HIGHWAY 1'S LONG ROAD TO RECOVERY
2 sections of famed coastal route reopening south of Monterey this weekend
Over a month after the flurry of winter storms buffeted the Big Sur coastline, some road closures are being lifted on Highway 1 this weekend, an important step toward fully reopening one of the country's most-treasured yet treacherous scenic drives.
That is good news for the small community of Central Coast residents who have been trapped between landslides on a 20-mile stretch of the winding cliffside south of Limekiln State Park and ending near the famous elephant seal viewing area in San Simeon.
But drivers hoping to make the iconic north-south trip between the Bay Area and Los Angeles in the coming weeks — and potentially months — will have to cancel their plans, according to Caltrans.
Two sections of the road are reopening today and Sunday. The first is a 10-mile stretch between Lime Creek and Paul's Slide that will give drivers coming from the Bay Area better access to Big Sur wilderness. The second opening on Sunday spans 18 miles from the southern entrance to Mill Creek.
While those sections of road reopen, the agency still needs to move about 1 million cubic feet of dirt — equivalent to 11 Olympic-size swimming pools — to replace a segment of road fittingly called Paul's Slide, near Limekiln State Park, where a devastating landslide split Highway 1 a month ago.
At the moment, Caltrans has no time estimate for reopening this section of the road.
“We're trying to do a ballet,” said Kevin Drabinski, Caltrans District 5 spokesperson, referring to the needs of local residents, tourists and heavy machinery operations on the narrow two-lane road. It could be “several months,” said Drabinski, noting that Caltrans is “at the early stages of planning” the repairs.
The bright side is that travelers from the Bay Area can get to the majority of Big Sur landmarks, including Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park and the Henry Miller Library, before hitting the dead end at Paul's Slide.
Rock slides are nothing new for Highway 1. They peren
nially cause havoc on the road as California's highway agency is given the Sisyphean task of holding back the crumbling Santa Lucia mountainsides on one side and the wild Pacific Ocean on the other.
In 2017, the Mud Creek Slide blanketed the road with dozens of feet of dirt in the largest landslide ever recorded there. For 18 months, Highway 1 remained closed to through traffic creating the “longest dead end” in California. Thousands of tourists unaware of the road closure were forced to make a U-turn after traveling for hours on the road.
The Caltrans work this weekend is bringing vital relief to around 250 people who live on the roughly 20mile stretch from Ragged Point in the south to Paul's Slide in the north. The community has been largely trapped since the series of atmospheric river storms started in late December.
The residents and business owners have relied on helicopter deliveries, stored goods and small gardens.
“We stocked up for years,” said Kate Novoa, who runs a local blog that spreads vital community information about road closures. “We always make sure every winter that we can last a certain amount of time. The only thing that I ran low on was gasoline for my backup generator.”
The Ragged Point Inn & Resort is also desperately hoping to recover some business. But even as it reopens, the hotel is losing a large chunk of business from Northern California guests.
“I'm looking at February, and there are days where I have zero guests on property,” said Dave Siegele, a front desk manager. He was working the phones on Thursday informing people who canceled their reservations that travel to his hotel has reopened. “We lost all of that revenue.”