Sunday from 4 am to 1 pm.

Highway 1 will be closed from the south at the start of the Marathon at Big Sur Station (PM 45.64) to just past the finish line at Rio Road (PM 72.92).

Only emergency vehicles and scheduled CHP-led caravans are allowed during the race. If travel is necessary between 4 am and 1 pm, travelers may join such a caravan. The caravan schedule is attached to this email and is available at the following link:

Click to access BSIM_2023_ResidentMailerWEB.pdf

For additional information about the Big Sur International Marathon on Sunday April 30, please visit: https://www.bigsurmarathon.org/

CHP will be on hand to lend their expertise in assisting with traffic control.

Message and directional signs will be in place to alert travelers.

Congratulations to all the race participants and their support teams.

Road information and updates can also be found on Caltrans District 5 Social Media platforms: Twitter at: @CaltransD5, Facebook at: Caltrans Central Coast (District 5) and Instagram at: Caltrans_D5.

Our crews deserve to get home safely too.

Drive slowly and carefully in work zones.

                           | #BeWorkZoneAlert | Twitter | Facebook | YouTube

###

Kevin Drabinski

Public Information Officer

Caltrans District 5

It seems almost sacrilegious to discuss an El Niño when we are still digging out from the winter from hell, but I want to point out Dr. Daniel Swain’s work and blog as well as weekly virtual office hours on you tube. Dr Swain is a professor at UCLA. I have been following him since he was a PhD candidate. He is not an alarmist. He is measured and careful in his predictions and discussions and can explain complex climatology and meteorology in terms a lay person can understand. I always feel as if I were auditing a college class when I watch him. His usual virtual office hour is Monday at 9 am. If it is a very dynamic week for weather, he will add a second day later in the week. He will take questions that you type into the comment box. You can follow him on twitter at @Weather_West. On you tube, just search for Daniel Swain.

Today’s blog post addressed the upcoming El Niño.

Notice that hot spot off the coast of Peru? He has been discussing this for a couple weeks. Today he wrote this:

“El Niño is now rapidly developing in the tropical Pacific Ocean, with remarkable and even record-breaking ocean surface temperature anomalies now emerging near the coast of South America (Peru). Additionally, the *entire* subsurface of the tropical Pacific from essentially the International Dateline eastward to South American is now much warmer than average–suggesting that there is a whole lot of anomalously warm water getting ready to surface during the next round of westerly wind burst activity (which, right on cue, is expected to ramp up during May). There is much chatter in the oceanographic and climatological communities at the moment regarding the amount of heat that has likely been sequestered in the subsurface ocean by a rare consecutive “Triple Dip” (three year-long) La Niña event against the backdrop of a warming climate–which mostly relates to the elevated possibility of a strong (or very strong) El Niño event this year. In other words: it’s not just that there’s a high likelihood of El Niño conditions of some magnitude this year (which there is), but there’s also a moderate but growing likelihood of a remarkably strong event later in 2023.” (https://weatherwest.com/archives/26039)

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Climate Prediction Center issued an “El Niño watch” Thursday morning, saying the climate pattern is expected to form sooner than previously anticipated. 

After La Niña ended last month, we entered “ENSO-neutral” conditions, which means neither La Niña nor El Niño is present. Those neutral conditions were expected to end at some point in the summer or early fall. 

But as of Thursday, it looks as though the timeline has moved up. Forecasters said there is a 62% chance El Niño will take over between May and July. The probability that El Niño will form by fall is even higher, between 80% and 90%

Note from me, what you won’t see predicted for a while is the strength of this El Niño, so we won’t know if we are going to have another very wet winter, but Daniel Swain (Weather_West) in his office hour this am discussed that possibility and what it COULD mean for the state.

These were taken in my garden or surrounding area with an iPhone 12, last week. The first is my d’anjou pear, the second is my Indian peach, and the 3rd is a Quercus lobata coming back to leaf.

You may have noticed, I did not post much this week. I didn’t post at all, I was traveling and visiting, and getting some things done. The registration on my Sprinter expired the end of 2022. I needed to get it smogged. Between not driving due to the infection inside my eyeball, and the collapse of Highway One, I couldn’t get it done. Finally, I could drive, I had the appointment, and I combined as much as I could, including a visit with a friend in King City and with friends in Morro Bay, into the week. I left on Monday and got home Friday. The slides to the north and to the south of me meant I was limited to the east.

It was such a beautiful drive — everything was so green, except for the explosion of poppies. Unfortunately, I couldn’t get a photo of that as there was too much traffic for me to stop, but I did get this intoxicating wisteria in SLO. So fragrant.

Date:	Friday, April 14, 2023
District:	05 – Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, Monterey, San Benito, and Santa Cruz Counties
Contact:	Kevin Drabinski or Alexa Bertola
Phone:	(805) 549-3138 or (805) 549-3237

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

UPDATE #39

CONVOY FOR LOCAL RESIDENTS THROUGH GILBERT’S SLIDE ON HIGHWAY 1

SET FOR WEDNESDAY APRIL 19

MONTEREY / SAN LUIS OBISPO COUNTIES – Local residents will be able to pass through repair work at Gilbert’s Slide north of Gorda for resupply activities on Wednesday April 19.

The schedule for resupply travel for local residents and fuel vehicles will be Wednesday April 19 from 7:00 am to 7:30 am, and again later that day from 4:30 pm to 5:00 pm.

A contractor led convoy will direct travel through the Caltrans maintenance facility.

A similar resupply window through Gilbert’s Slide is also scheduled to take place on Wednesday May 3.

While crews have made progress with excavation of the repair site, the presence of subsurface water is causing delays in the ability to begin to introduce fill into the site.

The new estimate for reopening Highway 1 at Gilbert’s Slide is July 14.

Highway 1 remains open through Morro Bay, Cambria, San Simeon, and the Ragged Point Inn, with all coastal San Luis Obispo County businesses open. Highway 1 also remains open with full access to all coastal businesses for 50 miles from Monterey south to the Big Creek Vista area in Monterey County.

Road information and updates can also be found on Caltrans District 5 Social Media platforms: Twitter at: @CaltransD5, Facebook at: Caltrans Central Coast (District 5) and Instagram at: Caltrans_D5.

Our crews deserve to get home safely too.

Drive slowly and carefully in work zones.

CHP Traffic Incident Information Page: http://cad.chp.ca.gov

Excavation work continues for the repair of Highway 1 at Gilbert’s Slide just north of Gorda.

###

Kevin Drabinski

Public Information Officer

Caltrans District 5

50 Higuera St.

San Luis Obispo CA 93401

Office: 805.549.3138

Cell: 805.748.1858

TTY 711