Without fanfare, no ceremony, nor hoopla of any kind, residents of the City of Riverbank saw the change of road signs indicating a change in nomenclature for a much traveled byway in the Crossroads area.

Eagle-eyed travelers on the main artery that bisects Crossroads, from east to west, may have noticed new signage on what used to be Crawford Road. Approved by the Riverbank City Council back in March, the work was recently completed on the stretch between Roselle Road on the east, to Oakdale Road to the west.

Further west, where construction on Crossroads West, and the new stretch of Westgate Drive, is continuing, presumably the new name will be installed as the roadway is completed.

The Riverbank City Council authorized the renaming of Crawford Road at its March 23 meeting. The move coordinated efforts to have one name on the east and west ends of the road.

When all is said and done, Westgate will continue from the east end, at Roselle Avenue, all the way to Coffee Road in the west. A portion of Crawford Road, which has orchards and a few homes on the Coffee Road end, remains in the county and will retain the name. It will be cut off from the old, renamed road, and will divert to the north at the canal which is the border of the new developments.

The change accommodates a requirement by those adjacent agricultural landowners on Crawford who will remain in the county. They required that the street be cut off to eliminate what they expect to be greatly higher traffic once the developments are completed.

The council found that the renaming made sense since there are no addresses on Crawford Road that needed to be changed. No homes face the new Westgate, only walls separating the noisy traffic from the back sides of homes along the way.

It’s anticipated the Crossroads West construction will feature walls on Westgate, as well.