Last night, the multiagency coalition that’s looking to create a master plan for traffic improvements in the south end of Eureka made clear to a crowd at the Wharfinger Building that it’s still considering a long-thought-dead scheme to build a whole new road through the city’s waterfront greenbelt in order to relieve traffic congestion on Broadway.
That plan – which had been known as the “Waterfront Drive Extension Project” — was las considered by the Eureka City Council in 2012, but had been burbling about government for many years before that. It would involve major road construction near or through the Palco Marsh and the city-owned “Parcel Four,” behind the Bayshore Mall, creating a north-south thoroughfare between Broadway and what is now the Waterfront Trail.
Many have been under the impression that strong opposition from the state Coastal Commission, and also from many local residents, had killed the project years ago. But last night, at the first public meeting of the new grant-funded coalition between the city, Caltrans and the Humboldt County Association of Governments to tackle Eureka’s Broadway Problem, it was back on the table – at least for argument’s sake.
