December is off to a rainy start on the Central Coast.
Though the rain is much needed, it has some wondering how these weather events will impact roads this holiday season.
“So both rains and cold weather have an impact and sometimes put a stop to our construction work," said Kevin Drabinski, Caltrans District 5 Public Information Officer.
Caltrans keeps safety and the flow of traffic top of mind.
“For the traveling public, the most significant change that they’ll see is that if we had a planned lane closure, we suspend those lane closures to keep all lanes of traffic open during the rain,” Drabinski said.
He says the cold weather also prevents them from being able to do paving and striping, "because those materials need a certain surface temperature in order for the work to be able to happen."
However, there are no major road repairs planned that would be significantly impacted by another rain event like the one making its way through the Central Coast this weekend.
By mid-afternoon Friday, no major rock slides had been reported along Highway 1 in Big Sur. Starting back in August, Caltrans began winter prep work along the highway by removing debris from hillsides to ensure the culverts remain open.
“They can keep debris and water off the roadway during a winter event,” Drabinski said.
San Luis Obispo City Manager Derek Johnson says the city of San Luis Obispo has made a number of improvements to the roads and bike paths but the major renovations for the year have already been completed.
“We finished up most of our road work. So we finished up a lot of the paving work, a lot of the striping work, a lot of that has been done,” Johnson said.
Though some touch-ups are necessary, it isn’t anything significant enough to be impacted by the rain.
“This is the first time that we’ve really repaved the downtown in over 20 years, so we’re pretty excited about this. It’s really making our downtown sparkle just in time for the holiday season,” Johnson said.
Johnson says some of those repairs completed by the city include 4.8 million square feet of additional roadways, 33-speed bumps, high visibility crosswalks, and 16,000 linear feet of bike paths.
Caltrans wants to remind drivers to leave extra time when traveling to your destination so you’re able to slow down if needed.
