Fearing danger to motorists and damage to a scenic river canyon, some environmentalists say California is moving too quickly to rebuild the western route into Yosemite National Park.That's a new twist in the story of a massive rockslide that shut down Highway 140 for months in 2006 and slowed hundreds of thousands of motorists in 2007 as they drove to Yosemite.Until now, the loudest message in the region -- mostly from business owners in Mariposa, Calif. -- was "hurry up and fix this." Their tourist-based economy has suffered, and their lives are bogged down in delay.But several activist groups say the alternative could be worse. They say there could be a disaster if officials rush a major construction project without fully studying the rockslide, which is still active and primed to drop more debris.The rockslide could cascade enough rubble to dam the river, create a large lake and swamp a busy roadway.The California Department of Transportation in November suggested a shortened study, called an environmental assessment, instead of an in-depth analysis of potential repairs."It's ridiculous," said George Whitmore, chairman of the Sierra Club's Tehipite Chapter Yosemite Committee. "There are too many issues to rush it. We need a full study."Caltrans officials are considering comments on their plans from several activist groups, including Friends of the River and Transportation Involves Everyone. Caltrans officials say they hope to decide by April how they will proceed with environmental studies for the project.The agency has worked for months on ideas to rebuild the road, coming up with three options ranging in price from $33 million to $62 million.All the options would leave 70,000 tons of rockslide debris on the road and bypass it with bridges. Traffic would cross to the other side of the river for a short distance, then return to Highway 140 beyond the rockslide.Caltrans estimates the project could be completed as soon as 2012, compressing the process as much as possible. It could take many months longer if a full-blown analysis is required.Even 2012 sounds like a long wait to many Mariposans. Businesses, tour bus operators, Yosemite-area employees and tourists already have coped with the rockslide for nearly two years."If they fixed it yesterday, it would not be too soon," said Dianne Fritz, a county Board of Supervisors member and owner of Happy Burger in Mariposa.After a three-month closure in 2006, one-lane temporary bridges were installed to bypass the rockslide. Traffic into Yosemite on Highway 140 increased by more than 60 percent last year compared to 2006. The region's economy rebounded.But traffic still comes to a stop for a few minutes as traffic signals allow motorists from both directions to alternate crossing the one-lane bridges.And large tour buses, trucks and any other vehicles longer than 28 feet can't make the sharp turns required to cross the bridges. They take other routes into Yosemite. No longer does Mariposa see buses carrying 45 or 50 paying customers each.Fritz said Caltrans should figure another temporary way to get those buses through Highway 140 right now. One idea would be to carve out part of the mountain at the end of the bridges to give longer vehicles more room for turns.But environmentalists say the bigger concern is the danger to motorists and the river canyon if Caltrans moves too quickly on a permanent fix. They said the Caltrans study in November did not analyze a scenario in which the original rockslide spills thousands of additional tons of rubble.A study also released in November by the U.S. Geological Survey said such a slide could block the river with debris more than 100 feet high.Ken Gosting, executive director of Transportation Involves Everyone, a nonprofit group in Midpines, Calif., said the Caltrans analysis ignored the federal study."This is the type of inter-agency 'blinders' -- non-cooperation between government entities -- that figured in the Katrina fiasco," he wrote, referring to communication breakdowns between agencies in the 2005 hurricane disaster.Caltrans spokeswoman Lisa Balcom said the Geological Survey's stud was not available for her agency's preliminary analysis. But she said Caltrans will consider it before making a final decision.E-mail Mark Grossi at mgrossi(at)fresnobee.com(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)
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