Bob Jones Trail wins final, critical approval from state — clearing way for construction

Yahoo

22-03-2025

After a long and bumpy road, the missing link of the Bob Jones Trail received its last required approval on Friday, setting the stage for construction to finally start next year.
The trail's redesigned connection was approved by the California Transportation Commission, guaranteeing the $48 million project will keep its state funding.
Efforts to close a 4.5-mile gap in the path, connecting San Luis Obispo to the sea at Avila Beach, have been in the works for over a decade.
The project has been stalled due to funding issues and opposition from property owners with land along the planned pathway.
'There are many reasons we have not given up on the Bob Jones Trail,' public safety being one of the biggest, SLO County Supervisor Dawn Ortiz-Legg said at the commission meeting.
On Friday, all of that patience and perseverance paid off when the state transportation commission voted unanimously to approve the decision.
With all the approvals and funding in place, construction can begin next year.
'Now the work really begins,' Ortiz-Legg told The Tribune.
Three items relating to the Bob Jones Trail came before of the Transportation Commission on Friday — two brought forward by SLO County, and one by the San Luis Obispo Council of Governments.
The county asked for both approval of the new Bob Jones Trail alignment — which was redesigned to avoid property owned by Ray Bunnell, a SLO County rancher who opposed the project going through his land — and approval for its plan to build the trail in segments.
SLOCOG asked the commission to allocate $5.7 million in State Transportation Improvement Program funds for the project.
All items required approval in order for the county to keep its $18 million state Active Transportation Program grant, which was necessary to keep the project alive.
All three items passed unanimously.
'It's such a huge hurdle,' county Public Works Department project manager Aaron Yonker told The Tribune. The decision 'advances this worthwhile and community-based project ... to create a safe, multi-modal access for all users,' he said.
Nerves were high leading into Friday's meeting.
SLO County Public Works staff waited to hear the result of their hard work, and SLO County residents in attendance — either in person or online — spoke passionately in support of the project.
'It has been a long time coming that we've been working on this project,' one SLO County resident and mother said during public comment. 'This trail segment is essential for full inclusion of people with disabilities.'
Her daughter, now a freshman in high school, has been waiting for the trail to be built since she was just a girl, her mother said.
Even though its been years since the project began, 'it's still so important,' she told her mother, she said.
California Sen. John Laird also expressed his support in a letter submitted to the commission.
Brian Manning, a legal representative, spoke at the meeting on behalf of Bunnell, who has been in negotiations with the county over his public safety concerns with the trail's current design.
'I want to be clear: He is not an opponent to the project, never has been,' Manning said of his client. Bunnell only opposed the trail interacting with his own property, the lawyer said.
Manning said it was 'not entirely accurate' to represent the trail as being fully separated from traffic, as the county had.
He pointed to a 600-foot stretch near the south end of Clover Ridge Lane, a dead-end road that runs next to Bunnell's property, where the bike path would share the road with drivers.
However, the county said the entire trail will function effectively as a fully separated trail, despite the sections shared with the road.
Though Bunnell and his agricultural tenant who lease his land say they use the road end daily, the county holds that it is a low traffic road with no through traffic.
'It is important to note that there is no vehicular throughput provided on this section of the road due to the road being a dead end road,' Yonker told The Tribune. 'As a result there is almost zero vehicular traffic on that southerly section.'
Manning, cut off by the time limit, ended his comment with a request that approval be contingent on the addition of safety features requested by Bunnell, such as security fences along his property.
The Bob Jones Trail was redesigned in October to avoid Bunnell's property after efforts to acquire his land failed.
The new design will reroute onto a strip of Caltrans-owned land next to Highway 101 for a stretch between Clover Ridge Lane — near Bunnell's property — and Ontario Road, county civil engineer John Waddell previously told The Tribune.
Caltrans originally committed to paying for construction on the land, but after it pulled out, the SLO Council of Governments allocated $7.8 million of its state transportation funds to cover the gap.
The bookends on either end of the Caltrans corridor will be built in two phases.
Phase one will complete the northern end from the Octagon Barn to Clover Ridge Lane using the rest of the $18 million ATP grant. Construction is expected to begin in 2026.
Construction on phase two, which will finish the southern bookend from the Caltrans right-of-way to the Ontario Road staging area, will likely start in 2027-28. It will be paid for with the $9.6 million in contributions from the council of governments and the county's $5 million.
To keep trail users safe along the highway segment, Caltrans will likely install a protective barrier between the highway and the path, built 10 to 12 feet away from the roadway, Waddell said.
At current levels, the project will cost $48 million in total, SLO County Public Works Director previously told The Tribune.
'We're finally going to have something that we've been working for for so many years,' Supervisor Ortiz-Legg said. 'It feels really good to keep the promises that were made to the community.'