A portion of Saddle Peak Road is closed to through traffic due to a landslide. The Hume Road landslide continues to move.
By Hans Laetz / Special to The Malibu Times
Another drainage failure and landslide has appeared under a mountain road above Malibu, forcing the closure of Saddle Peak Road and further isolating several dozen mountaintop houses above Las Flores Canyon. The emergency repair and closure is expected to last six weeks.
The newly closed road links the Fernwood neighborhood of Topanga Canyon with the Saddle Peak area and the Monte Viento Drive subdivision. The only detours available involve long canyon drives to either Mulholland or Pacific Coast highways. Several Webster Elementary School students and their parents will face lengthy detours to get home from school daily.
Los Angeles County Public Works Department officials said the single landslide on Saddle Peak Road, about 1.5 miles east of Stunt Road, would be tackled before Las Flores Canyon Road. Las Flores has several similar roadbed and drainage failures, which may necessitate a lengthy closure for repairs, said Public Works spokesman Ken Pellman. Engineers want to get Saddle Peak Road fixed before undertaking repairs on Las Flores. Pellman said Saddle Peak Road had a culvert fail as a landslide began to creep under the pavement. “We are going to have to strip that section of fill all the way down to the bedrock and then rebuild it,” he said.
While traffic will be allowed to access nearby homes, no vehicles will be able to pass through the big pit that was started beginning Monday, Pellman said. Stunt, Piuma, Las Flores Canyon and Schueren roads remain passable with several landslides restricting two-way traffic in some places to one lane.
“Well, that’s going to be very burdensome,” said Saddle Rock Road resident John Thompson. “I understand that these guys have a job to do but you think we would have been notified about this.”
Three miles away and several hundred feet lower in elevation, work has begun at the major landslide site at Hume Road, which is further isolating Monte Viento houses near Fire Camp 8 on Rambla Pacifico. County crews hope to reconnect Hume to Briar Bluff Drive by realigning the roads to connect north of the massive landslide.
And on Pacific Coast Highway, the “big bump” on northbound PCH near Tuna Canyon has grown larger and rougher. “Our engineers and geologists are monitoring the situation and trying to decide if it’s better to grind it down or do heavier, more extensive work,” said California Department of Transportation spokeswoman Jeanne Bonifilio.
At Sunset Mesa, Caltrans engineers continue to monitor the landslide across from the Charthouse Restaurant to make sure they have removed enough dirt to prevent further landslides, Bonifilio said. Four PCH lanes have been restored on a detour that eliminates the parking and shoulder lanes.
Further north on PCH, at Trancas, Caltrans contractors have inserted cement shoring underneath the remaining roadway where a culvert collapse and landslide has closed half the highway for three months. And on Malibu’s western approach, Caltrans is starting a $4.5 million repaving project from the Los Angeles-Ventura county line north to the freeway terminus near Las Posas Road. That grinding and repaving project will be done largely at night to avoid interrupting traffic, although occasional flagger controls and delays are likely.