The Green Bridge is going nowhere fast, stalled by litigation more than a decade after state officials first announced it needed to be replaced. Point Reyes Station residents have been in the dark about the replacement for years, and construction is not scheduled to begin until spring 2024, depending on the results of an appeal filed in California court and an array of necessary permits.
The century-old truss bridge that crosses Lagunitas Creek and marks the town’s southern gateway is seismically unsound, according to the California Department of Transportation, but when the agency nixed a retrofit and considered alternatives for an outright replacement, many locals weren’t happy. Though it is not an official historic landmark, residents say the bridge is a symbol of Point Reyes Station, and some balked at the plan to close the crossing for three weeks, turning the drive from Inverness to Point Reyes from a five-minute ride to a 20-minute detour along Platform Bridge Road.
Since 2018, after a lawsuit precluded a community meeting on bridge designs, locals have heard radio silence from Caltrans.
“Caltrans has been working to resolve the legal challenge before proceeding with the project,” agency spokesman Matt O’Donnell said last week. But, he said, the bridge replacement is now “moving forward.”
The design for the replacement is a nondescript concrete span that does away with the green trusses in favor of low steel railings and a wider pedestrian path. When construction begins at least two years from now, Caltrans anticipates it will conform to the environmental review document completed in 2018. The bridge will be closed for three weeks, and Caltrans says it still plans to use the Point Reyes Animal Hospital’s parking lot as a staging area. Supervisor Dennis Rodoni told the Light it’s still possible for the agency to use the vacant county-owned Donovan lot at the corner of B Street and Highway 1, which is slated to become a public parking lot.
Friends of the Green Bridge, the plaintiff group led by Inverness Park resident Bob Johnston, lost its litigation against Caltrans in Marin County court last June. Mr. Johnston had alleged the agency violated the California Environmental Quality Act in various ways and unfairly discounted seismic retrofitting as a less intrusive alternative to replacing the bridge.
Mr. Johnston accused the agency of lying and unilaterally dismissing a retrofit in favor of disingenuous justifications for a streamlined, “predetermined” approach.
“These guys came here, they had a project in mind and they tried to jam it down everybody’s throat,” he said. “All the new bridge designs are big concrete monstrosities.”
After Judge Andrew Sweet ruled against them, the Friends of the Green Bridge appealed, filing an opening brief in April. The group’s attorneys argued that Caltrans should create a new environmental impact report that considers retrofitting as an alternative and recirculate the report to the public for comment.
Mr. Johnston’s motivations are simple, he said: “I think it’s a lovely bridge and I don’t want to see it get torn down. And on principle, I’m against agencies that waste our money replacing things that don’t need to be replaced.”
Caltrans is set to file its opposition brief this month, after requesting an extension in May. In the meantime, the agency says it is proceeding with the next steps before construction: securing permits from various federal, state and local agencies, including the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board and the California Coastal Commission.
Amid the pending litigation, communication from Caltrans has been sparse. Mary Whitney, the veterinarian who owns the animal hospital, was opposed to the project since the agency chose the hospital’s parking lot as a staging area for the rebuild.
“Vibrating augers will be wreaking havoc just outside the front door of the hospital,” she told Caltrans representatives at a 2017 community meeting at the Marconi Conference Center. “I just can’t see how this would provide a healing environment for sick animals and for clients who are upset about their possibly dying pets.” She worried that the delays and noise caused by construction, which would last a year or more, could put her out of business.
Ms. Whitney wasn’t allowed to join the lawsuit because of her stake in the neighboring property, but she was a vocal opponent. Since the legal action, she hasn’t heard from Caltrans about the right-of-way agreement that would allow its workers to use her parking lot. Caltrans says it is now “starting the process” of obtaining right-of-way agreements, which can take up to two years.
“I feel like we really did stall it,” Ms. Whitney said. “My hope is that it will go away.”
Local defenders of the Green Bridge certainly stalled its replacement, likely by at least three years, but the project is not going away. “In the coming months,” Mr. O’Donnell wrote in an email to the Light, “Caltrans intends to re-engage with Marin County and the community of Point Reyes Station to deliver this important project.”