Traffic Projections Veer Far From Myths of Commuting

Despite the fact that virtually all rail planning for the San Fernando Valley is focused on a link with downtown, only about 5% of Valley residents work there.

Despite the fact that no one is considering the San Diego Freeway as a possible route for light rail, transit planners say ridership there would be as high or higher than any other route in Los Angeles County.

Despite large-scale housing construction in the northeast Valley, that area has only mild congestion and probably will get off lightly in the next century too.

These are among the snippets of information, some of which cast doubt on popular wisdom, packed into a study of Valley traffic in the 21st Century by the Southern California Assn. of Governments.

The report, most notable for its widely reported grim prognosis for mobility in the Valley after the turn of the century, is laced with such myth-busting findings.

And accompanying the report’s dire forecast are remedies so harsh that they are likely to jolt even those who have been numbed by the recent flurry of reports about growth-caused troubles for Southern California.

Just to keep traffic lurching along as it does today, the regional planning agency says, by the year 2010 the Valley will need more than $2.5 billion in new streets and freeway lanes, plus $1 billion to $2 billion more for two light-rail lines and the Valley leg of the North Hollywood-to-downtown Metro Rail subway.

By contrast, about $4 billion is spent each year in California by all governments on building, maintaining and landscaping streets, highways and freeways.

Double-Decking

The high visibility items recommended in the study--double-decking the Ventura and San Diego freeways and building a north-south freeway in the West Valley--were announced in November and already have become fodder in the Valley’s continuing debate over what to do about congestion.

The supporting documents on which the recommendations are based are being released a few at a time. A version of the report that will be heavy on graphics and largely shorn of such planning jargon as “mode splits” and “demand management” will be printed in large quantity in June or July. It will be distributed to civic groups and will be available to individuals on request.

Planners expect that overly optimistic Pollyannas will have a tough time explaining away the dire predictions.

“We hope to get as many people as possible to read it and realize the seriousness of the problems the Valley faces,” said Viggen Davidian, a traffic engineer who supervised the three-year study that led to the association’s report.

The decision to put the area under the traffic planner’s microscope was triggered by a 1984 study’s conclusion that the Valley faced far greater congestion than any of the other 25 planning areas into which the association divides Southern California.

In one oft-cited finding, the planners said that during the morning rush to work, 26,000 people an hour travel east across an imaginary north-south line just west of the San Diego Freeway. By the year 2000, they said, 52,000 will be trying to traverse the same line, and 14 new lanes of freeway or surface streets will be needed in each direction to accommodate them.

In response, the state Legislature directed the association, in cooperation with county and city agencies and local elected officials, to study the Valley in detail.

The state appropriated $350,000 for the study, much of it used to buy computer time to run projections for various combinations of improvements aimed at keeping people moving in the next century.

Each month, the staff work was brought back to a 30-member committee consisting of Valley elected officials, civic leaders and transportation planners. They systematically winnowed down the improvements.

‘A Bit Overblown’

Davidian said the prediction of 28 new east-west lanes proved “a bit overblown” when subjected to a detailed analysis but that planners found no shortage of areas for which computers predict near-total gridlock unless there is a sharp increase in lanes.

For instance, the Ventura and San Diego freeways each can expect an increase of about 40% in the number of vehicles trying to squeeze onto their already overtaxed lanes.

Hence the controversial recommendation for upper decks on the Valley’s two most congested freeways. The upper decks should be limited-access toll roads and each deck also should carry a light-rail line, the committee said.

“We tried to see if a mere widening or a new freeway would work,” said Los Angeles City Councilman Hal Bernson, chairman of the study committee.

“But nothing but an upper deck seemed to handle the load that’s expected on those freeways.”

The state Department of Transportation already has a study under way to determine whether double-decking the Ventura Freeway is technically feasible. A report is expected this summer.

Opposition to double-decking already has surfaced.

‘Handy Excuse’

Gerald A. Silver, president of Homeowners of Encino, has been gathering signatures in opposition to the proposal, which he says would “provide a handy excuse to developers who want to build larger projects.”

And the staff of the Los Angeles County Transportation Commission, which is building a countywide network of light-rail lines, has consistently questioned the wisdom of building a trolley line on an established freeway.

Richard Stanger, the commission’s project development director, said that in addition to the high cost of elevating a line along a freeway, “existing freeways tend to be already crowded at all major intersections. As a result, those intersections are poor places to put large parking lots and to draw large numbers of cars during rush hour.”

The difficulty in locating parking lots is a major reason that light-rail lines, which can carry up to 6,000 persons an hour--or about half the number of a five-lane freeway--often fail to reach that potential, commission staff members say.

For instance, in a preliminary study by the commission last year of five possible east-west routes, available parking ranged from 2,000 to 5,000 spaces.

Parking could be expanded by building garages, the staff noted, but the cost of the rail project would shoot up dramatically.

As for the Ventura Freeway, the report suggests that no matter what is done, it will continue to be the Valley’s chief trouble area.

