Public Input Sought on Climate Resilience Plan for Eureka-Arcata Highway Corridor
Aerial view of the corridor.
Press release from Caltrans District 1:
Caltrans District 1 is inviting public comment on the Comprehensive Adaptation and Implementation Plan (CAIP), a long-term plan to help shape the future of U.S. 101 between Eureka and Arcata in Humboldt County.
The CAIP outlines climate change adaptation strategies for the six-mile Eureka-Arcata Corridor, the region’s most heavily traveled highway. Due to its proximity to Humboldt Bay, the corridor is particularly vulnerable to sea level rise and other hazards like coastal erosion, flooding and saltwater intrusion.
District 1 Climate Change Adaptation Branch Supervisor Lorna McFarlane said the CAIP is not a series of planned projects but instead establishes a baseline understanding of current conditions, while providing a roadmap to improve the corridor’s resilience over the coming decades.
“The Eureka-Arcata Corridor is vital to the public safety, mobility and economic vitality of our region, and our goal is to keep it functioning now and into the future,” McFarlane said. “The plan has to be flexible so we can develop projects that support the environment while helping people stay connected.”
Adaptation strategies included in the CAIP vary based on the roadway segment but generally prioritize phased, nature-based solutions and ongoing monitoring to address changing conditions over time. The plan will be updated as new data, projections and funding opportunities become available.
“We’ve worked closely with state and local partners to develop this document, and we want it to reflect the experiences of all roadway users,” McFarlane said. “Public input will help inform our approach to strengthening the resilience of this critical infrastructure.”
The CAIP and supporting documents are available at NorthCoastClimateAction.org/
Eureka-Arcata-County. Submit comments to [email protected] by 11:59 p.m. on Tuesday, June 30.
Join the discussion! For rules visit: https://kymkemp.com/commenting-rules
Comments system how-to: https://wpdiscuz.com/community/postid/10599/
The freeway floods by c.r. and has for thirty years.
only after the land was taken into public stewardship as a wetland. They changed the floodgate system and planted all the alders. Messed up the century old water control. Thats all.
Attention CalTrans:
Next subduction zone earthquake will cause much of the roadway to sink by 5′.
Good luck.
So not melting icecap caused high water? I thought so. Now they will need to make man caused earthquakes TAXABLE.
Yup. Wait till it takes out the Arcata Sewage Ponds.
It is possible for two things to happen at the same time.
Caltrans can’t walk and chew gum at the same time?
More than one mechanism can be operating at the same time. Locally we have subsidence caused by both drainage (removing ground water causes land to sink) and by tectonic activity (see above) as well as sea level rise from warmer water (thermal expansion) and influx of water from melting glaciers and ice off land masses.
Could go either way. Might rise, might sink, though If I’ve read recently that the bay is sinking, as is the Eel River Valley to a lesser extent. The coastline from Sugarloaf south rose a meter in 1992 but just shows how much this place is folding.
We could rebuild the highway 10 feet higher and it will still sink. The “Big One” is less of an immediate risk than a 4 foot sea level rise, but it’s still all going to be submerged. As it is, places like Old Arcata Rd, even with all the slough reworking and drainage improvements floods every time there’s a heavy rain. What are they going to do, rase that one 6 feet too?
But they have money to blow, and photo ops kissing babies to do…
So how is the sea level going to rise? You say its the rising temps that will melt the polar ice caps? Most of the north pole melts every year. So thats out. Glaciers and the South pole? Is the temp really going up, or is data being fudged?
Temperatures are going up and if any data is incorrect, it is quickly retracted.
It’s also not the melting sea ice that’s the problem.
It’s melting glaciers and thermal expansion.
The trail on the railroad right of way is not going to be affected by sea level rise but the highway is. God smiles on non-motorized modes of travel.
Pretty sure whatever God you’re speaking of is just watching their creation lose their minds over the issue and not taking sides, because they don’t have to. But I can assure you that in any emergency that submerges the highway, which is at the same elevation around the bay, is going to be used by motorized transit. What, you think people will just stay home when they need supplies or get out of the area:
“AWD/4WD vehicles account for over 50.8% of new car sales in the U.S., surpassing 2WD for the first time”. (AI)
I suspect the percentage of all-wheel and 4WD vehicles sales is higher in Humboldt County, This should help to keep traffic moving during our North Coast storms.
It will not. Because the government will protect you from water covered roads. You are being trained not to enter covered roads.
A Ferndale Bottoms resident used a surfboard to get to the Ferndale Pharmacy during the 1964 flood to get meds for a sick child. Sometimes the government can’t help you. You just gotta be tough.
And last year? the year before? a woman kayaked into Falafel Love to see if they’d open that day; they did.
sea level rise? We need a bullet train. But the bike path took the right of way for the train. Nobody needs to go to Arkata anyway.
Very cool new train (SMART Train) running from Charles Schultz Airport to Larkspur now. We went all in for a bike path…go figure
We went all in, with the commendations of 5 Eureka councilpersons that apparently speak for everyone on reconfiguring half of the city for the whole 200 people that ride bikes with any sort of regularity. I’m all over the city and county each week and there is just hardly any cyclists. The Bay trail to Arcata is nice. I do see that used quite a bit actually, myself included. More than any other route, including C St, excluding the Hiksari segment. But unless it’s school kids, there’s just really not that many people on bikes. And almost zero when the weather is inclement.
And don’t get me started on that section through the Eureka golf course with those g-damned pylons that provide zero safety in a lane that shouldn’t exist at all, what with all the garbage and mud and tree branches that never get cleaned. More anxiety via something that’s supposed to be safer…..sure.
Whatever they do will be for the worse, public input or not. Therefore it is the best interests that as little as possible be done
https://www.spaceweather.com/archive.php?view=1&day=15&month=05&year=2026
That plume is going to come back around and really influence the weather in a few months as it gets into the cycle further west.
OMG, I went to a meeting years ago that Caltrans presented, where the people studied the different ideas and then chose the solution they felt would work. What ever became of that meeting? Choices back then were raising Highway 255, going inland (what by immanent domain?), and something else I forget. Then they go put millions into the Indianola bypass. Now we start again with more meetings about the corridor being at sea level?
Harper motors can become a boat dealership
Many similar highway issues exist in the bay area. The north coast deserves no less attention/planning/funding than those to the south. Think about it, maybe the corridor was built in the wrong place to begin with.
If there’s enough money to waste on a high speed rail to nowhere, then there’s enough money for this important small project.
It’s a good thing we have Old Arcata Road…
I don’t know when they built that corridor between Arcata and Eureka. I’ve been a regular up here since the early 90’s and I have always seen it.
But it seems like it was recent enough that they knew about climate change and the big earthquake that has been due.
Hopefully, those factors were considered. Maybe this document will clarify.
But I think that when the major faults in California do shift, and we see earthquakes of a number and magnitude unimaginable from our recent past, this six mile stretch of highway will likely be our least concern.
Yes, all of the coastal cities, from Miami to Eureka will probably be affected by the ocean rising. Island nations in the Pacific are already sounding the alarm as their homes go underwater…
But I think the destruction from the inevitable major land shift will consume our attention much sooner than that, and will require decades of reconstruction.
Those who are still alive then will hopefully consider ocean levels and expected rise when rebuilding these cities.
Hopefully the money lovers, guised as climate change deniers, will have died off by then, or would have been outvoiced by science and logic.