Caltrans launches multi-year update to Coast Highway Management Plan, seeks community working group

Caltrans District 5 on Nov. 19 kicked off a federally funded update to the Coast Highway Management Plan (CHMP), telling the Big Sur byways advisory committee that the work will focus on equity, climate resiliency, visitor impacts and coordinated emergency permitting.

Brandy Ryder, deputy district director for transportation planning at Caltrans District 5, said the update is the product of new funding and staff capacity: “We were very fortunate to secure funding so that we could do this update,” she said, adding that Caltrans has already started baseline data collection and expects to hire a corridor manager who will begin Dec. 1.

Why it matters: the CHMP guides how Caltrans manages Highway 1 along the Big Sur coast but is not itself a regulatory land-use document. Ryder told the committee the update will align design guidance and policies with current state goals and local planning documents, and will add fresh emphasis on equity, climate resiliency, economic impacts from closures and emergency permitting procedures.

Caltrans outlined next steps and structure for the update. The agency plans to: assemble an internal team and an external working group of technical specialists and community representatives; draft a charter and scope of work for the update; publish a project website and public survey; and run targeted baseline data collection (including traffic counters and camera-based hotspot monitoring) to inform corridor scenario planning.

Community concerns and coordination: committee members and agency partners pressed Caltrans to clarify how the CHMP will interact with Monterey County’s Local Coastal Program (LCP) and other regional plans. Brilan Ammon, introduced herself as a coastal planner and representing an agency partner, urged Caltrans to explore models used elsewhere where management-plan policies were successfully aligned with LCP rules. “It will be interesting to see kind of how we can marry or otherwise incorporate the coast highway management plan into the LCP,” Ammon said.

Local residents and stakeholder groups asked Caltrans to ensure the update preserves the LCP’s public‑access intent and to avoid measures that would unintentionally restrict access to fee‑based or bus‑only approaches. Colin Gallagher, who identified himself as a former county planner, said he supported preserving broad public access: “The parks and the public lands are for all people to access,” he said.

Data and equity: Caltrans described a mix of data sources it plans to use, including visitor and parking data from State Parks, automated traffic counters and week‑long camera captures of hotspot areas analyzed with automated counting tools. Ryder said the team will coordinate closely with Monterey County, State Parks and local transit providers so the baseline reflects both current conditions and the county’s land‑use expectations.

Timeline and public participation: Ryder said the CHMP update is expected to take three to four years. Caltrans will present a draft charter and a list of proposed participants to the byways group, and return with progress updates (the committee expects a follow-up update around March). The agency emphasized frequent public outreach at milestone points and the goal of re‑establishing a technical working group and steering committee to advise scope and deliverables.

What's next: Caltrans will share a draft charter and working‑group roster with the byways committee, stand up a project website and survey, and convene the technical working group to finalize the scope. Community members and partner agencies were invited to propose additional documents and data sources to include in Caltrans’ baseline. The committee asked for clearer schedule details once Caltrans' project development team can publish a forward-looking plan.

— Reporting for the byways advisory meeting; committee members said they expect the update to be an iterative, multi‑year effort that must balance safety, conservation and public access.