Adding 2nd Level to Freeway Is Feasible, Caltrans Study Says

Double-decking the heavily congested Ventura Freeway in the San Fernando Valley would be costly but feasible, the state Department of Transportation announced Thursday in a long-awaited study.

An upper deck from the Hollywood Freeway to Las Virgenes Road in Calabasas would cost $910 million and would displace more than 1,000 homes and businesses, Caltrans officials said.

The report was released to a 32-member committee formed to pick a Valley light-rail route.

In presenting the study, Caltrans urged that any upper deck also include a rail line.

Wally Rothbart, Caltrans Southern California planning director, said that studies indicate that the Ventura Freeway in the Valley will eventually need seven lanes in each direction “which can never be built in the space we now have.”

Caltrans engineers proposed an upper deck carrying either two lanes of traffic in each direction or one lane of traffic and a rail track in each direction.

Under Caltrans’ plan, only buses and car pools would be allowed on the upper deck.

Also, there would be only a handful of on- and off-ramps on the 18-mile-long deck.

Jerry Baxter, Caltrans’ Southern California director, said that while the yearlong double-decking study was not detailed enough to determine the exact design of ramps and pillars, “There’s enough engineering behind it to know that double-decking can be done.”

He said that because of a shortage of funds for both rail and highway projects, “It seems it would be best to combine resources.”

The Ventura Freeway is one of four light-rail routes that has been under consideration by the Los Angeles City Council-created committee.

The freeway route would connect Warner Center with the proposed Metro Rail station at Universal City.

A rival to the freeway route is the Chandler-Victory route, a controversial North Hollywood-to-Warner Center route that traverses numerous residential neighborhoods. Thursday night, the committee tentatively voted to end consideration of a route that parallels San Fernando Road from Union Station in Los Angeles to Sylmar, serving Glendale, Burbank and the northeast Valley.

The fourth route that has been studied would connect North Hollywood with Warner Center, but would avoid most residential neighborhoods either by using a subway or the Ventura Freeway shoulder.

The committee has until Aug. 1 to make its recommendation to the council.