🚘 Headlines About California Highways – July 2026

[cahwyguy]

It's that time of the month again. Here are your highway related headlines for July 2026:

https://cahighways.org/wordpress/?p=17810

As always, ready, set, discuss.

[SeriesE]

Gaviota Rest Area feels like they're closed longer than open in the recent years. I feel like they should stay open as a parking lot/brake check area/vista point with no services (with updated signs to indicate this).

The logical end point for I-10 if Santa Monica wants to remove it is at I-405, not where the study area is.

[Max Rockatansky]

Overnight work on 183 in Castroville seems like a questionable time to do things.  Merritt Street is pretty lined up with homes that house ag workers.  The weather is pretty nice out there and probably can be done during the day.

I'm not understanding how removal or capping of a freeway is supposed to "heal" a neighborhood?  The people who had lost their property to the Santa Monica Freeway are long dead.  Even if the freeway was removed it isn't as though those land parcels are going to be filled with structures like cheap single-family homes. 

1 in Big Sur isn't a disaster, it just went back to normal after reopening.  The crowds clogging the highway at the Bixby Bridge have always been there during the summer season.  What changed is that Big Sur NIMBY residents have a lot of political sway in Monterey County and convinced the board of supervisors to push for removing the parking area. 

[cahwyguy]

I'm not understanding how removal or capping of a freeway is supposed to "heal" a neighborhood?  The people who had lost their property to the Santa Monica Freeway are long dead.  Even if the freeway was removed it isn't as though those land parcels are going to be filled with structures like cheap single-family homes. 

I think the notion is that it reconnects two halves of a community that have been divided, as the points to actually cross the freeway are few and far between. There are great examples of that division in south central LA where the Harbor Freeway seemingly intentionally divided the community. So doing a cap park provides a park where the two halves can come together again.

[Max Rockatansky]

I'm not understanding how removal or capping of a freeway is supposed to "heal" a neighborhood?  The people who had lost their property to the Santa Monica Freeway are long dead.  Even if the freeway was removed it isn't as though those land parcels are going to be filled with structures like cheap single-family homes. 

I think the notion is that it reconnects two halves of a community that have been divided, as the points to actually cross the freeway are few and far between. There are great examples of that division in south central LA where the Harbor Freeway seemingly intentionally divided the community. So doing a cap park provides a park where the two halves can come together again.

I get that the neighborhood is "reconnected."  But how does that "heal" the perceived and/or real past wrongs though?  If this is a freeway cap then the conceptual parkland isn't exactly a one-for-one replacement for long demolished structures. 

I don't know, selling freeway removal proposals as reparations for things that happened six decades ago seems like faulty logic.  Selling them as enhancing aesthetics or just trying to make a city potentially nicer to live in seems to make more sense to me. 

Not that I have a dog in the fight with whatever happens with Santa Monica and I-10. 

[cahwyguy]

I'm not understanding how removal or capping of a freeway is supposed to "heal" a neighborhood?  The people who had lost their property to the Santa Monica Freeway are long dead.  Even if the freeway was removed it isn't as though those land parcels are going to be filled with structures like cheap single-family homes. 

I think the notion is that it reconnects two halves of a community that have been divided, as the points to actually cross the freeway are few and far between. There are great examples of that division in south central LA where the Harbor Freeway seemingly intentionally divided the community. So doing a cap park provides a park where the two halves can come together again.

I get that the neighborhood is "reconnected."  But how does that "heal" the perceived and/or real past wrongs though?  If this is a freeway cap then the conceptual parkland isn't exactly a one-for-one replacement for long demolished structures. 

I don't know, selling freeway removal proposals as reparations for things that happened six decades ago seems like faulty logic.  Selling them as enhancing aesthetics or just trying to make a city potentially nicer to live in seems to make more sense to me. 

Not that I have a dog in the fight with whatever happens with Santa Monica and I-10. 

