Frustrated motorists, take notice. Congestion relief for the Terrace-Shurtleff area of east Napa is now on the city’s front burner.

Plans are finally moving forward to punch Saratoga Avenue through to Silverado Trail, perhaps as soon as next year, according to Jacques LaRochelle, the city’s assistant public works director.

Simultaneously, LaRochelle is reviewing options for improving the five-legged intersection of Silverado Trail, Third Street, Coombsville Road and East Avenue. The public may be asked to comment on the most feasible design proposals this winter, he said.

Just extending Saratoga to Silverado Trail will improve traffic flow further north at the five points, LaRochelle said.

“It would provide a pressure valve,” said LaRochelle, “giving Terrace-Shurtleff residents another outlet to Silverado.”

Currently, Terrace-Shurtleff residents heading into town typically use the five points intersection or drive south to Kansas Avenue to reach Soscol Avenue, LaRochelle said.

The city has promised traffic relief for east Napa for years.

In October, 2004, after the preparation of an east side circulation study, the Public Works Department said construction of the Saratoga extension would start in 2005. Only this summer, four years later, did the city begin annexation proceedings to bring the needed right of way into the city limits.

Another traffic connection, the extension of Terrace Drive over Cayetano Creek, has gone nowhere. City staff said in 2005 that a bridge could be built in two years, improving north-south flows.

LaRochelle, who became assistant public works director in February, said the Saratoga extension will happen first, followed by the bridge over Cayetano Creek.

All three east side projects — the Saratoga extension, the bridge on Terrace and the five-legged intersection at Silverado and Third — are now high city priorities, LaRochelle said.

Public Works Director Mike O’Bryon has charged him with moving these projects to completion, he said.

The bridge over Cayetano Creek and the Saratoga extension are most doable, LaRochelle said. The bridge design is done, paid for by a developer, while the city has $1.5 million set aside to build the Saratoga extension, he said.

Although there is a chance that Saratoga could be extended next summer, the city is considering a redesign sought by the Napa Valley Unified School District that might delay things.

The school district may want to build an elementary school along the Saratoga extension route, LaRochelle said. Were this to happen, the district would like Saratoga rerouted, he said.

Instead of a straight shot to Silverado, the district would like Saratoga to go around the edge of the school site, entering Silverado 400 feet further north, LaRochelle said.

This would benefit the school, giving it additional frontage for student drop-offs and pick-ups, LaRochelle said.

The city is looking favorably at this proposal, LaRochelle said. A straight-shot extension of Saratoga would create a new intersection on a curve, a relatively short distance from where Silverado Trail meets Soscol Avenue, he said.

If Saratoga connected further north, motorists would have better sight lines, he said. Also, Saratoga could form a four-way intersection with a proposed street along the north side of Jimmy Vasser Toyota, he said.

Don Evans, the school district’s director of general services, said the district is trying to plan for enrollment growth along the Soscol Avenue corridor in future decades.

A citizens group will be recommending future school sites district-wide in coming months. The property near Saratoga is but one under consideration, he said.

Nearby Phillips-Edison and Alta Heights elementary schools have little or no growth room, while major residential growth is anticipated when Gasser Foundation land develops and the city promotes higher density housing in the Soscol Gateway redevelopment area, Evans said.

The NVUSD needs to acquire an east side school site soon, while land is available, but “we’re talking about years before we’d build it,” Evans said.

The city is closely following the school district’s site selection process, LaRochelle said. If the district commits to the Saratoga site, the city will try to wrap up design and get the project built, he said. The district would be expected to provide needed right of way, he said.

The bridge over Cayetano Creek would follow the Saratoga extension, but no timetable has been set, LaRochelle said.

Public discussion of options at Silverado Trail and Third is only months away, LaRochelle said. When a design is chosen, the city will need to work with Caltrans, which controls the stretch of Silverado Trail that is also Highway 121 and has veto power.

When LaRochelle got hired, the city had sketched 10 options for dealing with the five-points intersection, LaRochelle said. “I have come up with an 11th option,” he said.

A roundabout and a tunnel were among the less feasible options, he said. Eliminating access to East Avenue would by itself make the intersection work reasonably well, but this may be a choice the community won’t support, he said.

A fix might cost $2 million to $3 million, including land purchases to create more room for traffic lanes, LaRochelle said.

“It’s not an easy solution,” LaRochelle said. The problems with the five-legged intersection are “historic,” he said.