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Real Name: James Geluso Address: 1707 Eye Street Bakersfield, CA 93301 Member Since: November 01, 2007 Last Signed In: August 26, 2008 Profile Views: 923 Blog Views: 14379 Woodward loses (updated with trial notes) Woodward delayed ...and the city's response Woodward's case Beau Woodward won't give up Bike Path: The Tarabinos talk Beau Woodward gets 19, still one short Why aren't YOU running for office? So much for the council race It's the voters' fault November 07 December 07 January 08 February 08 March 08 April 08 May 08 June 08 July 08 August 08 
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24th Street widening
TRIP hosted an open house about the 24th Street project tonight. It was considerably calmer than the the 58-to-Westside Parkway one a few weeks ago. There are three segments to this project: There's the Oak and 24th intersection. With so much traffic there turning, it's a challenge, TRIP engineer Ted Wright said. The options range from just more lanes to a split-level intersection with curving ramps. There's the 24th Street segment. This is the tricky part. It's to be widened to six lanes. It can be widened on the north, the south or both. Here's the thing — widening either side would mean taking that first row of homes. Widening both sides would mean taking that first row of homes on both sides. One possibility on this segment is a frontage road on the north side, similar to what you can see today on Stockdale Highway or New Stine. That way, people from the north would be routed through one or more traffic lights. There'd be one on the north, not on the south, because the south side already has other east-wide open roads. The last segment is the part where 23rd and 24th are one-way streets. There, we're looking at adding lanes, but probably without any significant property acquisition. Restriping and eliminating on-street parking are expected to do enough. Choosing the alternative is expected to take until 2011. Really! This is a federal/state/local project, so it has to go through the channels. Construction would be something like 2013. The project, to meet federal standards, has to accomodate traffic for a 20-year life. That, staffers said, is why the city can't just route traffic onto Golden State. Said one woman: "I think they keep trying to correct mistakes they made a long time ago." You can see more about it on the TRIP Web site here. (The downloads up there are 1—The 24th Street widening without frontage roads, 2—The 24th Street widening with frontage roads, 3—The 24th and Oak intersection.) 3 comments from 3 users
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posted by
adampayne
on May 1, 2008 at 08:18 AM
Call me uninformed, dense and confused regarding this project. I am not sure why 24th Street needs to be made into an expressway. The best alternative would be to build a span and connector from Highway 204 to Highway 99 and Rosedale Highway. 204/Union Avenue could be the commercial expressway the city needs to bridge from both Highways 178 and 58 without tearing up quality residential neighborhoods. The noise from an expressway carrying the amount of cars passing through 24th Street would destroy Westchester forever. These are not viable alternatives for the community, and will just further erode the quality of life at the core of Bakersfield. I would suggest having 24th Street as a quiet mixed use combination of residential and boutique businesses supporting bike and pedestrian traffic, but the H Street concept of this reality has never really taken off in this town due to parking shortages and the high rates of traffic speed along the route. So just return the street to a quiet residential neighborhood in the hopes that the area will not be totally abandoned and can help sustain a revitalization of downtown at some future point in time. posted by
Shwaine
on May 1, 2008 at 10:40 PM
Union Avenue already connects to Golden State Highway which then leads to 99. For some reason, this commission considers doing anything with Golden State an unviable option (I didn't catch the reason why they think this). I think it would be a far less intrussive option, but would probably be more expensive with the bridge over the Kern and the overpass at Garces Circle. 24th Street is doomed to carry traffic anyways since it's a straight shot from 178 to Rosedale/58. posted by
Jburger
on May 2, 2008 at 08:25 AM
24th Street has been a mess since the 60's. From the reporting I did, the original plan in the 1950's and 60's was to make Highway 178 a freeway all the way through to Highway 99. But downtown merchants and the residents of the downtown and Westchester neighborhoods opposed the idea. The merchants didn't want drivers (and their pocketbooks) bypassing the downtown. Residents didn't want a freeway cutting through their neighborhood. Understandable concerns, certainly. But, as history has proved, shortsighted. Highway 178 stopped at M Street. But freeway or no freeway, the traffic came, moving at freeway speeds on arterial streets. The merchants watched drivers pass them by and the neighborhoods were cut in half anyway. (ever tried to cross 24th on foot in the tree streets? I've done it exactly once.) By 1971 the Downtown Business Association had thrown its support behind a city appeal to Caltrans to fund a full freeway from M Street to Highway 99. (I've got a copy of a July 21, 1971 newspaper at my desk with a headline that reads "Downtown freeway route gains strong support") Caltrans never made that connection.
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