No Surprise: L.A.’s Freeway Interchanges Are the Busiest

It probably won’t come as news to any beleaguered commuter from the Westside, but Caltrans made it official on Tuesday--the busiest interchange in the nation is the West Los Angeles junction of the Santa Monica and San Diego freeways, traveled by a daily average of 513,000 vehicles.

And it may not surprise local motorists to learn that trailing close behind are the East Los Angeles interchange of the Santa Monica, Golden State, Pomona and Hollywood freeways, with 509,000 vehicles, and the Santa Monica’s interchange with the Harbor Freeway in Central Los Angeles, with 502,500.

In fact, the nine busiest superhighway interchanges in the nation are in California, with eight of them in Southern California, the state Department of Transportation said.

Ranking fourth through 10th nationwide are:

* The Ventura and San Diego freeways in Sherman Oaks, with 480,000.

* The Eastshore, MacArthur and Nimitz freeways in Alameda County, with 455,500.

* The Harbor and San Diego freeways in Carson, 444,000.

* The Santa Ana, Garden Grove and Orange freeways in Orange, 441,000.

* The Artesia and San Gabriel River freeways in Cerritos, 425,500.

* The Orange and Riverside freeways in Anaheim, 421,000.

* Interstates 55 and 94 in Chicago, 419,639.

The Santa Monica Freeway is California’s most traveled highway, averaging about 315,000 vehicles a day, according to Chuck Pivetti, chief of the state’s Office of Highway Engineering. That’s about 218 cars a minute, 24 hours a day.

By way of contrast, he singled out California’s Route 270, which serves the Central Sierra ghost town of Bodie. It carries an average of 350 vehicles a day, or about one car every four minutes.