Even with the proposed upper deck with at least two lanes in each direction, a light-rail line and conversion of nearby Victory Boulevard to a high-speed, limited access “super street,” association planners foresee significant congestion after the turn of the century along the Ventura from Reseda Boulevard to the San Diego Freeway.

Seeking Alternatives

Using neighborhood-by-neighborhood statistics on where people live and work, planners asked their computer for alternatives to the 101 Freeway, such as an east-west freeway in the mid-Valley or conversion of Sherman Way to a limited-access street.

But destination patterns suggest that large numbers of travelers would still gravitate to the Ventura Freeway, planners say, even if its congestion, now at 8 to 10 hours a day, worsens.

“Everyone seems to head south and east to work,” Davidian said. “It’s a very, very popular route.”

In addition to commuters headed for the Cahuenga and Sepulveda passes, who have little choice but to use the freeways, there are thousands of local motorists who would switch to the Ventura if congestion lessened.

Davidian estimates that if the Ventura Freeway were widened to provide free flow for everyone who wanted to use it, no matter how short the trip, nine lanes would be needed each way in the West Valley.

The discovery of so much pent-up demand from those reluctantly using city streets for local trips leads Davidian to conclude that when the freeway’s upcoming widening to five lanes each way is completed in mid-1990, congestion will return “almost immediately. I’m not sure there’ll even be a short respite.”

Another interesting snippet of Ventura Freeway information traffic planners turned up: More than 50% of motorists on the freeway neither start nor end their journeys in the Valley. They’re just passing through.

Gridlock Forecast

The computer also spit out a warning on the north-south streets connecting Chatsworth to Woodland Hills.

Because of traffic generated by Warner Center and the Chatsworth-Northridge industrial areas, Topanga Canyon Boulevard, De Soto and Winnetka avenues and several lesser West Valley streets will become gridlocked unless there is a drastic increase in capacity, the report concludes.

But the suggested remedy--a new West Valley freeway connecting Sylmar with the West Valley--arrives with several built-in problems.

For one, its hefty $870 million price tag is not likely to sit well with state transportation planners at a time when other communities are forced to wait years for sorely needed minor freeway widenings.

Further, to fully relieve West Valley streets, the freeway would have to cut through long-established neighborhoods near Topanga Canyon Boulevard.

Difficult Task

Everyone connected with the study seems to agree that would be politically difficult, maybe impossible.

If moved west to avoid the politically potent West Valley neighborhoods, its value to beleaguered city streets drops sharply, Davidian said.

Bernson, the new freeway’s chief booster, for the moment seems to be avoiding controversy by describing the proposed roadway as crossing the Simi Valley (118) Freeway just west of Topanga Canyon Boulevard, clinging to the Santa Susana Mountains west of the Chatsworth Reservoir and intersecting the Ventura Freeway near the Woodland Hills-Calabasas border.

No matter how it gets from Chatsworth to Woodland Hills, planners say, the proposed freeway would attract many who otherwise would use the Simi Valley Freeway.

As a consequence, the 118 Freeway would need only minor widening--and only west of Balboa Boulevard--between now and 2010, the report concludes.

The report also notes that the Valley’s east-west traffic is heavy in both directions during both morning and evening rush hours, while north-south traffic largely flows south in the morning and north in the evening.

As a result, the committee enthusiastically endorsed immediate conversion of the median of Sepulveda Boulevard into a reversible lane--a low-cost, widely used method of getting more capacity out of a street.

Unfeasible

But when the committee turned to Victory Boulevard in search of a short-term method of relieving the Ventura Freeway, the nearly equal east-west traffic volumes ruled out reversible lanes.

The committee subsequently recommended a politically difficult remedy--converting Victory to a limited-access street by building overpasses on major north-south streets and blocking off lesser streets.

Some of the unexpected facts that emerged from the traffic planners’ research led directly to the committee’s recommendations. Others, while interesting, had little influence on the final report.

Such was the case with finding that only 5.6% of employed Valley residents work downtown, while a hefty 15% work in a wide area roughly bounded by downtown, Mulholland Drive and the San Diego Freeway. This even though virtually all rail planning is aimed at connecting the Valley with the downtown business district.

While the percentages raised eyebrows among committee members, Davidian said most concluded that the proposed Metro Rail subway route along the Hollywood Freeway “also happens to be an effective way of getting commuters to Hollywood” and the Wilshire district.

The finding that a trolley on the San Diego (405) Freeway from the north Valley to the Westside would enjoy high ridership also led to no move by committee members to secure a higher priority for such a line.

Planners said this was so because a line down the 405 Freeway can’t be seriously considered until completion of proposed connecting lines running east from Santa Monica and El Segundo.

“Its ridership projection depends on the line being connected with other lines,” a County Transportation Commission spokeswoman said. “Otherwise it would merely be a fragment.”

On the other hand, committee members welcomed statistics showing the northeast Valley as a rare bright spot.

