‘Most Beautiful Freeway’ Is the Role Model : Challenge Handed to Toll Road Designers

Split-level freeways running through canyons, following the curves of hillsides and spanning up to 11 lanes are the challenge facing a design team chosen Thursday to create Orange County’s toll roads in the next decade.

The aim is to build roads that resemble the Junipero Serra Freeway (Interstate 280) from San Francisco to San Jose, and which has been called the most beautiful freeway in the world.

The board of directors that oversees the Transportation Corridor Agencies, developers of Orange County’s three planned toll roads, Thursday named four firms to act as a team in engineering construction of new highways.

The highways are called transportation corridors because the intent is to build not just roads, but busway and car-pool lanes and perhaps light rail lines.

Complex Financial Plan

More than 60 miles of toll highways are planned along three separate Orange County routes for the next 10 years. Construction will cost an estimated $1.3 billion to $1.7 billion in 1986 dollars. But the final cost is likely to be double that if interest on the construction bonds is included.

The roads are to be paid for through a complex financial plan combining developer fees, toll revenue and federal money.

Cutting through canyons in the east of the county and along the San Joaquin Foothills between John Wayne Airport and San Juan Capistrano, the roads probably will be at split levels that match hill contour lines, said Susan Marzec, a spokeswoman for the agencies.

Gene Foster, project engineer for the San Joaquin Hills Transportation Corridor, said, “The roads are designed to hug the sides of the mountains as much as possible to match the terrain and do the least amount of damage as possible.”

6 to 10 Lanes

Similar to the Junipero Serra Freeway, the Orange County routes will include park-and-ride lots with space for about 250 cars each and use California native plants for landscaping, Marzec said.

As now planned, they will range from six to 10 lanes for general traffic, with a 12-foot lane set aside for buses and car pools, separated by a 14-foot buffer zone. Some interchanges will rise from the center of the freeways solely to carry car pools and buses, and on- and off-ramps would connect directly with car-pool lanes.

The planned 15-mile San Joaquin Hills route will probably be built first, with construction beginning as early as 1989. So far, it is the only one of the three routes designated a state highway and thus eligible for federal construction money.

The proposed 15- to 23-mile Eastern Corridor would connect the Riverside Freeway with the Santa Ana Freeway. The Foothill Corridor would be the longest of the three and probably the last built. It would run about 32 miles through the foothills of the Santa Ana Mountains and then through Camp Pendleton to the San Diego Freeway south of San Clemente. The Marine Corps has not yet agreed to the plan.

The Corridor Agencies were created by agreements between the county and 10 of its cities.

The firms it chose Thursday have formed a partnership called the Corridor Design Management Group. Their job is to convert the rough blueprints of winding lanes and busways into a reality.

The group was hired on the basis of a statement of qualifications, and the actual cost of the contract won’t be known until the environmental review process is completed and final designs are approved, Marzec said. “We don’t have a handle on the costs yet,” she said.

The firms are Howard Needles Tammen & Bergendoff of Los Angeles, Parsons Brinkerhoff Quade & Douglas Inc. of Denver, Fluor Daniel of Irvine and Church Engineering of Newport Beach.

Church Engineering contributed work on the original corridor plans, analyzing design alternatives. Howard Needles, established in 1914, has worked on plans for 1,500 miles of interstate highways in the United States and is building new toll booths for the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco.

Fluor Daniel is a subsidiary of the giant Fluor Corp., an international construction firm. Parsons Brinkerhoff, founded in 1885, also is an international transportation and public works firm.