Lance Gulch Road (Formerly East Side Connector)
Project Information
Construction of Lance Gulch Road, a new road in Weaverville, is in progress now. Tullis Inc. of Redding is the prime construction contractor. The new road is a County owned and operated arterial that will connect State Highway 3 across from Five Cent Gulch Street in northern Weaverville with State Highway 299 across from Glen Road in eastern Weaverville. (View map) The route will cross East Weaver Creek on a new bridge, go behind the Golden Age Senior Center and cross Brown’s Ranch Road, go behind the Trinity River Lumber Mill, connect with Martin Road via a new extension of Pioneer Lane, connect with the Tops/CVS shopping center and CHP office, and connect with State Highway 299 at a new intersection that will include the first traffic signal (stop light) in Trinity County.
The signal will also control traffic on Glen Road, which will come onto State Highway 299 across from Lance Gulch Road, but at a slight offset (View intersection drawing). It was originally thought that access to Nugget Lane at this location might have to be restricted to one-way, but the engineers have determined that two-way access to Nugget Lane from Glen Road can continue with no changes.
The road will have Class 2 bike lanes along both shoulders for the full length, and a sidewalk on the east side from Brown’s Ranch Road to Highway 299. The road will be two lanes, each 12 feet wide, with turn pockets at all intersections. Turn lanes will also be added to the State Highways at the intersections.
For funding purposes, the project has been split into two phases. Phase 1 will start at Highway 3, cross East Weaver Creek on a new bridge, cross Brown’s Ranch Road and end behind the Trinity River Lumber Mill, creating two new entrances to the Mill. Construction of Phase 1 was started last year and is expected to be completed during summer of 2015.
Phase 2 will complete the project, including the traffic signal at the intersection with Highway 299, in 2015 or 2016. (View Phasing Plan). The construction contract for Phase 2 has been awarded to Tullis, the Phase 1 contractor, and full construction is expected to begin in May, 2015. Phase 2 is expected to be complete by the end of 2015, but some portions of the work may be extended to the 2016 construction season.
All funds for Phase 1 are from the State Transportation Improvement Program (STIP). To obtain sufficient funds for Phase 1, several other projects programmed in the STIP for 2014-2015 had to be delayed. They include designs for rehabilitation of Wildwood Road and Lewiston Road and construction of the Lowden Park bicycle trail that included a bicycle/pedestrian bridge over East Weaver Creek. The Lowden Park project started as part of the East Connector Project, but was separated in 2008, when separate Transportation Enhancement (TE) Funds became available for bicycle and pedestrian projects. However, even though the companion bike trail project has been delayed, Lance Gulch Road will include bike lanes for its entire length and a sidewalk for most of its length. The California Transportation Commission allocated the funds for Phase 1 on January 29, 2014. Once allocated, these funds cannot be used for any other project but construction of Phase 1 of Lance Gulch Road. The County has also obtained Federal funding for Phase 2 (the same funding source as Phase 1) so that construction can be completed concurrently with Phase 1.
View the project overlaid in Google Earth (.kmz): This file includes Phase 1 and Phase 2 as a single project that can be seen in Google Earth.
Once the kmz file downloads, open the kmz file to view it in Google Earth. The computer must have the free Google Earth software installed to use the file.
The mitigation monitoring and reporting program describes the measures that will be taken to reduce the projects impacts to less than significant and the parties responsible for implementing them.