There's a difference between "repair" and "reparations". They can never be reparations; it can never "restore" the neighborhood as it was. But it can help to reunite a divided neighborhood. Sometimes, that's the best that can be done (especially as in this case, I think freeway removal will never happen, and it was more a threat to get a cap more consideration).

There are cases where freeway removal might happen, especially where traffic is low or the route is redundant. This isn't it. But I do think you'll see more freeway caps.

[Plutonic Panda]

I think they just need to leave interstate 10 as is through Santa Monica. It's a nice freeway. They don't even need to add a cap to it.

That article about the rest area is bizarre. Closing it because it might endanger steelhead trout. I mean, I don't know what to say about that but it seems pretty ridiculous that rest area that's right next to the largest body of water on the planet and that is notorious for consistently flooding closes because somehow they can't find water to keep it open. You can freeze it however you want, but that is just absurd.

The 91/241 express lane connector will be very welcome.

So the road through Big Sur is fully open now? I'm not familiar with the parking area that was closed. I don't know what that has to do with anything other than the fact that it's a little wild the Nimby's have that much control.

I'm so shocked to see Joe Linton bitching about any little freeway expansion. Oh well.

[Max Rockatansky]

1 has been open through Big Sur for several months.  That is why we are having a meet up there in October.  My thought is that we need to do a meet ASAP before another big slide happens. 

Pretty much everything I post on our Facebook page related to Big Sur gets a high percentage NIMBY style comments.  Back in 2017 fairly well known local Big Sur Kate took particular dislike to my Facebook posts about the Nacimiento-Fergusson Road during the Mud Creek Slide saga.  Essentially her take was that I was encouraging "disaster tourism."  I got some amusement from that and ran a "disaster tourism" series on our actual site through much of the year.

One of my friends out of Fresno is a OHV guy.  He claims to have once had a local Big Sur resident point a gun at him while traveling Old Coast Road in his Jeep.  I wasn't there for that particular incident but it tracks with other stories I've heard over the years (Palo Colorado Road seems to be frequent source for them).

[Plutonic Panda]

Yeah, I had someone following me around in their car one time in the Palisades earlier this year. I guess they had seen me before because all occasionally drive through there to see how the area is being rebuilt because it used to be one of my favorite areas and I do a lot of hiking around there. They send something similar like I was either scoping out properties to steal from or I was doing something like what you said disaster tourism. Reality is just pains me to see what happened and I wanted to check on the progress that's going on. It wasn't like I was taking photos or interfering in anyway with what's going on over there.

It seems like people in big surge just got spoiled by the lack of traffic but state Route one is a very popular road for people to do road trips on. I did hear something about state Route one reopening through Big Sur but I didn't realize it was completely open all the way I'm glad to hear that. I'll be taking a drive-through when I go up to the Pacific Northwest for the first time later this month.

[FredAkbar]

A freeway cap seems like a low-cost version of a tunnel? Or at least you get the same effect of having multiple layers of vertical space. I guess that's a good thing. Though the pollution inside the tunnel (under the cap) would probably be pretty bad if there isn't a way to cleanly ventilate it.

[Plutonic Panda]

A freeway cap seems like a low-cost version of a tunnel? Or at least you get the same effect of having multiple layers of vertical space. I guess that's a good thing. Though the pollution inside the tunnel (under the cap) would probably be pretty bad if there isn't a way to cleanly ventilate it.

I wouldn't mind a park cap or two, but I don't think the entire thing needs to be capped and then that does bring the issues of whether or not a ventilation system would be required. Selfishly I just like the view driving through this highway. It's kinda nice. It's different unique it just gives off the vibe about. Hey I'm about to enter a different zone of the beach Zen.

[SeriesE]

I guess the overpasses could be made to look like the one for Euclid Avenue over I-210 to make the overpass more aesthetically pleasing/seamless from the street side

[Plutonic Panda]

What exactly is a freeway cap gonna do in this area like the surrounding buildings don't even seem like they would benefit from a freeway cap. This just seems like it would be a park where the homeless would go. I don't see tourist using this. I don't think it's gonna spark some sort of Renaissance in the area like this shit seems completely pointless.