East Blanco Road closure planned for next week in Salinas

A small road closure has the potential to cause major headaches in Salinas next week.

Announced Wednesday, on May 4th, 2015 the city of Salinas will be closing the westbound lane on East Blanco Road between Blanco Circle and La Mesa Way for about 8 weeks.

To get to Highway 68 potentially thousands of drivers will have to detour. Taking Abbott Street to John Street, onto Main Street, which turns into Highway 68.

Luz Cedillo owns a little bakery off South Main Street, and only one thing came to mind when she heard about the East Blanco Road closure.

“Traffic. Traffic and the children when they come out of school and before school, it’s already hectic enough,” said Cedillo.

Located across the street from Salinas High School, Cedillo expects planned detours to make traffic an even bigger nightmare.

Because this is such a big closure, every Wednesday the city will be holding a public meeting at city hall from 11 a.m. to noon to update people on the project.

“This is a very critical place on the road… We just want to make sure everybody knows what’s going on,” said Director of Public Works Gary Petersen.

The purpose of the closure is to install new waste water pipes to support south Salinas agricultural businesses. The total cost of the project is about $8 million dollars.

“This is part of our recycling and waste water improvement project so that we can move water more efficiently recycle it for different use,” said Petersen.

But while the closure might back up Main Street, Cedillo said there could be a bright side.

“There are a lot of people that don’t know of south main. We have a lot of great businesses, so that might help,” said Cedillo.