Construction of barrier on Highway 60 in Beaumont begins

Construction has started this month on a Highway 60 median barrier west of the I-10 junction in Beaumont to close a center-divider gap along a route beset by accidents, including two fatal collisions, not to mentioned countless near misses between trucks and cars over the past 25 years that this section of the freeway has been completed.....I know, I've had more near misses on this section than any other section of roadway in southern California.

The $1.8 million Caltrans project is expected to be finished by mid-October.....In the meantime, traffic along the four-lane highway may be restricted to one lane each direction on weekdays, said a spokeswoman in the Cal Trans department's San Bernardino office.
The 1.1-mile project in the vicinity of Western Knolls Avenue will eliminate the left-turn option from the highway to Western Knolls.....That's to bad in a way, because there is a Roadside stand there that has great Vegetables and fruits for sale....It looks like just getting to the place will be hard enough...Originally years ago, there were plans to put in an intersection at that location....Looks like that has been taken out of the plans.

The highway has average daily traffic of 45,600 vehicles, according to Caltrans statistics.....A decade earlier, the road handled about 30,000 vehicles a day.....Most people still prefer to take the 10 freeway westward, but I always found that I could save time taking the 60 westbound....with the opening of the 210 in Redlands, the 60 might lose traffic, instead of gain more.
The four-lane road connects with Interstate 10 in Beaumont and to the west climbs and winds through the Badlands to the Gilman Springs Road exit and Moreno Valley......In that stretch, traffic is separated for about 15 miles by either a concrete median or guardrails.......The new median is being installed in a stretch where eight people died in collisions in 1997 and 2004.

In the stretch from Gilman Springs Road to I-10, California Highway Patrol records show there have been 227 collisions, including five fatal crashes since January 2006......In 2005, Caltrans settled a wrongful death lawsuit for $6.5 million stemming from the 1997 accident that killed Jose and Maria Castellanos and their 6-year-old daughter, Kimberly......A car driven by a Mission Viejo woman, who also died, crossed the dirt median and hit the family's car......The lawsuit alleged that the portion of Highway 60 was dangerous because the state failed to erect a median barrier.

A pending lawsuit against Caltrans is related to a 2004 crash that killed three mentally disabled passengers in a van that broadsided a car whose driver also died.....Andrea Venute, 20, of Banning, was driving west on the highway when an Upland driver made an unsafe lane change, causing Venute's car to swerve into oncoming traffic and collide with the van, police said at the time......Venute and one van passenger died at the scene and two other passengers died later of their injuries.

The attorney representing the Venute family in the second lawsuit, John Gaule, said last year that if a barrier had been put up after the 1997 crash, it could have prevented later deaths.....A trial management conference in the Venute family's lawsuit is scheduled in November.
The median work is a safety improvement project, according to a Caltrans spokesperson.....They had no comment on the lawsuits.

Gary Hall, the ghostpainter