Orange : Third Area Is Added to Road Improvement Plan

A third area has been added to the city’s Transportation Systems Improvement Program in a move designed to raise funds for future road construction and other traffic improvement projects.

The new area includes the City Shopping Center and all commercial property on Chapman Avenue between the Orange Freeway and Main Street. All new construction or improvements to businesses within that zone must pay 2% of the total value of the work into a special fund which will be used to match federal, state and county highway funding, City Manager William Little said.

“The whole idea behind the program is to impose a fee on new developments, not existing ones, the theory being that new developments have the greatest effects on traffic and should therefore help pay for the costs,” he said, adding that the money could be used for such projects as new roads, freeway off-ramps, traffic signals and turn lanes.

The program’s first designated area, near Main Street, La Veta Avenue and the Garden Grove Freeway, was approved in 1982, and the second area, along Tustin and Katella avenues, was added earlier this year. New developments in those zones will be taxed at 1%, Little said, because not as much development is anticipated there.