CA 17 North, Santa Cruz To San Jose

This video follows CA 17 North from Santa Cruz, over the Santa Cruz Mountains, and out to San Jose and Silicon Valley. Includes footage of Patchen Pass, with a peak elevation of 1,810 feet.

Category:

Travel & Events

Tags:

• CA 17
• California State Highway 17
• California State Route 17
• Patchen Pass
• Big Moody Curve
• Valley Surprise Curve
• Santa Cruz Mountains
• the hill
• driving over the hill
• Scotts Valley
• Seagate
• Santa Cruz
• Los Gatos
• downtown Los Gatos
• Campbell
• downtown Campbell
• San Jose
• Santa Cruz Highway
• freeway
• highway

[Coastergeekperson04]

Welcome to my daily life.

[FreewayBrent]

@Coastergeekperson04: Actually, the speed limit is 50 MPH for automobiles, and 35 MPH for trucks and all vehicles with 3 or more axles.

[Hstylezx408]

nice video,i live in San Jose and i was surprised that the city has now a population of over 1.06 million people, last time i checked SJ had around 950,000 in '07,

[FreewayBrent]

Yeah, that surprised me a bit, too. I figured it would be another 2 or 3 years before San Jose would crack the million mark.

[PanzerVIZeke]

Finally you did a video on this road! I was waiting for this!

[FreewayBrent]

Yeah, it took *forever* to film this; every time I wanted to and had the time to film, it was always foggy on the coastal side of Highway 17, but the weather finally cooperated with me last week, long at last.

[itsalleternal]

@Coastergeekperson04 - Although not the most effective solution, one possibility is to close the barriers with some overpasses but keep right turns permitted (left turns via overpasses and turning around) - if you look at Highway 11 in central Ontario, you'd know what I am talking about.

[jennapinkham]

I shouldn't have watched this right before bed. I'm going to have nightmares about summer traffic on that stupid highway.

A friend and I were driving back from Santa Cruz this past summer while they were doing some construction. They were working on two lane, so they erected a makeshift barrier that basically squished you into a lane just barely wide enough to fit your car. Then you had to drive down 17 at night with a bunch of a-hole drivers.

We called it the 'maze of death.' So terrifying.

[rickkuhn]

@bmbsage Not comfortably. Houses are still over half a million. It will be tight, but this area is pretty sweet. Good luck!

[bmbsage]

@Hstylezx408 How does it feel living in san Jose, I might be moving there due to work (Cisco systems) if I made 120,000 yearly could I live comfortably with a family of 5...

[gemini6179]

I've driven this highway a few times and there's three things I hate about this highway:

1. It's freaking curvy

2. Those notorious at-grade intersections

3. There's hardly any shoulder lanes

[hmmmmm12]

sexy

[FortitudeOfHeaven]

On the hill pass just between Santa Cruz and Campbell, watch out for cops. They love to camp there with their radar guns, especially on the summit and sometimes at the turnouts.

And be careful at that winding road too, there's always accidents there.

[2550505]

@HoltCalifornia

But it's exciting....

[HoltCalifornia]

This looks really bad, CalTrans should put more lights, otherwise it would be hell at night.

[Coastergeekperson04]

@itsalleternal It wouldn't need to be elevated, they could just build overpasses. They could eliminate every other intersection because there are already alternate ways to get there using side roads (which could be fixed up too).