Adriana Lopez has a much more extreme proposal to eliminate the safety issues that she and some of her fellow Lathrop Road residents claim that they face daily.
Make it illegal for trucks to exit I-5 onto Lathrop Road.
In an open letter to the Lathrop City Council and city staff, Lopez – the lone holdout of the three property owners the city contacted to acquire a small part of their parcels for the Lathrop Road expansion project – suggested that not only should the 53-foot STAA trucks that have been the focus of a lot of the negative attention be outlawed, but all commercial trucks that she believes create traffic and roadway hazards and impact the quality of life for homeowners.
The council has yet to bring the Lathrop Road expansion project back for formal consideration after intense opposition at a public forum prompted Mayor Sonny Dhaliwal to take a step back and see if some of the concerns could be addressed. But with money already invested into the project and with city plans long called for the two-lane stretch through Lathrop’s commercial core being widened to four lanes, the project will eventually make its way back before the council.
“When are you going to ensure our safety by forcing the police department to enforce the law and protect the pedestrians, bicyclists and the residents whose home face Lathrop Road? We the residents of Lathrop Road and the entire community pay our taxes for you to provide police protection to ensure our safety,” Lopez wrote in her open letter. “It has been over 10 months and nothing has been done to protect anyone.
“All trucks should be banned, excluding those with city approved permits, on Lathrop Road between Harlan Road and the eastern city limits because alternative routes are available it is not a STAA Highway.”
But as South San Joaquin County grows by leaps and bounds – driven by housing that’s affordable when compared to current Bay Area pricing and commercial and light-industrial properties that can be described the same way – transportation analysts are working to determine the best way to move people and goods through the heart of California in the most efficient way possible.
While the Highway 120 Bypass is the southernmost connector between I-5 and Highway 99 within San Joaquin County, it’s also one of the most heavily used and traffic during weekday mornings and evenings snarls at the connectors to the access ramps to the state’s two main north-south routes often back up for miles.
Lathrop Road, which was an onramp and off-ramp at I-5 and a new state-of-the-art interchange in Manteca at Highway 99, has emerged as a viable alternative, much to the chagrin of homeowners like Lopez who claim that the trucks are a nuisance and a safety hazard.
But according to Dhaliwal, the plans have long been in place to widen Lathrop Road to four lanes – the city has invested tens of millions of dollars into at-grade crossings over a pair of railroad traffics, and both bridges are four lanes. The city has lived up to its goal of taking input from residents and answering as many questions as possible.
“We had a community forum and a town hall so that we could discuss these issues, and we made sure that all of the concerns were taken down so that staff could address them,” Dhaliwal said. “This is a project that has been on the books for years, and I think that the city has given residents an opportunity to share how they feel about this.”

To contact reporter Jason Campbell email jcampbell@mantecabulletin.com or call 209.249.3544.