Saratoga News

Memorial honors victims of Highway 85 accidents

By Sarah Lombardo

Family members of the victims of Highway 85 crossover traffic accidents were on hand July 23 at the Dent Avenue pedestrian bridge above Highway 85 to witness a dedication to those who lost their lives before a median barrier was installed.

Assemblyman Jim Cunneen, hosted the dedication, unveiling a bronze plaque with the names of the victims, all of whom were killed in accidents on Highway 85 that involved cars losing control and crossing over the dirt median into oncoming traffic. Cunneen said officials came up with the idea for the plaque "to make sure that we pay tribute to the fact that it took tragedy for a median barrier to be installed to make this freeway safe."

Since the freeway opened in 1994, there have been at least nine reported incidents of crossover accidents--and in 1996 alone, six people lost their lives, including Los Gatos resident Alma Ribbs and her twins, Robert Ribbs Wyckoff and Nina Elizabeth Wyckoff. The twins were delivered in an emergency Caesarean section after the July 25, 1996 accident and died two days later. Other victims of Highway 85 crossover accidents include Carol Ann Klamm, Elizabeth A. Polyniak and 11-year-old Jessica Zhao.

Highway 85 was opened without a median barrier because Caltrans' former policy stated that such a barrier was only necessary when a median is less than 44 feet wide or if there have been a high rate of crossover accidents. Highway 85's median varies in width from 46 to 50 feet.

After the 1996 accidents, local city officials and Cunneen began to pressure Caltrans to install a barrier along Highway 85--fast.

"People are dying because no median barrier exists," Saratoga City Council member Paul Jacobs said in 1996 when the council voted to appeal to Caltrans to find the funds to build a barrier immediately.

Caltrans found the funds through the department's State Highway Operation and Protection Program and "fast-tracked" the project, according to Caltrans division chief of operations Paul Hensley. The barriers, which stretch 13 miles along Highway 85 from Cupertino to South San Jose, were completed in February 1997.

"Had this freeway been opened with a median barrier, these lives would not have been lost," Cunneen told the Saratoga News. But Cunneen said that one good thing did result from the tragedy: "Caltrans has changed its policy now so that they cannot build a highway like that through suburban areas without a median barrier."

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