Judge puts hold on L.A.’s Olympic-Pico traffic plan

A Superior Court judge gave a big red light to the city of Los Angeles this morning when he ruled that a plan to make the Westside’s Olympic and Pico boulevards behave more like one-way streets can’t go forward until a study is done of its effects on businesses and residents.

The ruling is a blow to Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and his ally City Councilman Jack Weiss, both of whom have been pushing the proposal since November. Two Westside groups – one representing businesses and the other homeowners – sued the city to stop the plan.

In his five-page ruling, Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge John Torribio wrote that the Olympic-Pico proposal had a reasonable chance of causing impacts that required study. He took particular umbrage with a claim by the city that the project didn’t need to be studied because it wasn’t a major change to how the streets are managed.

“In other words, the very purpose of the project is to expand the use of the existing streets,” Torribio wrote. “To claim that the project will not expand the current use and is therefore exempt” from further study “seems inconsistent with the stated purpose.”

The idea behind the proposal was to give commuters an easier way to get to and from jobs on the Westside, given that the Santa Monica Freeway is often clogged.

The first part of the plan involved removing street parking along parts of Olympic and Pico during rush hours – leading to complaints from merchants, who said they feared it would frustrate and drive away customers. The city also wants to time traffic signals to stay green longer so that westbound Olympic and eastbound Pico traffic moves faster.

City leaders had planned to start work on the project this week.

“This is a pretty clear ruling – they have to start from scratch,” said John Murdock, an attorney representing the Westwood South of Santa Monica Boulevard Homeowners Assn. “They’ve got to look at the whole project from beginning to end and determine whether it can be mitigated or not – and if it can’t, they’ve got to do a full environmental impact report.”

Such studies can take six months to a year to complete.

Matt Szabo, a spokesman for the mayor, said officials would be reviewing the decision. Last week, Villaraigosa said the city would be willing to conduct a study if required.

 steve.hymon@latimes.com