9 Miles of Hwy 101 to Remain Closed After Yesterday’s Large Snowstorm Though More Reopening Now
Downed trees and snow in Frank and Bess Smythe Park. [Photo from Caltrans]
According to the California Highway Patrol, the closure is being moved.
The CHP Garberville Facebook page states, “The north end of the closure has moved to south of Piercy (pm 102). The south end of the closure is at the U.S. 101 Route 1 Jct. in Leggett (pm 91.2). This section of U.S. 101 is still fully closed between these two closures due to downed trees and utility lines. A contractor is en route and will reevaluate tomorrow for possible reopening.”
Below is a map of the closed area.
The blue area shows the section of Hwy 101 that remains closed.
Please note that Hwy 1 is still closed from Route 271 to Cottoneva Creek.
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Once in a Generation Snow Storm. Everyone can tell their grandchildren about this winter. Seems like we are soon to come out of the other side of the worm hole. Thanks for getting the road cleared first responders!
With the changing climate this may become more frequent
Or not! We really won’t know until we get there…
I wouldn’t call it once in a generation. I grew up here and until about 15- 20 years ago, snowfall was a normal thing. So was nearly 100 inches of rain! Let’s hope wet winters will become normal again!
Defenitly, 3 years ago 101 was closed from Leggett to willits because of snow. 5 years ago we got 160 inches of rain. This is normal weather, people forget that we were in a drought and got used to it. But then again some people haven’t been around for the past decades of seasons
3 years ago we had a snow storm closed the hwy from Leggett to willits for 2 days, took 3 months of tree clean up
Yeah that section of 101 south of Spy Rock Rd really was a mess for months. Someone told me years ago and it stuck in my head (I never fact-checked it) that the high pass just south of Spy Rock Rd is actually the highest elevation of 101 along it’s whole length…SoCal to Olympic Peninsula. Higher than Ridgewood Grade even.
Rattlesnake Summit
Back when they labeled watersheds up here they put altitude numbers on the passes too. Rattlesnake was just under 1800 feet as I remember, just a bit above Laytonville as you can see. Ridgewood Summit just south of Willits says it’s 1953 feet. fwiw.
What about the drought, California not sure if it’s a drought or over population. Climate change or just too many people? Our great politicians have had decades to create bigger reservoirs. Decades of lousy voting has gotten us here. Thank you voters ,the past and current politicians have done wonderful, what a disappointment.
I don’t remember voting for blizzards…
That was not a blizzard.. a snow storm yes.. but def not a blizzard.
Voter shaming? So… its not that we have a completely broken and corrupted system, we just need to vote better ?
Voting again and again for the same politicians that wrecked your town worked out so well for Detroit, eh?
And Portland, Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Chicago, Jackson (Mississippi), et cetera ad nauseum.
When they don’t fix it, voting them back in means you want it “gooder and harder”… That applies to all parties, all candidates…
Thank You! The obsession with blaming one party and embracing the other is polarizing us and has us attacking each other which only makes us easier to abuse. There are decent parts of each party, crappy parts also, one might be slightly better but what we need to focus on is getting rid of corrupt politicians- From BOTH parties! The Citizens United decision still stands- by that bare 1 vote in the Supreme Court- and it has sent BOTH parties into a tailspin of corruption, beholden to corporate interests. If all you have are crappy candidates then you cannot vote yourself out of the mess!! We really need an educated and intelligent public to realize that they still hold the ultimate power in our system but they need to stop acting like sheep and compliantly going along with a corrupted takeover of our democracy….
Mike- I see your comments and you are much more conservative than I. Like A LOT. But I see hope in connecting with people from “across the aisle”. The political polarity (fighting between political parties) is a smokescreen to keep people divided. We have TWO parties which are not working anymore for the middle and working classes but for their wealthiest donors. More people are claiming to be “Independents” every day so maybe we can hope for some sea change…
A population that willingly divides itself is trivially easy to control.
Yes, the difference between climate and weather is very complicated and difficult for some to understand. sheesh.
Climate is what we expect
Weather is what we get
How would reservoirs have helped this situation?
Or are you just rambling about whatever pops into your mind again?
I moved from Humboldt to near Yosemite and we are getting hit with snow WAY worse than Humboldt/Mendo and they somehow are able to keep the roads open. They have plows constantly going up and down the roads and dropping salt. It aint hard. In SoCal their could be a ten car crash with bodies, downed power lines and wrecked cars all over the road and they’ll have that s**t cleaned up in an hour. In Humboldt/Mendo if a few inches of snow and and a f**kin tree falls and they shut a MAJOR US highway down for DAYS?! A highway that, for many, is the only way in or out! Hard to understand.
You see this piece? https://kymkemp.com/2023/02/24/devastating-scenes-coming-from-hwy-101-in-mendocino-county/
I did. Its a tree, some power lines and moderate amount of snow. I’m not saying it wasn’t bad, but for this to cause a 3 day shut down of the ONLY way in and out of the area, with hundreds stranded, just wreaks of poor planning and a serious lack of resources. “A contractor is en route and will reevaluate in the morning”? People are in shelters and stuck at home, because why? Because after 2 days someone is finally “en route” but doesn’t work nights. This is not how most of the rest of the state handles these problems. I’ve been in traffic jams in LA where they cleaned up wrecked cars, a wrecked 18 wheeler that spilled chemicals all over the road, and downed power lines in an hour or two. As far as the snow, I meeeeean… common. Its snowing waaaay harder in many places, including where I am, and the roads stay open.
You mean people around Yosemite are good at preparing for something that happens many times each season? While people in the coastal redwoods are unprepared for something that happens once in twenty years? Wow! Imagine that!
