Busiest Freeway to Have a Make-Over

By JAMES QUINN

Feb. 16, 1988 12 AM PT

Times Staff Writer

After years of delays and a bitter debate over a car pool lane, work is about to begin on a $90-million make-over of the nation’s busiest thoroughfare.

On Wednesday, workers will begin synchronizing traffic lights on streets adjacent to the venerable Ventura Freeway in Woodland Hills--the initial step in the first of four major expansion and rehabilitation projects that will be undertaken on the freeway over the next five years between Thousand Oaks and Universal City, a distance of 24 miles.

The work gets under way with one key issue unresolved--whether one of the proposed lanes will be a “diamond lane,” restricted to car pools and buses--and amid fears that construction will make movement even more difficult in a corridor with few good alternative routes.

Residents Concerned

In recent months, half a dozen people have called her office in near-panic over the onset of construction, said Karyn Foley, a broker with Fred Sands Realtors in Woodland Hills.

“They said, ‘I’m getting out of here. I’m worried,’ ” she said.

“We’ll come back in five years when the project’s done,” said Donald L. Like, explaining why he and his wife, Marvene, are temporarily forsaking their Oxnard beach home for a Sherman Oaks condominium.

The state Department of Transportation scoffs at such gloomy predictions. Noting there will be bypass routes and that all work on the pavement will be done at night, officials predict that congestion will be no worse during construction than at present.

Said Thomas Conner, principal transportation engineer with the Los Angeles Department of Transportation: “A lot of us in the transportation field who have studied their (Caltrans’) plans feel they should meet their goal.”

While there is disagreement on the effect of construction, all agree on one point: In recent years the Ventura Freeway in the San Fernando Valley has slowly succumbed to congestion.

Even on a good day, the freeway has eight hours of extreme congestion. So many motorists take pains to avoid it that spillover traffic is blamed for jamming up nearby surface streets and even Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu.

When the last of the new concrete is ready for traffic in 1993, there will be eight lanes of freeway from the fast-growing suburban community of Thousand Oaks to Woodland Hills and 10 lanes from there to the Hollywood Freeway.

And the freeway’s seemingly arbitrary variations in width, a major cause of rush-hour headaches, should be no more than a disagreeable memory.

At present, inbound from Calabasas the 101 Freeway shrinks from eight lanes to six lanes, then expands to eight lanes and then grows again to 10 lanes near its juncture with the San Diego Freeway. Then it contracts to eight lanes again and finally, at the Hollywood Freeway, opens back up to 10 lanes.

In the resulting bottlenecks, dismayed motorists are forced to slow to a crawl, then accelerate, then reduce speed again.

Even though the bottlenecks will soon be eliminated, traffic planners are not optimistic about U.S. 101’s future.

They predict that upon completion of the make-over, there will be enough lanes in the right places to accommodate the Valley’s growing traffic volume for no more than a year or two.

After that, residential and commercial growth, especially in nearby Ventura County communities, should bring a return of congestion.

In fact, a Southern California Assn. of Governments traffic study committee recently recommended that planning begin as soon as possible on a double deck for the Ventura Freeway from Woodland Hills to the Hollywood Freeway, then south through Cahuenga Pass to downtown.

The committee, created by the Legislature in response to a 1983 study indicating that the Valley faces the worst congestion of any area in Southern California, urged that the upper deck be a toll road with limited on- and off-ramps, and that it also carry a light-rail line.

Caltrans has the matter under study.

The four projects:

- Widening of the infamous “Woodland Hills bottleneck,” a two-mile stretch of six-lane freeway bracketed at both ends by eight lanes of freeway. The $20.4-million project, which begins Wednesday, will include one new lane in each direction.

As with most other freeway widenings in crowded Southern California, Caltrans will secure these and other new lanes on 101 by narrowing existing lanes and taking 7 of the 10 feet from the inside shoulder.

- At about the midpoint of the Woodland Hills widening, Caltrans said, it will contract to repave a 9-mile section of the freeway between Calabasas and Thousand Oaks.

- If the diamond lane debate is resolved, Caltrans expects work to begin work early next year on widening the freeway to 10 lanes from Woodland Hills to Universal City.

Contributing to the freeway’s patchwork reputation, about one-third of this 13-mile stretch has been 10 lanes for more than a decade, while the remainder has been a traffic-choked eight lanes.

This $22-million, 16-month project is expected to affect more motorists than all the other area construction combined, Caltrans planner say.

