Week in Review : MAJOR EVENTS, IMAGES AND PEOPLE IN ORANGE COUNTY NEWS. : COUNTY : Mishaps Up Since Commuter Lanes Began, Group Claims

Just when you thought it was safe to drive on the Costa Mesa Freeway, a committee of drivers opposed to surrending two lanes of the freeway to buses and car pools produced a disturbing statistic:

Accidents on the freeway have increased 77% since the new commuter lanes took effect in November.

Drivers for Highway Safety, a group that claims that the lanes are unsafe because they allow car poolers to whiz at high speeds next to motorists crawling through regular traffic, found a review of accident statistics done by the state over the past three years that appeared to back up its claim.

California Transportation Department officials were skeptical.

So was the Orange County Transportation Commission.

Both agencies said the figures were misleading, because traffic as a whole has increased so much over what it was three years ago.

Moreover, the old figures don’t count all the accidents that most likely occurred, they said.

But Joe Catron, president of Drivers for Highway Safety, said that Caltrans just didn’t want to admit that it had been caught.

“The safety factor is much worse that the public has been made aware,” said Catron, a former sports car racer.