Was CA-1 supposed to bypass Santa Cruz?

[ZLoth]

I was doing a day road trip on Sunday, and noticed the very unusual sharp curve sign at CA-1/CA-17. This leads me to wonder if there was plans to bypass Santa Cruz before the Anti-Car Alliance said "no way".

[NE2]

I was going to research the question but your Anti-Car Alliance comment made me decide not to.

[TheStranger]

While not Route 1 per se, a freeway route through the beach area was once proposed from the Route 1/17 junction eastward:

http://cahighways.org/097-104.html#100

[The Ghostbuster]

Any CA-1 bypass would have to be routed around the University of California, Santa Cruz campus. Also, what kind of terrain is there in the area? Would a bypass, even if proposed and approved, be practical?

[TheStranger]

Some more info from a quick Google search:
http://we.got.net/~mapman/streets/SantaCruz/SC.html

"Back in the 1960's, Caltrans proposed creating a freeway bypass of Highway 1 along the Mission Street corridor. The Santa Cruz City Council endorced a proposal which would have paralleled Mission Street to the north, cutting through some neighborhoods along the entire route. The nearby residents appealed this decision all the way to the California Transportation Commission, which sided with the residents and chose their alternative of an alignment on the northern outskirts of town through the recently-opened University of California Santa Cruz (UCSC). However, UCSC strongly objected to this new alignment, and eventually the entire bypass issue was dropped."

[kkt]

Any CA-1 bypass would have to be routed the University of California, Santa Cruz campus. Also, what kind of terrain is there in the area? Would a bypass, even if proposed and approved, be practical?

USCS would have fought tooth and nail, both the administration and the students.  The meadows and woodland setting is a huge asset for them, as well as space for future expansion as the UC system grows.

The terrain is steep hills.  It would be expensive to build on.

[DTComposer]

From the March 26, 1964, Santa Cruz Sentinel:

Joint Session Set On UCSC Plan

[excerpt]
Yesterday Commissioners Elaine Reinelt, Erle Byer and Harvey Edmund all complained about the possible location of a Highway 1 freeway north of Mission Street. Byer and Reinelt both own property in the area.
Planning Director Bert Muhly explained that the location shown is only a very tentative one. "If you cut out the freeway, you cut out the backbone and make ludicrous the entire planning program. This is the key to circulation 10 or 20 years hence," he said.
Edmund interjected that "if we go along and say yes, that's where the freeway will go in, and it doesn't belong there." Instead the commissioner suggested that the freeway route run down toward the beach along the Southern Pacific railroad tracks. It would then sweep along the edge of Neary Lagoon and out again, Edmund said. He noted the proposal was first suggested "about 30 years ago."
Neary Lagoon, he declared, is the natural recreation area for the city in any event, and the freeway would disturb far fewer homeowners there.
[/excerpt]

It seems like the route Edmund suggested is basically where Route 100 might go. I'll see if I can't find any articles that have a map/graphic.

[mapman]

From what I recall from my research (about 15+ years ago) for my web site reference that TheStranger cited, the original freeway plan from Caltrans would have built a new CA 1 freeway between Mission and King Streets.  Residents in that area protested, and, as DTComposer noted in his quote, the new alignment proposed was through the UCSC property.  UCSC objected to that idea, and, I think to not tick off the UC system (as UCSC's first class began in Fall 1965), the alignment through UCSC was also scrapped.

Some of the older Caltrans system maps (say, from the 1970s and 1980s) did show the proposed alignment of Route 100, although not any other non-state highways in the area.  Once can compare that to a street map of Santa Cruz to get a better sense of the alignment relative to other city streets, but I believe DTComposer is correct as to his suspicions on the proposed alignment.