Relieving the traffic congestion caused by the two lane bottleneck on Highway 101 south of Santa Barbara is county’s biggest transportation priority. The Measure Transportation Investment Plan allocates $140 million to widen Highway 101 to three lanes in each direction from Montecito to Carpinteria.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Construction began on the first phase of the widening project, from Milpas Street to Montecito, was completion in 2012. The second phase, from Mussel Shoals in Ventura County north to Carpinteria, was completed in 2015. Phase 3, within the City of Carpinteria, began construction in September 2016 and is scheduled to complete construction in 2020. Phase 4 is the project in the Measure A Investment Plan and environmental work in on-going and design efforts have commenced. Phase 4 will be implemented in segments with the first construction segment scheduled by 2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The remaining ten mile gap from Montecito to Carpinteria will require $425 million to complete. $140 million in Measure A funds will be matched with $285 million in state and federal gas taxes to accelerate the project schedule by an estimated 10 years. After funding the Highway 101 widening project, the remaining $910 million in Measure A revenue is divided equally between north and south county because the population of the county is split 50-50<\/p>\n\n\n\n