The report concludes that staggered work hours and sharply increased car-pooling recommended for all areas will keep the northeast flowing without difficulty.

Only the Golden State (5) Freeway through Sylmar appears to need major expansion in the next two decades.

Except for a short segment east of its intersection with the 118 Freeway, the Foothill (210) Freeway has enough capacity now to see it through the first decade of the next century.

Despite the participation by major political figures and by experts from other planning agencies, transportation experts say they fear that the report could soon be forgotten if money for highway and rail projects does not become available soon.

But some see its timing as fortuitous.

For one, Keith Gilbert, highway engineering manager for the Automobile Club of Southern California, says it is coming out just as a consensus seems to be forming in favor of spending more on streets and highways.

$6 Billion

He feels that statewide spending on streets and highways, now $4 billion annually, “must go up dramatically, probably to $6 billion, if we are to retain mobility.”

Others feel an increase to $5 billion a year would solve many, if not most problems.

All will be watching the outcome of the $1-billion bond measure for street and highway improvements on the June 7 ballot.

A landslide vote for the measure could induce the Legislature to loosen the purse strings on highway spending. It might also lead to an increase in the gasoline tax, higher developer’s fees for transportation improvements and the creation of a local assessment district for road improvements.

“This is a very important report with a lot of good ideas in it,” said Brad Rosenheim, deputy to Los Angeles City Councilman Marvin Braude and a member of the study committee.

“But if there is no money it could all be forgotten.”

And if money becomes available, he said, “then we will promptly have to begin sorting through these proposed improvements to see which are environmentally and politically feasible.”

Davidian said that during the study, staff members paid little heed to where the money might come from.

“We merely laid out the minimum needed to keep the Valley moving,” he said, adding, “If most of these improvements aren’t in place by 2010, the Valley is going to be in horrendous shape.”

TRANSIT PROJECTS

Major Improvements Needed by 1995 to Maintain Current Level of Mobility

Metro Rail subway from downtown to North Hollywood. Estimated cost: $3.8 billion.

Conversion of Victory Boulevard to a “super street” by building overpasses at major intersections and blocking off smaller intersecting streets from Burbank to Woodland Hills. Estimated cost: $38 million.

Conversion of median of Sepulveda Boulevard from Devonshire Street to Mulholland Drive into a reversible lane, open to southbound motorists during morning rush hour and to northbound motorists in the afternoon. Estimated cost: $1.4 million.

Major Improvements Needed by 2010 to Maintain Current Level of Mobility

A new West Valley Freeway from the Ventura Freeway (101) near the Woodland Hills-Calabasas line to the junction of Golden State (5) and Antelope Valley (14) freeways in Sylmar. Estimated cost: $870 million.

An upper deck on the Ventura Freeway (101) from Topanga Canyon Boulevard to downtown Los Angeles. Estimated cost: $860 million.

An upper deck on the San Diego Freeway (405) from Victory Boulevard to the Santa Monica Freeway (10). Estimated cost: $580 million.

Widening of the Simi Valley Freeway (118) from Simi Valley to the San Diego Freeway. Estimated cost: $48 million.

Widening the Ventura Freeway (134) from the Hollywood Freeway (170) to the Golden State Freeway. Estimated cost: $16.5 million.

Widening the Golden State Freeway from the Foothill Freeway (210) to the San Diego Freeway and from the Simi Valley to the Hollywood Freeway. Estimated cost: $10.5 million.

Extension of Victory Boulevard from Woodland Hills to the Ventura County line. Estimated cost: $90 million.

A light rail line along Ventura Freeway from Warner Center to Universal City. Estimated cost: $400 million to $800 million.

A light rail line along the San Diego Freeway from the Simi Valley Freeway to connect with the proposed Coast line operating from Santa Monica to Torrance. No cost estimate.

A light rail line from downtown Burbank to Metro Rail station in Universal City or North Hollywood. No cost estimate.

A twice-hourly, diesel-powered train during peak commuting hours on Southern Pacific tracks from Simi Valley to downtown Los Angeles. Estimated cost: $3 million a year.

Source: Southern California Assn. of Governments

VALLEY COMMUTERS

Moving People During Rush Hour: Maximum commuters per hour in one direction

Metro Rail: 24,000-- 6-car trains every 3 minutes.

Freeway: 12,800-- 5 lanes with one lane reserved for car pools buses.

Freeway: 12,000-- 5 lanes.

Light Rail: 6,000-- 3-car trains every 6 minutes.

City Street: 2,160-- Each lane.

Commuter Train: 1,000-- 2,500-passenger trains per hour on existing tracks.

WHERE VALLEY RESIDENTS WORK

West L.A./Santa Monica: 3.1%

East L.A./Compton/Pico Rivera: 3.7%

Glendale/Northeast L.A.: 4.9%

Downtown L.A.: 5.6%

Other areas of So. Calif.: 7.7%

Hollywood/Westwood/Wilshire District/Culver City: 15%

Work in Valley: 60%

Source: Southern California Association of Governments