You can take it personal and be in denial if you want. But, it aint personal. Neither the federal, state or local government is allocating enough resources to SoHum when it comes to this, and many other things. And ya, trees fall in the road out here all the time too. But, guess what? They don’t stay there for days!
I vote for [edit] to get your unhappy ass out there and do something about the situation instead of complaining about how bad it is. But nooooooo…you will stay nice and warm talking shit.
I’ve seen 101 closed for more than 3 days with a bad slide north og Peg House in the 1980s. It is what it is. The trees have been affected by the drought causing more problems too. Mother Nature is in charge fir the moment. Sometimes it’s OK to be humbled by our surroundings since so many forget to stop and pay heed most of the time.
Trees along 101 in Mendo are not drought affected. The ones left after the snow three years ago are decadent, and growing fast. The snow made them fall, not dry weather. Overusing the D word doesn’t explain what happened. Kern County might be in a drought, but we aren’t up here. They are because it’s a desert, and they need canal water from Northern CA. Every drop of the San Juaquin is spoken for, and then some. North State water replaces it…until you get to the next pumps. You can’t dry up your own creek here. California’s water is over allocated. Someone’s planting more Almonds, or pomegranates right now, because there’s snow in the mountains. No matter how much rainfall chases overplanting, we will be in a “drought”.
It is not “A” tree. There are hundreds of trees down near and across that stretch of 101, 271, and Hwy 1. Here’s some pics from Hwy 1 https://www.facebook.com/CaltransD1/posts/pfbid0Sgx97YPGssu9BCRxTS4qYZYtg5QRPB2Fy6EXpCN4a6UJZNE8VihXZHoxd7mdqHg6l.
I just read someone describing Richardson’s Grove as having probably 20 or so “smaller” (as in not old growth) trees fallen in just that area.
Compare County Revenue. Humboldt County Revenue is Dead Last.
https://counties.bythenumbers.sco.ca.gov/#!/year/2021/revenue/0/entity_name
Or, maybe we failed to report…
The highway closure is actually in Mendocino. Piercy is the county line. 101 closed below..
Shh. Your facts are messing up their narrative.
We’re dead last cause theres some fiasco in the auditors office about reporting.
OHH NOOOOO! We solved that because conveniently, it was aaaaalllll one person. Only. Nobody else. We scaped that goat last year! and now everything is perfect.
We’re VERY happy you moved. 1 more idiot we don’t have to worry about anymore. Have fun in SUPER crowded Yosemite. Beautiful, but waaaaay too many tourists….
Why try to insult the guy for pointing out the obvious? The interstate highway serving a big chunk of the State is out. We had warnings. Do other areas have some wild new technologies like plows, loaders, or chainsaws?
Caltrans does have plows, loaders and chainsaws BUT Piercy to Willits is a remote area. They have the amount of plows etc needed for our rare snows. Snow rarely dumps on a good part of California at the same time (so no borrowing from nearby places when the same thing is happening nearly everywhere else). You can’t expect all areas to prepare for snow like we live in Tahoe. We don’t. We need to spend our money normally on dealing with slides and potholes not extra snowplows.
Looking at Caltrans QuickMap on Thursday was amazing. I don’t think I have ever seen so many chain requirements and closed roads at one time before. I was not prepared for the level of closing roads etc.
That said, for years Caltrans has underfunded maintenance in my opinion so there aren’t the needed crews and equipment for major events and, with climate change, there will be more major events.
I don’t mean to blame the Ground Pounders at all.
Maybe it’s pre-positioning the utility and tree crews, I’m sure they had all the plows out! Buy more plows, hire up? That might be where the Eric was going.
On the other hand, trees in snowy areas kinda self prune better than that temperate rain forest in northern Mendo!
Yep, our trees are different that snow area trees.
I don’t think there’s any reason to take what Eric said personally. If we don’t demand things improve we will continue to get piss poor services here.
Perhaps in the Yosemite area snows every year & Caltrans has the snowplows in the yards available to deal with?
Since snow is not the norm in Humboldt & Mendocino, it would be poor spending, to keep snowplows stored/maintained at the Caltrans local facilities.
Pardon me, but you seem to be the poor planner. I hope you do not work for any public agency that spends tax payer money.
The road closure has impacted me. I was due in Phillipsville 2 days ago; but
He made a reasonable point without resorting to insults. Are you saying CalTrans in Northern Mendo was PREPARED for this?
I’ve spent a lot of time up there. Totally different topography. Mostly open. Not like here where the highways are going through the middle of forests. Besides it being snow country in Tuolumne Co.
I would imagine this kind of situation happens there much more often, hence they have more infrastructure in place to deal with these situations. We haven’t had snow like this for over 20 years.. Hell the last really cold winter I can remember was 2011, and we still didn’t get an abnormal amount of snow, but it was frozen solid for a month or so.
Looks like Yosemite is closed until Wednesday due to winter conditions.
I have to agree with Eric. Nowhere else in Cali would this have taken so long to clear up. Also, there would have been major signs posted with warnings, places to purchase and put on chains, etc. We had hundreds of cars stranded over night in freezing temps and it didn’t even make the news (outside of the immediate areas affected). A lack of resources and sparse populations have made mendo and humboldt a non issue for the state. Honestly, for anyone who wasn’t born here it’s mind boggling.
Sorry for all the travelers that had their plans changed due to the road conditions. A big thank you to all the hard workers trying their best to get the road open. If they are standing their when you can go by give them a thumbs up and say thank you!
My car is packed & ready to drive up to Phillipsville. Just waiting for the road to open.
Anyone has any idea if 101 will reopen today?