Freeway Help : Ventura County Gets Call Boxes

Ventura County will become the third county in the state to install emergency call boxes at quarter- and half-mile intervals on freeways, officials announced Thursday.

Cubic Communications Corp. of San Diego will begin installing a wireless system of call boxes on the county’s six freeways in February, said Al Knuth, deputy director of the Public Works Department.

The phone system, which will cost about $815,000 for parts and installation, will be in place by the end of the summer, Knuth said. The remainder of $1.9 million earmarked for the project will pay for maintenance of the 390 boxes and for the salaries of three California Highway Patrol dispatchers, he said.

Only Los Angeles and Orange counties have similar call-box systems. But Knuth said a state law passed in 1986 will enable most California counties to collect enough money to install boxes within the next five years.

The law allows counties to charge motorists $1 per registered vehicle and to use the revenue for call boxes. Since November, 1986, Ventura County has collected about $900,000 in such fees, Knuth said.

Early Start

Ventura County was able to get a head start over other counties on installing the boxes because it received $1 million in federal funds for them, said Jeff Bowling, a legislative assistant for state Assemblyman Jack O’Connell (D-Carpinteria). Under a bill sponsored by O’Connell and enacted in 1985, federal revenue from oil drilling was earmarked for call boxes, Bowling said.

Each box to be installed in Ventura County will be powered by a solar cell during the day and a battery at night, said Todd Murphy, special projects manager for the Orange County Transportation Commission, which installed a similar system this year.

When a motorist picks up the phone, digital tones are sent to a cellular transceiver on a hill or large building. The transceiver switches the signals to traditional phone lines and then to a dispatcher, Murphy said. The dispatcher summons help for the stranded motorist.

Unlike Orange and Ventura counties, Los Angeles County uses underground phone cables instead of cellular technology, said Peter De Haan, an analyst for the county Transportation Commission. Los Angeles County began installing its 3,498 call boxes in 1967 and paid for the system with county funds, he said.

Ventura County now has three call boxes. Two are on the Simi Valley Freeway just over the Los Angeles County line. The other is on the southbound side of the Ventura Freeway, halfway up a steep incline out of Camarillo.

Jan Carr, CHP communications supervisor in Ventura County, said about 60 motorists a month use the phone on the Ventura Freeway, far more than the 23 people per month who use each of the Simi Valley Freeway phones.