Downtown Santa Rosa bracing for Mendocino Avenue closure
Of all the criticisms of Santa Rosa's plan to reunify Old Courthouse Square - the outrage over the removal of mature redwood trees, the debate over park space versus parking spaces and the angst over the $10 million price tag - none has dogged the project more persistently than the concerns over traffic.
How, many ask, can the North Coast's largest city expect to sever a main traffic artery through the heart of an already congested downtown without triggering gridlock?
Well, we're about to find out.
On Friday, workers will permanently block off all four lanes of traffic running through the square, rerouting cars, buses and bicyclists around the site so workers can begin rejoining the two halves of the square split nearly 50 years ago by Mendocino Avenue.
It will be the most consequential and visible milestone in the controversial project to date, one that will directly affect thousands of drivers daily along one of the city's heaviest traveled corridors.
City officials say they've done everything they can to prepare downtown streets to handle the additional traffic loads, educate the public about alternate routes and remind people that all downtown businesses remain open during construction.
“I think the city is ready for this change,” said Julia Gonzalez, outreach coordinator for the city's Transportation and Public Works Department.
Originally, the city had wanted the contractor, Thompson Builders Corp., to finish reinstalling the two historic side streets, Hinton on the east and Exchange on the west, before blocking off traffic through the center.
Challenges dealing with underground utilities set the project back several weeks, forcing the city and contractor to move up the closure of Mendocino Avenue before the side streets were ready, said Jason Nutt, director of the Transportation and Public Works Department.
That shouldn't be a problem because those streets were never designed to handle through traffic, but rather were intended for business patrons and future park visitors, Nutt said.
They will be slow-speed, one-way streets with diagonal parking on each side, allowing cars to go north on Exchange and south on Hinton.
This clockwise pattern is counter-intuitive to some, who have criticized the design for “getting it backward,” Nutt said. They argue the traffic pattern should be counter-clockwise to let northbound traffic go up the east side of the square and southbound traffic travel down the west side.
But one of the goals of the project is to create a slower-paced, more welcoming space for those looking to spend time in the city's downtown “living room.” Moving the four lanes of traffic - which regularly exceeds 40 mph - from the heart of the city is seen as a key to create that more attractive downtown dynamic.
“Right now, it's a downtown that you drive through. We're building a space for people to drive to,” Gonzalez said.
Large signs have for weeks warned drivers of the changes, and additional detour signs will be added throughout the downtown in preparation for the Friday switch.
Lots of work has gone into making the changes go as smoothly as possible, but city officials expect challenges.
“It's going to be a hard day out there in the field for motorists and pedestrians,” Gonzalez said. “There's going to be a lot of activity.”
She urged drivers to be patient, give themselves extra time to get through downtown and consider other routes, including Highway 101.
Distance-wise, the main detour will not be long.
Southbound traffic will shift from Mendocino Avenue onto Healdsburg Avenue. Cars will also be able to cut over to B Street at several locations closer to the square.
Northbound drivers will have a bit trickier time. They'll turn west on First Street or Third Street, then head north on B. They'll then have to head east along Fifth, Seventh or Tenth streets to rejoin Mendocino Avenue.
Groundwork laid
Work to prepare the peripheral streets for the new traffic patterns kicked into high gear last week. Workers turned a one-way stretch of Fifth Street between Mendocino Avenue and B Street into a two-way roadway. They also tweaked the signals and restriped lanes of Third and B streets to handle the increase in northbound traffic.
This week, two left-turn lanes will be added to Santa Rosa Avenue to send northbound traffic west on Third Street.
Other changes were completed years ago, such as adding a second southbound lane to B Street and installing a traffic signal outside the Sears parking lot to help buses access the transit mall.
The prep work gives city officials confidence that the changes, while challenging for some drivers in the short term, will create an overall benefit to the downtown.
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