| by Elaine Weinreb |
Westhaven has always been a quiet rural place with no downtown, no stores – at least in recent years – and no city government of any sort. It is tree-lined with mature redwood, Doug fir, red alder, and a relatively untouched understory of native vegetation. It is crossed by numerous small creeks that flow into the Pacific, about a half mile to the west. The houses are mostly old, and in some cases have been in the same family for generations. The people are not wealthy, and incomes are under the state average.
Many of the houses started out as logging cabins, sixty or more years ago, before the county started mapping right-of-way on the dirt roads that were later paved and given names. The cabins were built close to the roadway, separated perhaps by a row of trees or shrubs, a fence, or a short driveway. As the years went by, the cabins were expanded into houses, again long before there was a planning department. As a result, now in the 21st century, many of these homes now extend into the right-of-way of county roads, to the amusement of surveyors.
It is not a laughing matter for homeowners, however, who discovered last year that Caltrans planned to double the width of Westhaven Drive, on which about 150 properties front. Westhaven Drive, which is three miles long, is a low-traffic, winding rural road, not quite two lanes wide. It connects the Moonstone Beach area to the incorporated town of Trinidad. Locals usually drive slowly and carefully, watching for blind curves, schoolbuses, and sleeping dogs. Impatient drivers take the freeway.
If the road were widened, affected homeowners would lose their front yards, any semblance of peace and privacy and, in some cases, their driveways, wells or septic systems. Children and animals would have no protection from the traffic. Because the road would meet Caltrans standards, traffic would go much faster than it does at present, making it dangerous to walk dogs, bike, or enjoy any other form of passive recreation.
How did this come about? It is a bizarre story, rooted in the efforts of the Trinidad Rancheria to build a 5-story Hyatt hotel on the crumbling bluffs of Scenic Drive. As a traffic mitigation for Trinidad, the tribe asked Caltrans to construct a new interchange on 101, which would channel traffic directly to the proposed hotel. The interchange would connect to Westhaven Drive, hence the need to widen it to Caltrans standards. The tribe’s rationale for involving Westhaven was that a few tribally-owned houses are on the east side of the freeway, with no direct access to the Rancheria’s other properties.
The highway planning proceeded for nearly ten years, with little or no public notice. Residents did not learn of these plans until an HCAOG-funded Project Studies Report appeared in print.
Caltrans has been unresponsive to the questions and concerns of the residents, telling them to talk to the Tribe. Trinidad Rancheria, however, claimed ignorance of the Westhaven Drive widening, even though plans for it appear many times in the Project Studies Report, bearing the tribal seal prominently on its cover.
This makes the widening of Westhaven Drive a runaway train. Nobody knows who climbed into the engine and tinkered with the gears, but it is now racing down the tracks with nobody in control, threatening to wreak havoc.