It includes the traffic-swamped stretch through Encino, where Caltrans reports that the Ventura carries an average of 270,000 vehicles daily, qualifying the freeway as the nation’s most heavily traveled roadway.

The 5-year debate over a diamond lane from Woodland Hills to Universal City seemingly was settled a year ago when Caltrans, responding to widespread opposition to a diamond lane, dropped its proposal for an eastbound car pool lane.

But the issue flared anew in Demember when Southern California air quality regulators unexpectedly entered the fray.

The South Coast Air Quality Management District board, which is seeking to promote car pooling, has threatened to go to court unless Caltrans reverses itself and redesigns the widening to include an eastbound diamond lane.

Caltrans has thus far refused, citing more than 12,000 anti-diamond lane letters it received from Valley residents and a delay of more than a year if the project were redesigned.

From the outset, the new westbound lane between Woodland Hills and Universal City has been designated for general use.

- The final project, and the costliest at an estimated $30 million, is expansion of the freeway’s intersection at Valley Circle and Mulholland Drive in Woodland Hills, long a choke-point at the Valley’s western end.

Despite Caltrans’ prediction that congestion will not worsen during construction, skeptical elected officials have proposed several measures to relieve congestion.

Los Angeles City Councilmen Zev Yaroslavsky and Michael Woo have proposed banning trucks from the freeway during peak hours while construction is under way.

The council has voted its support of the ban. However officials of Caltrans and the U.S. Highway Administration, which together have the final word, say they believe there is no suitable alternate route, as required by law.

Yaroslavsky said he plans to wait until “there is an outcry from the motoring public once work starts” and then will lobby state and federal officials for the ban.

Also, state Sen. Alan Robbins (D-Van Nuys) has proposed hiring Amtrak to operate two round-trip commuter trains daily from downtown through the Valley to Ventura County during the freeway construction.

The California Transportation Commission has responded enthusiastically to the plan and has ordered its staff to return by August with a detailed proposal.

1. Boundary: White Oak Avenue to Valley Circle Boulevard.

Estimated cost: $20.4 million.

Project Outline:

Add fourth lane in both directions from Topanga Canyon Boulevard to Valley Circle.

Add fifth westbound lane from White Oak to Topanga.

Resurface and reconstruct scattered segments of pavement.

Replace 3,200 feet of pavement at Valley Circle interchange.

What Motorists Will Face:

All work on pavement will be done in the evening or at night. Day projects, such as retaining walls, will be screened from motorists.

Between Topanga Canyon and Valley Circle, three lanes in each direction will be open throughout the project, but all six lanes will be on the same side of median for a time, almost certainly causing some slowing.

Suggested bypass routes will be marked with signs on local streets.

Some ramps between Topanga and Valley Circle will shut for up to eight months at a time.

2. Boundary: Las Virgenes Road in Calabasas to Hampshire Road in Thousand Oaks.

Estimated cost: $15 million.

Project Outline:

Add 5 inches of asphalt to existing concrete, which has begun breaking up because rock with an unusually high acid content was used when freeway was paved 18 years ago.

What Motorists Will Face:

All work to be done between 11 p.m. and 5 a.m.

In early morning hours, there could be additional slowing of traffic as lanes are closed down to speed work. At least one lane will be maintained in each direction.

3. Boundary: Hollywood Freeway crossing at Los Angeles River to Topanga Canyon Boulevard on Ventura Freeway.

Estimated cost: $22 million.

Project Outline:

Add fifth lane eastbound from Topanga to Hollywood Freeway and westbound from Hollywood Freeway to White Oak. Eastbound side of freeway already has been widened to five lanes between Hayvenhurst Avenue and Van Nuys Boulevard, and westbound side already is five lanes from Van Nuys Boulevard to White Oak.

Widen roadway to accommodate shoulder on eastbound side between Hayvenhurst and Haskell Avenue.

Widen roadway to accommodate shoulder and sound wall on westbound side between Van Nuys and Sepulveda boulevards.

What Motorists Will Face:

All work on pavement to be done in evening or at night. Day work to be screened from motorists, although some slowing of traffic is anticipated.

All existing lanes to be kept open throughout project.

Various ramps closed for differing length of time.

4. Limits: Ventura Freeway interchange with Valley Circle Boulevard.

Estimated cost: $30 million.

Project Outline:

Reconstruct and enlarge Valley Circle interchange, including new on-and-off ramps.

What Motorists Will Face:

Work will be off freeway pavement, but interchange construction normally slows traffic somewhat.