Plans call for Manteca’s fourth interchange on the 120 Bypass being pursued at McKinley Avenue to be the city’s first partial cloverleaf.
But in order to save money the city is considering an option that would allow the interior loop onramps to be built at a later date.
That means the initial construction would have all left turns from McKinley Avenue to 120 Bypass onramps go through signalized intersections just as they currently do at the Airport, Union, and Main interchanges. When the loops are completed northbound McKinley Avenue traffic will be able to get onto westbound 120 without going through a traffic signal as would southbound McKinley to eastbound 120.
A full cloverleaf interchange — which is not being proposed — eliminates the need for any traffic signals.
The project is before the City Council when they meet Tuesday at 7 p.m. at the Civic Center, 1001 W. Center St. The council is being asked to hire HDR Engineering for $2.8 million to provide environmental, right-of-way acquisition and engineering for the interchange.
There is $7.6 million set aside to help cover the cost of interchange work. It includes what is left from a federal grant, Regional Transportation Impact Fees collected on new growth and set aside from the last Manteca Redevelopment Agency bond issuance.
Work will include a separated bike path that eventually will connect with the Atherton Drive bike path to provide access to Big League Dreams and the envisioned family entertainment zone.
Ultimately it will be a link in a separated bicycle pathway that loops the city going along McKinley Avenue north to connect with a path that cuts behind Del Webb at Woodbridge that crosses Union Road and ties into the Tidewater Bikeway. The Tidewater then heads south and ties in with the Atherton Drive Bikeway via Industrial Park Drive and Van Ryn Avenue.
Manteca, which has identified other funding sources for the balance of the $30 million project, would like to start work on the interchange by 2018 with completion by 2020.
The interchange is critical to head of household jobs. Most of those jobs, though, won’t be coming from the much touted, high-profile family entertainment zone with a 500-room destination resort hotel site with an indoor waterpark and conference center although endeavor west of Costco and Big League Dreams may ultimately generate over 1,500 jobs including 570 jobs at the envisioned resort hotel.
Instead they will be provided by over 5 million square feet of building space in the Lathrop Gateway Business Park that will straddle McKinley Avenue on 384 acres west of the resort hotel and family entertainment zone.
The majority of the 165 acres of limited industrial uses and most of the 83 acres of service commercial space will depend on the creation of an interchange at McKinley Avenue. The project’s 57 acres of commercial office and accompanying freeway commercial is clustered around the Yosemite Avenue interchange north of the 120 Bypass.
The McKinley interchange is critical for the Lathrop Gateway Business Park.
It is bordered on the south by the Union Pacific tracks that carries Altamont Corridor Express trains and serves as the city limit line between Lathrop and Manteca. The northern border is Yosemite Avenue/Vierra Road with the Union Pacific tracks that swing by Simplot serving as the western boundary.
The McKinley Avenue interchange is also part of the long-range circulation plan for Manteca south of the 120 Bypass where more than 60 percent of the city’s population is expected to be by 2040.
McKinley Avenue is envisioned to head further south and then swing to the west to connect with a proposed interchange on Highway 99 midway between Austin and Jack Tone roads as part of the Raymus Expressway corridor.
To contact Dennis Wyatt, email dwyatt@mantecabulltin.com
