Area Caltrans Director Says Agency Will Help Ease Impact of PCH Work

• Current DOT Budget Numbers Don’t Include Funding to Address Malibu’s Proliferating Potholes

BY HANS LAETZ

The state official in charge of the Southland stretch of Pacific Coast Highway says the City of Santa Monica will not be allowed to back up traffic to and from Malibu during two construction projects by limiting work to daytime hours to spare Santa Monica residents in the work area from construction noise.

Douglas Failing, the District 7 director of the California Department of Transportation, said Monday that Caltrans will not grant Santa Monica any permits to close lanes on state-owned PCH unless those closures are limited to light-traffic periods, which will likely require evening or overnight work.

Failing made his comments during a wide-ranging interview about PCH, the 27-mile-long main street of Malibu. Failing had good news and bad news for Malibu residents, including details about imminent improvements on the San Diego (405) freeway that should reduce the number of inland commuters on PCH.

Caltrans called in reporters Monday to formally unveil details on $1.9 billion worth of improvements planned for Los Angeles and Ventura counties, including several major widenings on routes that will affect local traffic.

But as the official in charge of Malibu’s most vital public structure, Failing said he is keenly aware of almost every pothole or other problem on the 27 miles of PCH in the city, as well as the other 1050 miles of state highways in Los Angeles and Ventura counties.

Failing was asked if Santa Monica’s plan to close PCH lanes for the daytime-only replacement of the California Incline bridge and stabilization of the Santa Monica bluffs would be modified by Caltrans to require nighttime work.

“I’m going to say yes,” said Failing. “I’m not sure they [Santa Monica] have that choice, the work hours are our choice.”

Failing said he was aware that Santa Monica traffic management during construction projects is a sore point for PCH commuters. That city’s sewage-line tunneling project several years ago closed two of six travel lanes on the key artery.

Santa Monica refused requests to implement reversible lanes or let through traffic use the center median lane, and caused hours-long delays throughout the three-year work period. “You moved to Malibu, you should expect to sit in traffic,” one assistant Santa Monica city manager said at the time.

This time, Santa Monica engineers indicate they intend to keep lanes open as much as possible during the two upcoming projects, which may take up to two years. But they say they cannot commit to keeping at least three lanes in each direction open during all daylight hours, even though closing lanes between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m., when traffic is supposedly light, usually results in heavy delays.

In addition, Santa Monica will not commit to maintaining all three northbound lanes on a 24/7 basis by temporarily eliminating the center turn lane, used primarily by residents.

Failing said Santa Monica will be asked to cooperate with the cities of Malibu and Los Angeles, whose commuters make up the bulk of the 80,000 daily PCH trips through Santa Monica, to work on a solution. So far, that city has not done so.

POTHOLE PROBLEMS

Failing said he is aware that the pavement on PCH in several parts of Malibu is breaking down as it approaches the end of its 10-year life cycle. But he said “no project on the immediate schedule is due in that area.” The Caltrans regional director said fuel tax revenues for road maintenance are insufficient, which is a statewide problem.

Caltrans’ lead engineer, Frank Quon, said a study is nearly complete on calls for a barrier of some sort to be added to the highway at Zuma Beach, where abrupt and illegal U-turns have killed three people in the last nine months.

“We have to look at the whole corridor, and evaluate the various solutions,” said Quon, who said a decision will be made this month, and barriers possibly placed shortly afterward.

Quon and Failing said the yellow plastic bounce-back barriers used elsewhere in Malibu appear to prevent illegal turns and may be appropriate at Zuma.

During the media session, the Caltrans officials said they are cracking down whenever they find contractors closing PCH traffic lanes without permission. Workers building a new fiber-optic line along the length of PCH did not have permission Monday to cone off a southbound PCH lane in Pacific Palisades, which caused delays stretching back to Malibu.

Failing said Malibu residents can expect substantially fewer inland drivers using PCH instead of the 405 when current construction projects in West Los Angeles are finished. And he said the voters’ recent approval of statewide Proposition 1B will mean a $950 million project to complete the northbound carpool lane over Sepulveda Pass can begin construction in 2009.

Failing confessed that he could build ten times the amount of freeway lanes he has money for, and still not end congestion. But he vowed, “Most people in this region are really going to see a difference” in traffic as a result of the new building spurt.

Local drivers, he said, will benefit from several of projects to the east, including the widening of Highway 138 to four lanes in each direction between Palmdale and Victorville, a frequent shortcut for local drivers bypassing city traffic on the way to Las Vegas.

Other funded projects include widening the Santa Ana (5) Freeway in Norwalk, completing the carpool lanes on the San Bernardino (10) Freeway in the San Gabriel Valley, and adding a third lane in both directions at a choke point on U.S. 101 near the Ventura/Santa Barbara county line.

Caltrans is also chipping in on a $70 million interchange in Oxnard, which, when finished, will allow Highway 1 to be relocated from downtown Oxnard into the strawberry fields along Rice Avenue.