Highway 68 typically experiences severe congestion westbound during the morning commute. This led many drivers to exit Highway 68 and use Portola Drive  to cut through the neighborhood as an alternate route. This cut-through traffic resulted in severe congestion along Portola Drive as well as adjacent residential streets where some residents could not even exit their driveways. Aggressive cut-through driving near the Toro Park Elementaty School grounds led to safety concerns and otherwise negatively impacted the neighborhood's character.

TAMC hosted a public workshop on April 3, 2024 primarily attended by Toro Park and Serra Village residents and some parents of Toro Park Elementary School students. Comments from community members resounded a feeling that their neighborhood was taken over by this cut-through traffic and it was time for action.  There was consensus that TAMC and Monterey County Public Works should address this issue by implementing a pilot project before school commenced on August 7, 2024.  After TAMC Board approval, staff offered to lead this pilot project and committed to staying engaged throughout the project by observing changes in traffic conditions and making appropriate adjustments while gaining feedback from stakeholders. A committee of residents assisted staff review over 40 alternatives to the partial road closures selected on Torero Drive and Portola Drive. These alternatives  included other locations for the partial road closures, gates, signage and other features intended to eliminate cut-through traffic. These other laternatives will be re-evaluated after the pilot project has been evaluated and a long-term recommendation is developed to review by the TAMC Board of Directors.

Phase I of the pilot project was installed July 12, 2024 and included a partial road closure on Torero Drive where cut-through drivers were re-entering Highway 68 . The project team worked with the school district to redesign the school drop-off area and improvements were  in place before school opened. The revised drop-off area resulted in more efficient school traffic flow, but the partial road closure on Torero Drive rerouted school traffic to the Portola interchange. The cut-through traffic that was using Torero Drive was successfully rerouted back onto Highway 68. The project team has been working with Caltrans to improve traffic flow along Highway 68 by coordnating the traffic signals and otherwise improving traffic flow through San Benancio Road and Corral de Tierra.  Once these signal operation improvements are implemented, the travel time should actually be reduced from Salinas to Monterey each morning. 

TAMC staff observed that drivers started to exit Highway 68 at the River Road interchange and drive through Serra Village using Portola Drive to avoid traffic . This new cut-through traffic and the rerouted school traffic created congestion at the Portola interchange. In response, on September 5, 2024 Phase II was implemented to install a second partial road closure on Portola Drive at Creekside Court. Phase I and II have completely eliminated all cut-through traffic in this area and all traffic was re-routed back to Highway 68.

Travel times on Highway 68 were not expected to increase from this pilot project because it did not change the amount of westbound traffic on Highway 68 upstream from the River  Road interchange  or downstream from Torero Drive.  The pilot project was actually intended to improve traffic flow on Highway 68 by eliminating congestion at the Torero Drive intersection. Based on that assessment, the project team estimated Toro Park and Serra vIllage residents would experience no more than 12 minutes extra commute time to the Monterey Peninsula because of the partial road closures and no more than 4 added minutes for trips made in  off-peak conditions.  Field conditions recorded on October 2, 2024 indicated that travel times had  increased significantly along the corridor after each phase of the pilot project was implemented. It appears that the additional travel time reflects an increase in traffic using Highway 68  due to construction projects on Davis Road and Imjin Parkway. We are optimistic that the  traffic signal adjustments at San Benancio Road and Coral de Tierra will mitigate this issue.

We are all in this together and hope you understand the benefit of this pilot project . We are trying to  address this historic problem by installing and evaluating features quickly. We will be monitoring traffic throughout the pilot project phase and gathering feedback from community members. At that time, we will review traffic data and have permanent solutions to review.

TAMC will be hosting a community workshop at 6:00 pm on October 8, 2024 at the San Benancio Middle School. The objective is to gather public input from community members impacted by the project and other stakeholders.

On October 23 the TAMC Board of Directors is meeting and this item is expected to be on the agenda.