On Tuesday, Brentwood Mayor Joel Bryant reported that the East Contra Costa Regional Financing Authority (ECCRFFA) has agreed to reprioritize funding for the 3-mile Sand Creek Road extension.
Bryant stated during the city council meeting Sand Creek is already built and completed from Deer Valley Road to Heidorn Ranch Road at the city limits, but now they have received funding to connect Sand Creek Road to Deer Valley.
“One of the top priorities has been for the City of Brentwood to find a way to get Sand Creek Road as a life saving measure at least to help alleviate traffic between Sand Creek, Lone Tree and Antioch, that the process required a re-prioritization of the James Donlon Road in Antioch,” said Bryant. “It seemed to be a long shot, but all cities worked together to make it happen. We voted and got passed unanimously, it takes a unanimous vote to get it done, to reprioritize Sand Creek from Brentwodo to Deer Valley.”
Bryant said upon completion of the extension, residents could then take Sand Creek Road all the way to Deer Valley and it should also cut approximately 10 minutes off the run to a hospital from Brentwood.
Oakley Mayor Aaron Meadows announced during the Oakley City Council meeting that the reprioritization will allow developers to get reimbursed as the project is now placed above James Donlon Road in Pittsburg as a priority.
According to the February 20 Special Meeting of ECCRFFA, they found that due to unexpected cost increases on the James Donlon Extension Project while construction of Sand Creek Road is currently proceeded, there are extenuating circumstances regarding regional priorities and there are difficulties implementing the James Donlon project as a Third Priority Project.
It also came down to Sand Creek Road being “shovel ready”.
DeNova has already constructed two segments of the Sand Creek Project (Aviano Phase II and Aviano Phase III) between an extension of Dozier-Libbey Road to the west and an extension of Hillcrest Avenue to the east).
Back in July 2022, Sand Creek Road was prioritized as the Fourth Priority in the fee program. However, James Donlon Extension Project is estimated to be $300 million which would mean ECCRFFA has a contribution of $200 million and the City of Pittsburg would contribute $100 million. The City of Pittsburg is going to look at this project to see how the costs could be reduced.
Its estimated it could take another 4-5 years to collect funds for the James Donlon Extension which would then delay construction for other projects—such as Sand Creek.
ECCRFFA share of the Sand Creek Extension cost is $10.8 million (Dec 2019 cost estimate)—along with other segments funded. They will now set aside $70 million for James Donlon Extension while staff works with the City of Pittsburg on updated construction cost estimates and how they can be further reduced.
Editors Note – from our ECT 2018 article:
Back in 2018, this extension became a public safety issue after multiple traffic crashes and fatal crashes. The original story had no timetable as to when the road would be extended because neither the City of Antioch nor City of Brentwood were directly responsible for the road construction—but rather developers. The three mile extension was anticipated at the time to be “years away”.
“The timing of the road is contingent on when development occurs,” said Antioch City Manager Ron Bernal. “The developers are the ones who will decide when they want to develop and take the risk of getting started on that project. Until development occurs, the road will not occur.”
The project, which has been on the drawing board since the late 1990’s, will be built by developers in charge of three different residential developments; Bridle Gate (336 homes), Aviano (533 homes) and Vineyards at Sand Creek (641 homes). While the Sand Creek Road extension does require coordination between the cities of Brentwood and Antioch, the two cities are not directly in charge of its construction.
“The timing of construction of the Sand Creek Road extension will depend on the developer’s schedule of building homes,” said Brentwood Assistant Director of Public Works Jagtar Dhaliwal. “Providing timing of construction is difficult since there are many factors involved and will vary depending on the construction schedules for each project.”
While the exact cost of the entire project isn’t known at this time, it is expected to reach into the tens of millions, with the Brentwood portion of the extension being tagged at $8 million. However, the completion of Sand Creek Road is actually only a part of a much larger development and transportation project.
According to the Antioch Police Department, since 2008 (Note – through 2018), a total of 141 vehicle accidents have occurred on the narrow and winding 2.4 mile stretch of Deer Valley Road between Prewett Ranch Drive and Balfour Road. Of the 141 accidents, 22 have resulted in injuries, while two have resulted in fatalities.
1 comment
Good job/long overdue/Safety needed to be addressed!!
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