BEWARE the night between Mendo and Elk! Caltrans fixing everything on the roads from Mendocino to Elk, but you won’t read about it on their website

Caltrans and its contractor, Argonaut Constructors, are working furiously on the biggest Mendocino Coast road project you have never heard about. 

You will love the new roads and guardrails. You won’t like driving at night south of Mendo town.

Going from Elk to north of Mendocino between the hours of 5 p.m. and 6 a.m? Might be good to bring lunch and a book along with you.

And don’t look for news of this huge project, it’s not there.

Caltrans has told us all about the Jack Peters Creek bridge upgrade project, now in its second summer.

But not about the massive project going on through September that makes traveling anywhere south of Caspar a huge hassle.

I first encountered the massive tie-ups one day when I was filling in doing the news broadcast on The Coast, KOZT. 

Caltrans provides the media with a list of projects. I got into the usual tie-up at Jack Peters Creek Bridge. 

Then WHAMO!  I hit the second tie up that Caltrans sure didn’t share with me to inform the morning radio listeners that day.

Big River Bridge was closed while a giant machine called the Liquidator worked on the guardrails. I waited 10 minutes then went down to Big River Beach instead. I had read the Caltrans news feed which warned me about tree work in Boonville, but said nothing about this. I went home and read the website. Nothing there either.

Here is my earlier account of that trip on Mendocinocoast.news.

Caltrans spokesman Manny Machado says the state is working to keep the project safe while making for the least traffic tie-ups possible. That means guardrails will be done in the daytime and the paving at night. 

A month later, I went from Fort Bragg to Albion, with the trip back happening in the twilight.

The crews set up and blocked me starting at 5 p.m.

Traveling through this project at dusk was a bit disconcerting. 

There were so many workers, all working fast, seemingly inches from my car as I followed the long line of vehicles behind the pilot car. Machines lurched close to m,e and spotlights blared at every curve.

Hearing from others made me decide to do a story. 

However, I really didn’t want to travel this ride at night, even for a story.

A Fort Bragg woman did that for me and told me how it was that she and her spouse were driving home to Fort Bragg after a SF Giants game. They hit the night project at Little River. 

“With dense, dripping fog requiring windshield wipers going off/on it was a dangerous situation following the flashing pilot truck with all the waiting asphalt trucks, grinders, rollers, and add in an ambulance and fire truck on the closed lane. With at least a dozen cars following the pilot truck the vehicle in front of us turned into a driveway, and there were no cars in front of us, including the pilot truck. The support vehicles all appeared to have their high beams on making it difficult to find the road. This is the third time we’ve been in the middle of this project. The other times were daylight. Tonight just didn’t feel right. I’ll sleep on i,t but will probably be in contact with CHP, Caltrans, and Argonaut tomorrow. We just didn’t feel safe.”

Caltrans spokesman Manny Machado said the $24 million project will continue along State Route 1 from Elk to the community of Mendocino through September and consists of road resurfacing and the installation of new guardrails.

“Motorists can expect delays of up to 10 minutes and are asked to drive with caution in the construction zone. To reduce traffic impact, guardrail work will occur during the day and paving at night.”

“This project will improve safety and enhance the infrastructure of Route 1 along the Mendocino Coast, resulting in a smoother drive for the traveling public,” Machado said.

Jim Heid of Albion also gave me his take on the massive and silent project.

“Caltrans has a jobs program for the entire stretch of Highway 1 between Mendocino and Navarro Ridge Road — new guardrails and strange new concrete buttresses on the Salmon Creek, Little River, and Big River Bridges. I’d love to hear the explanation for why those were necessary.”

Machado answered Jim’s question for me.

“Some of the guardrail installation at bridges involves building bridge concrete barrier wall transitions. This involves connecting a concrete bridge barrier to a guardrail. The purpose is to maintain structural integrity and prevent vehicles from going off the roadway on bridge approaches.”

“Then there are the repairs on the botched Navarro Safety Project just south of Navarro Ridge Road, where slides occurred exactly where we at Albion Bridge Stewards warned Caltrans and the Coastal Commission about in our unsuccessful appeal of that overkill project.

Between all that, it’s easy for the trip between Albion and Mendocino to take upwards of 30 minutes. And heaven forbid that an emergency vehicle would need to navigate that maze.

The new pavement is nice, though I don’t recall the old stuff being all that bad.” Heid said.

For one, I like the new pavement. Less lean to it.

I had confirmed earlier that there were problems as  he described in the above quote at Navarro Ridge Road, now a big staging area. I have heard from an ambulance driver that the road crews are really good about getting them through, but on these narrow roads, it would create delays in emergency response despite this.  It’s hard to imagine any other way to do this project. There is no way to use all that equipment on these narrow roads.  They are working fast.  My only question is – Is it too fast?

Several people suggested that a Caltrans honcho check out the contractor simply by driving through the wild scene, which hasnt had any serious issues so far, to be fair.

Jamie Matteoli, the Caltrans regional boss who loves to check things out firsthand might take a nice drive up the Coast and see!

Linda and I went to Mendocino this past Monday. First, we waited in line for the light at the Jack Peters Creek construction site. Then we cleared that and Linda had to brake hard to avoid a stoppage for the project described above. There was no warning sign of a second construction project. I had to get out to see the flagger up the road. There were already 14 cars in line. We waited 7 minutes 11 seconds before we got to go and turn left up Little Lake Road 

Coming back was also dicey, after we went to Big River Beach for more pictures of the big cold milling machine devouring the bridge, entirely closed for a few minutes. The Wirtgen Group of Germany says this machine weighs 65,697 lbs. I was amused the German site advertised the weight in pounds.

I talked to people under the Big River Bridge. A friend said she had been astonished to get stuck behind the mess when she had looked for information and, like me, found nothing. A guy got a $500 ticket after he waited for about 10 minutes, and nobody came from either direction, he said. So figured nobody was out there and he could just go up the road a bit. The CHP was out there. Don’t do this. Wait. They all said the work looked great.

A man walking by asked what everybody was excited about. I pointed out the closed bridge and I said, it really seems like they should tell us about this, in my best outraged radio voice.

I am not sure who he was, but he had the advantage, he said, “You have to break a few eggs to make an omelet, Frank, as he walked away.”

When I got back in the car and Linda and I went out of town on Little Lake, the bridge was again closed both ways. To me, this is drastic, even if necessary and should be more noticed and also perhaps send information out so our radio reporters can alert the public.

As a big equipment nerd, I was more fascinated to watch the cold milling machine cross the highway at about 2 mph, close to its top speed. Nobody came from either direction for 4 minutes. We were allowed to go north to wait for the Jack Peters Creek project red light.

There does not appear to be any intent in NOT noticing this big project. Caltrans gives sufficient notice, or even more than sufficient, to major projects like the Jack Peters Creek Bridge. And they notice tiny projects that pop up suddenly, like the ones I read on the radio that day 

But they don’t provide notice of ongoing projects that they don’t consider major. In the big city, repaving is common enough not to be a big deal. But here with blind curves and a single two-lane North-South artery, this should be publicly noticed. It just fell between the cracks, literally. 

And they really need more signs to warn of this. Again, they may be using protocols from other areas, but we need the huge message signs to warn us before we come around these curves.

BTW, Caltrans is more responsive to input than many people think. They will likely update their site at some point. That means the story worked! But as soon as they do, people will jump in to show me, “saying look here, the article is wrong.” I can predict it as surely as the ocean swallowing the sun every day just to the west. 

As always thanks for all your input and your time, truly.

Please keep the comments coming our way.