Delivering drivers from bad traffic

Can the postman come to the rescue of gridlocked Wilshire Boulevard?

He’s going to give it a try.

The U.S. Postal Service has changed the final pickup at 300 mailboxes along Wilshire from downtown to West Los Angeles from 5 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. The idea is to get the postal trucks off the boulevard before rush hour with the hope that it will ease the often grueling commute on one of the city’s main east-west routes.

Parking is prohibited along much of Wilshire from 7 to 9 a.m. and from 4 to 7 p.m., giving traffic an extra lane in each direction. But postal vans block those lanes most evenings as they crawl down the boulevard for the final mail run.

“We run in and we run back out,” said Larry Dozier, a spokesman for the Postal Service. “During peak hours, it causes more congestion.”

Stickers on the mailboxes tell customers the nearest place to drop mail for a later pickup.

Some people along Wilshire are not happy about the change.

“It sounds like a good idea but a lot of people can’t get off work early enough to get their stuff mailed,” said Ted Paul, 21, a USC student who lives near Wilshire and Western Avenue. “It’s probably a worse thing to have pickup at 3:30 p.m. It’s more stuff to cram into a smaller span of time.”

Jake Park, a manager of Gold Town, a shop on Wilshire near Normandie Avenue, said getting postal trucks off Wilshire during rush hour is a good start.

“But it’s not just postal trucks. You’ve got FedEx. You’ve got UPS. And all the delivery trucks,” he said. “We’ll have to adjust like we do for banking hours. If I’m doing business, I’m going to have deliveries in the morning or at night.”

Park said his section of Wilshire needs traffic relief. He lives only a few miles from his Koreatown store, but has a commute that at regular speeds should take five minutes and usually takes 20.

More than 100,000 vehicles travel Wilshire each day. In addition to being one of the city’s busiest thoroughfares, it’s also one of the slowest: It can take up to 19 minutes to drive one mile of Wilshire near the San Diego Freeway, according to transit studies.

Last year, in an effort to get traffic moving along the boulevard, city officials deployed a “gridlock tiger team” of 15 parking enforcement officers and 10 tow trucks to quickly remove vehicles impeding traffic flow. Nearly 10,000 citations were issued and 3,100 vehicles were towed between June and November.

Gloria Jeff, general manager of the city Department of Transportation, said officials are “pleased and appreciative” of the Postal Service’s plan, adding that it will improve the quality of life in Los Angeles by helping reduce congestion.

jean.guccione@latimes.com

tony.barboza@latimes.com