Apparently I am not doing much of a job getting credit to CABO for our work, but here’s the good news; the letter I sent on behalf of the Calif. Bicycle Advisory Committee requesting a meeting with Caltrans Director and inviting CalBike’s Dave Snyder to attend resulted in our being able to make our case to Caltrans Chief Deputy Director Kome Ajise on Feb. 4th. Adventure Cycling’s Virgina Sullivan participated via telephone. Mr. Ajise agreed to work with Caltrans District staff to find a way to make the bicycling route work. District staff surveyed to route choices with Adventure Cycling Wally Warner and SUCCESS!
It apparently “takes a village” to move Caltrans. Now seems like a good time to re-address other Calif. State Highways that prohibit bicycling but offer poor, none, or marginally available bicycling connectivity.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> forwarded message from Adventure Cycling <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< From all of us at Adventure Cycling, we wanted to share some good news! After a year of negotiations with Caltrans, we just leaned that the agency is going to open two sections of I-40 between Needles & Barstow that were previously closed to cyclists. In one case, the historic Rte 66 was closed to non-local traffic (washed out bridges, etc) and in the other, the road is in extremely poor condition. This success was made possible through the help of a number of people but let me begin with the most recent chain of events. Dave Snyder from the California Bicycle Coalition and Jim Baross of CABA [sic should be CABO] & California Bicycle Advisory Committee met with the Depty Director of Caltrans a couple weeks ago. Because of this meeting, the Caltrans administrator requested the district 8 staff meet with us last week. They (dist 8) agreed to an on-the-ground review of conditions. Wally Werner, our board president was able to join district staff last Friday and drove the entire section on both the historic route and I-40 (144-miles). Wally reported back as did the district 8 staff and today we heard back from Dist 8 that they are going to open up these two critical sections. It isn't everything we asked for, but it's the most important sections that we needed. This has been a long process and we've received a lot of great advice and support. We also must thank additional partners - ACA volunteers/members: Walt Farmer and Brian Sousa; Alan Thompson from Southern CA Assoc of Governments. Mark Friis from Inland Empire Bike Coalition, Eric Bruins from L.A. County Bike Coalition, board of supervisors from Ventura and San Bernardino counties and many, many more! The maps are still slated to go out the first week of March and we'll be supplying addenda with the new information. We still figuring out how we will do this. In addition, Jenn will be posting a blog about this development and we'll be updating our Call to Action page with a new map showing the route on and off the freeway. I'll send you all a link once these go live. Finally - we pledge to work with CBC, CBAC and Caltrans to help develop a long-term solution to the freeway/adjacent route closure issue. Jim, Dave, please keep us in mind as you work on next steps. Cheers! Ginny Sullivan Director of Travel Initiatives t. 800 755 2453 or 406 532 2769 f. 406 721 8754 150 E Pine St, Missoula, MT 59802 Adventure Cycling Association Inspiring and empowering people to travel by bicycle