Petaluma intersection where four teens died to get stoplight

It’s been 11 years since four teens died in a fatal crash at a three-way intersection on Petaluma’s unincorporated rural east side, surrounded by fields and wildflowers that brush up against horse fencing on Adobe Road where it meets East Washington Street.

On a recent weekday afternoon, with some drivers waiting to collect their kids from the nearby elementary school, traffic was backed up by three stop signs topped by flashing red lights.

But it’s better - and safer - than it used to be.

The signs and lights were installed at the intersection a little more than a month after Adrianna DeLaTorre, 18, Christina Ramirez, 19, Caj’o Phelan, 17, and Greg Kubeck, 16, died there on Dec. 13, 2005.

DeLaTorre’s brother, Michael, 17 at the time, and foster sister, Michaela Jones, 16, survived the crash.

Neighborhood friends, the teens were students at San Antonio and Casa Grande high schools, and on their way to Santa Rosa for Christmas shopping that afternoon when DeLaTorre’s Ford Taurus sedan was broadsided by a southbound delivery truck.

The CHP determined DeLaTorre’s northbound left turn onto Adobe Road was too close in front of the truck, which was traveling at the posted 50-mph speed limit. No one was charged in the accident.

There have been no fatalities at the intersection since, according to CHP records, but in the past decade there have been 37 collisions, 17 involving injuries.

Last week, the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors approved a plan to install a traffic light at the intersection to improve safety and reduce congestion.

“It was always about finding the required dollars,” said Supervisor David Rabbitt, whose district includes the area and who pushed for completion of the project.

In addition to the signal, the $1.7 million project will widen Adobe Road to include eastbound left and right turn lanes, lengthen the existing westbound left turn lane and create bike lanes.

Rabbitt said funding such projects is difficult in rural, unincorporated parts of the county because of the lack of impact fees.

DeLaTorre’s parents, Mike and Kim Young of Petaluma, lamented how fast people travel down those roads, far in excess of the 50-mph speed limit. They agreed it was a long-overdue project.

“It takes something to happen for them to do something about it,” Mike Young said.

Petaluma Mayor David Glass recalled driving past the memorials of flowers, balloons, wreaths and crosses that sprung up along the side of the road after the teens died.

“They’re fixing it, but I wish they would’ve fixed it 20 years ago,” he said.

Mike Kerns, a county supervisor representing Petaluma at the time, was working to improve the safety at the intersection prior to the accident.

Plans had been drafted a few years before to put a traffic light at the intersection, he said, but because of a lack of funding it never happened. In a December 2005 interview with The Press Democrat, he estimated it would cost about $1.2 million to install a signal, and said, “There are reasons why it hasn’t been done, but I don’t want to sound like I’m making excuses.”

In a phone interview this week, Kerns expressed anger and regret.

“I kept saying, ‘What do we have to do? Wait until somebody gets killed there to get something done?’?” he said.

“My office got a call that day and they said there was an accident and some young people had been killed - that it was a fatality - and I said, ‘Oh my God, where?’ And when they told me it was Adobe Road and East Washington, I was devastated. ... I really felt bad about it, and frustrated that we couldn’t have gotten something done to prevent it.”

The day after the accident, Kerns had a series of meetings to place additional stop signs at the intersection supplementing one at East Washington Street, according to Press Democrat files. The Adobe Road signs went up in January 2006.

A recent county report shows on an average day 12,000 cars travel along Adobe Road, and 6,000 travel on East Washington.

“I remember looking at the sight lines (after the accident) and remember seeing how it could happen,” Kerns said. “This could’ve happened to anybody. It was awful. It was sickening.”

Construction at the site is expected to begin in June.

“(The accident is) something that nobody in this town will forget,” Glass said.

“That was so tragic. It sticks in your memory.”

You can reach Staff Writer Christi Warren at 521-5205 or christi.warren@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @SeaWarren.