RESIDENTS CLAMORING FOR A NEW STOPLIGHT
MONTEREY >> In early August, Robin and John Dotimer were at home off of Skyline Forest Drive in Monterey when they heard the sounds of shattering glass and grinding metal. At the intersection of Skyline Forest and Holman Highway first responders were using the “jaws of life” to free a couple trapped in a small car after being broadsided.
After a stay at a trauma center in Salinas, the couple survived and are now at home recovering. But a growing chorus of neighbors say the intersection is dangerous and want a stoplight installed. Indeed, nearly 50 people posted comments on a recent Nextdoor string after they heard about the accident.
In this particular case, the vehicle on Skyline Forest attempted a left-hand turn and pulled out into the path of a westbound car and was broadsided, according to excerpts from a California Highway Patrol report. The westbound car was traveling within the posted speed limit.
But that’s not always the case. Cars traveling west at 30 mph is the exception, not the rule, Robin Dotimer said. And in many regards it doesn’t matter who was at fault, residents say. It’s dangerous and creates moments of anxiety anytime someone attempts to make that lefthand turn onto the Holman Highway.
Ed Cavallini, one of the neighbors living near the crash site, said there is a stoplight at the intersection of the entrance into Community Hospital of the Monterey Peninsula and then not another one until the entrance into Pebble Beach at Morse Drive. That allows cars to accelerate from the CHOMP stoplight to Skyline Forest, a distance of about 0.7 miles.
For many of the residents wanting to get out to Highway 1 by another route, it means taking a circuitous journey through twisting streets over to Soledad Drive. A drive where “patches have patches,” John Dotimer said.
Karen O’Neal lives in Oldtown Monterey and makes the trip up and over the hill to get onto Holman Highway at the Skyline Forest intersection. O’Neal knows stoplights. She was a member of a citizens group that pushed to get the stoplight put in at the intersection of Highway 218 and the Monterey-Salinas Highway. The Holman/Skyline intersection has some of the same challenges.
“People coming from the east speed, particularly delivery trucks,” she said. “It’s very dangerous and we all know that. It’s perilous tourist traffic — they don’t know where they are going or what they are doing.”
Holman Highway is the main artery connecting visitors coming off Highway 1 with the popular 17-Mile Drive.
Caltrans won’t yet commit to it being dangerous or not. Jim Shivers, the public information officer for Caltrans District 5 in San Luis Obispo, which includes Monterey County, said its Traffic Operations team of engineers is conducting what’s called a traffic signal warrant analysis for the location to determine if a signal is necessary.
“It may take our engineers a few weeks to complete this work due to the brush fires in the area,” Shivers said. “When Caltrans has completed this analysis, we will inform interested citizens of our findings.”
Traffic engineers say that while stoplights can slow traffic through intersections they can also cause accidents by backing cars up into oncoming traffic.
Many citizens, however, say they’ve done all the analysis needed. Robin Dotimer said no one can traverse the intersection safely, particularly since drivers on Holman Highway are all driving faster than 35 mph.
“I’m afraid to go there anymore,” she said. “It’s just a matter of time before someone gets killed.”
Officials can likely expect to hear from more residents, and perhaps even receive a petition. Sunday residents are gathering for the first meeting planned to advocate for what they call a critically needed stoplight.