Project to repair Union Valley Parkway in Orcutt nears completion, reopening planned for Friday

ORCUTT, Calif. -- The month-long project to repair storm-damaged Union Valley Parkway in Orcutt is close to completion.

According to Santa Barbara County Public Works Department, the important east-west roadway could reopen to traffic as soon as tomorrow on Friday, Feb. 17.

Union Valley Parkway was badly damaged during the significant rainstorm that battered the Central Coast on Jan. 9, 2023.

During the night of Jan. 9, a sinkhole developed, causing a large portion of the roadway to collapse, which sent a wave of water rushing down the adjacent cul-de-sac on Hibiscus Court.

Several homes on Hibiscus Court, as well as intersecting Parkland Drive were either destroyed or badly damaged due to the crushing volume of water that roared through the neighborhood.

Due to the sinkhole on the northside of Union Valley Parkway, the entire roadway was closed to traffic and has remained blocked for more than weeks.

“Having Union Valley closed, it has been an inconvenience," said Mark Zimmer, who lives close to the roadway. "Having to go out to Santa Maria Way or Clark, it has been an inconvenience. We've also seen an increase in traffic on Bradley Road here, a lot more people coming down Bradley, either going out to the freeway or going and coming to the schools.”

Now, after continuous road construction, the project is close to completion.

possible. As you can tell right now, we are wrapping up," said Chris Doolittle, project manager with Santa Barbara County Public Works. “We were able to demolition the damaged structures and basically bring it back up to grade and reconstruct the sidewalk, drainage elements, roadway and we're at that final phase now where we're trying to complete the work and get it open.”

Additional upgrades include a two-foot high reinforced concrete barrier located along the newly build sidewalk.

“That's to put in a secondary safety in case that this ever does happen again in some future massive storm event and we do have an excessive amount of storm water here," said Doolittle. "That will provide additional protection to the community below. It will provide some additional protection should a massive storm event happen again. That water will flow down here and dissipate that energy and try to divert down Bradley to the other existing storm drains.”

Another soon-to-be completed project is taking place at the adjacent drainage basin located on the south side of Union Valley Parkway.

“We did put in a new structure there, which is a spillway from the street into the basin," said Doolittle. "The water will have a pathway to more easily the basin and then continue its journey into the stormwater system.”

Doolittle added the project has been a high priority for the county since the damage occured on Jan. 9. It's been just one of several storm-related projects the county has been handling over the past five-plus weeks.

“The County of Santa Barbara is trying their best to put the community back together in as quick as possible," said Doolittle. "It is a widespread damage event throughout the county and we have a lot of work still yet to do. Right now, we're just trying to finalize the emergency opening work and the debris removal work, but there is quite a lot of work still to accomplish to bring the county's road system back to its functionality.”