Caltrans says Tom Lantos Tunnels at Devil's Slide to open March 25

The $439 million project is well behind schedule and over budget but coastsiders are looking forward to it finally opening.

Half Moon Bay officials hope tourists will find their way to the coast with the project's completion.

"This is a monumental opportunity to bring our friends to the coastside in a safe manner," Half Moon Bay Vice Mayor John Muller told the Daily Journal yesterday.

Muller heard March 25 was set for the grand opening yesterday.

Over the years, when Devil's Slide would close for emergency repairs, Half Moon Bay's economy would suffer, he said.

"It's taken a lot of years and lots of dedication to get to this point. They've done one beautiful job," Muller said about Caltrans.

Each of the two tunnels is about 45 feet tall and just under 30 feet wide. The debris from the tunnels filled a disposal site equivalent the size of a football field, 150 feet deep and Caltrans essentially constructed a new mountain on the south side of the tunnels with all the debris where a maintenance center will be hidden away from view.

When opened, the project will officially be called the Tom Lantos Tunnels at Devil's Slide. Lantos, the late congressman, secured about $150 million in federal funding to get the project off the ground. Lantos had worked for three decades to bring the project to light and lived long enough to dedicate the two tunnels before he died in early 2008 at the age of 80.

U.S. Rep. Jackie Speier, D-San Mateo, sits in Lantos' former seat now and was on the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors in the 1980s when a few alternatives were offered up by Caltrans to improve traffic conditions on the coast but none of them included tunnels.

"It's the hallmark of a grass-roots idea to drill a hole through the mountain," Speier told the Daily Journal yesterday. "It was discarded as a harebrained idea at first."

The tunnels, Speier said, will now create a level of certainty people on the coast have not had for years.

Sometimes the slide would close for weeks, she said, wreaking havoc on residents and the economy.

Don Horsley, current president of the Board of Supervisors, represents the coast now.

"It's going to provide a safe, reliable connecting route along the coastside. The opening of the tunnels will offer us an opportunity to turn the old road into a world-class destination for hikers, bicyclists and sightseers to see some of the most beautiful parts of the California coast," Horsley wrote the Daily Journal in an email.

The grand opening, essentially a private affair for dignitaries, will also include a parade of 30 vehicles representing 100 years from 1913 to 2013, said Mitch Reid, with the Citizens Alliance for Tunnel Solution.

A 1913 Model T will lead the parade, he said.

silverfarb@smdailyjournal.com

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