Pavement cracking closes portion of HWY 154 in Santa Barbara County

SANTA BARBARA COUNTY, Calif. — The Department of Transportation closed parts of Highway 154 from Santa Barbara to Santa Ynez on Saturday, due to pavement cracking.

CalTrans District 5 created hard closures on Monday between San Antonio Creek Road and Painted Cave.

According to CalTrans District 5, there is continued movement on the adjacent slope on the HWY 154 shoulder near San Antonio Creek Road.

As a result, there is a 24/7 flagging operation in effect in response to the tension and cracking.

CalTrans says, there is a soft closure at Highway 192 in Santa Barbara to Highway 246 near the roundabout in Santa Ynez.

According to CalTrans, local residents will have access, but will not be able to move past the damaged roadway on each side of San Antonio Creek Rd.

CalTrans spokeswoman, Genelle Padilla, says field staff, working on an existing emergency project of a slip-out, discovered the pavement cracks.

"CalTrans has been working on this emergency repair project for slide repair since this past winter. And these cracks were discovered by field staff already in the field working on those repairs," said Padilla. "We are still anticipating completion of the project to be late summer of this year."

Travelers are encouraged to use Highway 101 or Highway 246 as an alternate route.

For more information and updates go to CalTrans Quickmap.