It
’s difficult to overstate the importance of improving the roads
that comprise the southern gateway to the South Valley and the more
northerly reaches of of Silicon Valley. We applaud the Valley
Transportation Agency for taking the lead in finding a way to solve
the traffic and safety problems that
currently exist.
It’s difficult to overstate the importance of improving the roads that comprise the southern gateway to the South Valley and the more northerly reaches of of Silicon Valley. We applaud the Valley Transportation Agency for taking the lead in finding a way to solve the traffic and safety problems that currently exist.
Highways 25, 152 and 156 are heavily used roads that connect the Bay Area with the Central Valley and beyond. They are dangerous thoroughfares that have claimed at least 48 lives just since the year 2000, according to the California Highway Patrol.
Six options – with price tags ranging from $700 million to more than $1 billion – are under study. Politicians and traffic experts will have to do a delicate balancing act with competing interests – environmental impacts, time urgency and high price tags in lean economic times.
One concern, however, that they should not fret over is the fiction perpetuated by many slow-growth advocates that fixing these roads will be “growth inducing.” Clearly, the growth has already happened. Hundreds of thousands of people risk their lives by using these roads every day – many of them to commute between jobs in Silicon Valley and more affordable housing in San Benito County and the Central Valley.
Just last month four additional lanes of U.S. 101 from Morgan Hill to south San Jose opened, bringing relief to commuters.
The highway, which opened in 1984, was limited to just two lanes in each direction by then Gov. Jerry Brown and his Transportation Secretary Adriana Gianturco. They, and others, said it would be growth inducing. Other reasons have also been cited. People with jobs in Silicon Valley moved to South Valley communities, the Hollister area and Monterey County in search of more affordable housing. It continues to happen today. People are going to put up with traffic-clogged highways in order to afford to buy a home.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, approximately 8,000 of San Benito County’s nearly 23,000 workers – 35 percent – commuted to Santa Clara County for work in the year 2000. The Association of Monterey Bay Area Governments (AMBAG) expects an increase of 129 percent of workers – another 8,300 workers – commuting from San Benito to Santa Clara counties between 2000 and 2020.
Whether or not the roads are adequate for the volume of traffic, people are using them already – and will continue to do so in ever-increasing numbers. Anyone who advocates for not improving the southern gateway in the name of slow-growth idealism bears some measure of responsibility for those who die in grisly, preventable accidents on these highways. Other, less dangerous, ways exist of slowing growth.
Transportation officials must choose the best plan for the entire region – keeping in mind not only environmental concerns, which are important, but also practicalities of keeping time frames as short as possible and price tags as low as possible.
We urge the VTA and elected officials from Santa Clara and San Benito counties to flex their political muscle to develop a timely, affordable fix for the southern gateway. It’s a matter of life and death.
