Sandag Focus on Freeways Puts Transportation Plan on Wrong Track

It’s just as well that the San Diego Assn. of Governments has delayed a public vote on its Regional Transportation Plan, because that plan would condemn San Diego County to the traffic and smog nightmares of Los Angeles.

Sandag’s plan would put two-thirds of its new sales tax money into freeways and surface streets. Yet the doleful evidence of Los Angeles shows that adding freeway lanes does not reduce traffic. Only rail transit can take auto and bus traffic off freeways and surface streets.

A double-track suburban rail line, running 10-car trains at 12-minute intervals, can carry 6,200 people an hour. In contrast, Los Angeles’ four-lane Harbor Freeway handles 4,000 cars per rush hour when traffic crawls along at 10 m.p.h. With an average of 1.36 people per car, that is 5,440 people an hour.

So Sandag goes awry when it would build more of these low-capacity freeways. Instead, it should focus on getting people off freeways and onto a comprehensive network of rail lines.

Such an interconnected rail grid would respond to the diversity of our points of origin and destination, making rails our first choice for routine trips to work, to major shopping areas, to schools and to universities.

Sandag estimated such trips make up 33% of our weekday total. The rail network could handle most of those trips--and more besides--sharply reducing traffic on freeways and surface streets.

Without that rail relief we, for sure, will become another Los Angeles-type traffic quagmire: Sandag predicts 3.95 million daily passenger trips by the year 2000. Yet Sandag, with its fixation on the auto, expects that only about 4% of that year 2000 traffic will go on rails. Unavoidable doom, in Sandag’s view!

This view is reflected in the rail system it does propose, which is inadequate. Most of its rail lines would radiate from downtown San Diego; there would also be an Escondido-Oceanside line. That is precisely a major cause of the collapse of Los Angeles’ once-superb Pacific Electric system 40 years ago.

Although downtown is the county’s major traffic point and sorely needs rail transit now , not everybody wants to go there.

But traffic “hot spots” already exist at many other points, with more to come: Otay Mesa; North Island; the airport (with its outrageous parking fees); Mission Bay; our colleges and universities; University City’s “Golden Triangle”; the office and industrial complex of Sorrento Valley/Mira Mesa; the fairgrounds (where cars stood for an hour or more waiting to park for this year’s Del Mar Fair); in North County, California 78 and the industrial complexes along El Camino Real. (The predicted population of North County in 2000 is 1 million.)

A rail system must get people to and from these places easily and quickly. If they must be reached roundabout--by way of transfer downtown--the rails will not attract enough passengers to ward off the traffic bedlam that already is irritating citizens all over the county.

So, in addition to Sandag’s lines focused on downtown, outlying interconnecting routes are necessary. For example:

- From the line along I-15 westward through Mira Mesa and Carroll Canyon to Sorrento Valley, connecting with the North Coast line at University City/UC San Diego.

- From the I-15 line westward around Lake Hodges and Rancho Santa Fe to a connection with the North Coast line at Encinitas Boulevard. This would replace the proposed Highway 680, subject of hot debate by residents of that area.

- A spur to Otay Mesa; or a loop, Chula Vista/Otay Mesa/El Cajon.

- North Island via the bridge and Coronado surface streets; or via an underbay tube if Coronado can help raise the added funds.

The priority must be to plan to build this total network now, rather than by 2005, as Sandag proposes.

The rails should follow roadway and freeway medians wherever possible. The tracks must be elevated or depressed as required for fast train times and minimum interference with street traffic. Surface-street crossings should be minimal, with traffic lights giving the trains priority. The rail cars must be compatible with those now in operation, so that interconnections between lines can be made.

This will cost a lot of money--probably at least $2.5 billion to $3 billion, for construction and equipment. It will also save a lot of money, generate new income and enhance the quality of life that has brought such fame to San Diego. It will be good for business.

The rail system will save huge sums for public entities such as colleges and universities, the airport and the fairgrounds, which now must continually pony up new money for parking spaces.

It will save millions for businesses that now must invest in parking, or parking subsidies, for employees and customers--especially downtown.

It will take pressure off the county and our cities--struggling to finance new streets, repairs to old one, traffic lights and law enforcement--to contend with increased traffic.

It will save all of us drivers sizable sums on parking fees, gas, collision repairs, insurance and depreciation. It will free us from maddening traffic on freeways and surface streets.

It will save our air.

Thus it is well that Sandag has paused to evaluate its situation. It originally planned to ask voters to approve a half-cent sales tax increase on the November’s ballot. Now it has postponed the vote until November of next year.

Sandag should take this time to revise its plan for spending the new tax money. The current plan would put only about one-fifth of the estimated $2.4 billion into rails. The rest would go to freeways, surface streets and buses.

Instead, at least four-fifths of the funds should go to the rail network and the rest for buses tied into the rail system.

This wouldn’t stop freeway expansion--we would continue to get our share of state and federal highways funds, administered by Caltrans. But some of that Caltrans money should go to rails. For example, Caltrans now plans a buses-only roadway in the Interstate 15 median. But those so-called “express” buses, once off their own lane, still must plod, fuming, among the autos.

So why can’t Caltrans lay the rails now, instead of the busway?

The construction costs of the total rail network would just about be obtained from the half-cent sales tax, and other state and federal funds may be available also. There remains the problem of operating costs, which would start out at around $30 million to $40 million a year. There are viable sources for such funds:

- Fares paid by passengers.

- Increased property taxes resulting from soaring values of properties adjacent to rail stations and destinations. These tax increases should be reserved solely for rail operations.

- A tax on parking fees in areas served by the rail system.

- A tax on rents in high-density areas served by the rail network, due to increased accessibility of such locations.

- Parking fees for governmental employees now enjoying free parking, in areas served by the rail network.

- State and federal funds.

A total rail network in San Diego County can be expected to flourish; not only for its economies, but because most of us feel we live in a special place. We have shown we will vote to sustain it, with San Diego’s Proposition A and similar measures in many of the county’s cities. The present rail line to San Ysidro has gained national attention due to its phenomenal success, which far exceeds predictions.

In fact, in Sandag’s own opinion survey of early 1985, we said we would tax ourselves for public transit--but not for more freeway congestion. Why should we tax ourselves to become another L.A.?