One way out: Residents in East Bay neighborhood demand an alternate escape route

The peaceful rural Delta living and proximity to open space in far eastern Oakley and nearby Bethel Island can seem idyllic for many – that is, until there is an emergency and there’s but one way out.

Then the tranquility can give way to chaos and confusion and concern, as shown more than two years ago when wind-swept fires temporarily blocked exits from Oakley’s Summer Lake neighborhood. The only way out for many: East Cypress Road, the main thoroughfare clogged with fire and emergency vehicles until drivers were eventually directed to an alternate route on a narrow private road, through a gate and over a slough.

Since then, little has changed, and though not been plagued by fire recently, area residents have at times found themselves temporarily on either side of a major vehicle accident or inching their way to their destinations amid a traffic nightmare on East Cypress Road or slogging through a narrow alternate route out.

That’s why Sharon Kuykendall and her neighbors, as well as some residents on Bethel Island to the north, continue asking for the widening of East Cypress Road or extensions of north-south routes and a better evacuation plan.

Two recent accidents two weekends in a row temporarily blocked two-lane East Cypress, clogging the road, and Kuykendall said she’s had enough.

“I posted all over social media … that we need to stand up as a community,” said the 12-year resident of Summer Lake, a large lakefront development at Oakley’s eastern edge. “We need to be heard.”

Oakley City Manager Josh McMurray acknowledges the road challenges during emergencies and says that city staff is trying to remedy the “complex” problem. “It is a No. 1 priority,” he said.

The problem existed before Oakley incorporated, McMurray said. In 1993, Contra Costa County approved Shea Homes’ plans for the 628-home Summer Lake South — with no secondary exit in what was then unincorporated land.

The city’s short-term fix, McMurray said, is to get property owners and a levee maintenance special district to agree to a secondary route so Summer Lake residents and others could evacuate if needed.

The second step, he said, will be developing protocols for what to do during an emergency. Oakley is coordinating with Contra Costa County, the Sheriff’s Office, East Contra Costa Fire District and the levee maintenance special district.

“I know the process is taking a little longer than we’d hoped,” East Contra Costa Fire Batallion Chief Ross Macumber said, noting that that’s because the city has transitioned through two police chiefs since it began the process two years ago. “It’s good to see it finally getting done right.”

Kristen Crithfield, who owns the property where the evacuation route would pass through, has voluntarily unlocked her gates to let vehicles exit before and recently completed a formal agreement with the city.  Oakley just paved her narrow private road and plans to install fencing but she cautions that the road is not made for large, heavy vehicles.

“There have been problems with speeding, and RVs, trailers, boats, three-axle dump trucks coming through, which if they got stuck, would hinder the evacuation of any vehicles after them,” she said.

Crithfield also wants to make sure there’s traffic enforcement and signage to direct drivers.

“It’s an absolutely dangerous, scary, crazy situation, that you would send all of us through there (the alternate exit),” Kuykendall said. “The road is too narrow. … You go off a little bit on one side, you’re going into the levee.”

“Find the funds somewhere (to fix the roads),” she said.

Other Summer Lake residents agreed.

Tresa Toomer said residents are “screaming for help,” but she doesn’t think officials are listening.

“We are sitting ducks right now, especially since fire season is approaching,” she said. “We’re in need of an access road in case of an emergency other than relying on the kindness of a private landowner.”

Patsy Gottehuet, another Summer Lake resident, said she’s been temporarily trapped several times.

“Probably the scariest was a few years ago when we had to drive out through flames on both sides of the road,” she said.

Now she is prepared when her grandchildren visit. “I always have their stuff all together and I’m ready to go in case we have to get out of here,” Gottehuet said.

Steve Leube is concerned about major emergencies, especially with more homes being built.

“If ever truly a major evacuation needed to happen, it would be a disaster to get out that way,” he said of the alternate way out through private property.

Macumber pointed out, though, that newly built homes are less likely to catch fire.

A new software system called Zonehaven — almost ready in Contra Costa County — will help emergency officials and inform residents about evacuation routes through an app with real-time evacuation information, he said.

Even so, Macumber acknowledges it’s a tough, remote area to evacuate.

Those on Bethel Island also are sometimes trapped. Their only option is to head north to a levee road.

Julie Jackson, who owns Boyd Real Estate on Bethel Island, has been watching the growth near East Cypress Road and with it, more traffic.

“It seems like a lot of growth in a short period of time, but no plans for the traffic,” she said.

To complicate matters, not all of the land that would be needed for road improvements falls under city jurisdiction, McMurray said. There is also the cost, which will be borne by the developers in the area.

“It’s a very costly issue, and we’re trying to coordinate improvements that developers need to install,” he said. “And, to the developers’ credit, they recognize this and they want to install the improvements up front.”

It’ll likely be more than a decade before the area is built out, McMurray said. DeNova Homes has plans to build Summer Lake North and TI Capital is developing Grand Cypress Preserve, both in the East Cypress Road area. Together, they will bring some 4,000 homes to Oakley.

A second road out, such as extending Bethel Island Road south, would not be easy to build and would need a bridge that starts in the city and ends on unincorporated land, he said.

Widening East Cypress Road, meanwhile, would require building a new parallel road to the north, plus undergrounding a canal and widening the roadway over the Contra Costa canal.

Even so, McMurray said he doesn’t want to wait for developers.

“I’m trying to make sure we get some improvements now,” he said of his hopes to extend and expand roads.

He added that he hopes those improvements — expanding East Cypress Road and starting to extend Bethel Island Road — would come in the next two and a half years.

“It’s really not as simple as just going out and building another road. … Although we’re trying to work on it as fast as possible, it is still going to take time.”