CTC Backs Doomed Highway Project
Meetings of the California Transportation Commission (CTC) usually fly under the radar with few, if any, members of the public aware they’re happening, much less showing up to comment. But a raft of grants proposed for contested highway projects, including the Highway 99 interchange in Fresno and State Route 37 widening, drew opposition from transportation advocates and attention in the press.
CalBike Executive Director Kendra Ramsey joined a number of other advocates in attending the June 26, 2025, CTC meeting. She testified against funding to add lanes to SR 37, which is already subject to flooding and will be permanently underwater, due to sea level rise, by the middle of the century.
Where California invests its transportation funds is crucial
As our climate grows hotter and our roads and freeways become ever more congested and unmanageable, we need new solutions. We need to invest in projects such as those proposed in the Bike Highways Bill, AB 954, which would add connected bike networks to state transportation plans, helping to make biking a viable transportation option for people of all ages and abilities. We need to increase funding for the Active Transportation Program (ATP), which supports biking and walking projects across California. We need to invest in transportation infrastructure that provides options outside of a car, not trapping people behind a steering wheel.
Yet Caltrans and our elected leaders are moving in the wrong direction. Governor Gavin Newsom stripped $400 million from the ATP last year, leaving the program able to fund only 13 projects in its last cycle. Despite a promise to restore the funds, the budget deal just approved by the legislature and signed by the governor doesn’t give back the missing funds. And Caltrans continues to promote projects that don’t offer long-term solutions to our transportation problems but do add to the carbon burden in our atmosphere.
California pays lip service to addressing climate change in numerous policies, but its actions — especially its budget allocations — turn those policies into hollow promises. It’s time for our state to invest in active transportation and fostering neighborhoods where walking, biking, and taking transit are comfortable and easy ways to get around.
Moving toward invest/divest
Leaders consistently use budget shortfalls as an excuse for underfunding sustainable transportation, but we have the money. We simply need to divest from climate-killing projects that move us backward instead of forward. CalBike’s Invest/Divest campaign seeks to redirect funding from reckless highway building and use that money to give Californians true transportation choices.
The advocates didn’t win this round at the CTC. Predictably, the commission voted to allocate funds for SR 37 and other projects opposed by advocates. But this is a long campaign that won’t be won or lost in one hearing. We succeeded in shedding light on CTC and Caltrans operations, which depend on a lack of public scrutiny to keep building highways like it’s 1979. CalBike will continue to be vigilant, turn up with our allies, testify at hearings, and let our state transportation leadership know they will be held to account for their decisions.
