Wine Country Times

The beginning of the new year brought with it the start of a road project on Highway 101 that has spanned through from Sonoma to Marin County and lasted 20 years.

Project leaders describe the project as being in the home stretch. With a total price tag of $754 million, the wait has been worth it for California motorists that have seen a 16-mile of road widened to accommodate an increase in traffic. From Route 37 in Marin County to Corona Road, crews have spent decades making improvements. The final stretch of road to be completed is a 3.3-mile stretch of carpool lanes to be completed between mid and late 2022 representing the final unfinished section for Sonoma County, The Press Democrat reported. 

One reason for the length of the project is work has taken place as funding became available. The project was originally developed by Peter Calthorpe, an urban planner for a consulting team, in 1997. The report called for "multi-modal" transportation solutions, improvements to roadways, the addition of a rail service with bicycle and pedestrian accessibility.

“It’s definitely the seventh-inning stretch,” Suzanne Smith, executive director of Sonoma County Transportation Authority, said. “We’ve still got another year and a half of construction, but by the end of 2022, we should all be driving on those new lanes.”

The current stretch will cost $121 million. Funding comes through $85 million in a state gas tax increase and $28 million from Sonoma County’s Measure M sales tax. Another $7 million has been kicked into the project by the City of Petaluma for the elongation of an elevated highway section going over the site of the proposed crosstown connection. The north work section is expected to be done in 2021 with this new phase projected to be done in 2022.

Once the Petaluma segment is done, the unfinished part of the narrows project will be a six-mile Marin County segment, from Atherton Avenue in Novato to San Antonio Road. Funding in the amount of $40 million will come in gas tax revenues with completion due in late 2023 or early 2024.

“It’s frankly very exciting that we’ve finally gotten to this stage,” Jake Mackenzie, outgoing chair of the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, said. “We’re talking more than 20 years of political battles, enviros versus the developers, as to whether the highway should be widened or not.”