Study Raises Toll Road’s Total Cost by $76 Million

An independent report on the San Joaquin Hills toll road indicates the financing plan for the project is sound, despite a $76-million increase in its estimated cost, state and local transportation officials said Tuesday.

The latest cost estimate of $541 million for the 14-mile roadway was based on more detailed engineering studies than were available last summer, when the cost was estimated at $465 million. The new study also takes into account delays in obtaining approval for environmental reports, the officials said.

They warned, however, that further postponements could cause costs to skyrocket even more.

Bruce Nestande, a former county supervisor who now sits on the California Transportation Commission, declared that the toll road “will be built,” even though it is more than a year behind schedule. He called on environmentalists who oppose it to negotiate with planners on their demands.

Tollway ‘Inevitable’

“It’s not a question anymore of whether there will be a tollway, that’s inevitable,” Nestande said. “It’s now in everybody’s best interest to settle their differences and try to keep the costs reasonable.”

County Supervisor Thomas F. Riley, chairman of the San Joaquin Hills Transportation Corridor Authority, agreed.

“I would not say the challenges (by the environmentalists) are frivolous, because they believe in what they are doing “ Riley said. “But we’re now seeing the environmental process costing more than the design process, and their real target is to kill the road.”

Laguna Beach officials, who have fiercely opposed the planned route of the toll road through Laguna Canyon, and environmentalists who challenged the original environmental reports, vowed Tuesday to continue their battle.

‘Are Serious Concerns’

“There are people in Laguna Beach who wll never accept the idea of a toll road in the canyon,” said Elizabeth Brown, president of Laguna Greenbelt Inc. “But it’s an oversimplification to say that there are not serious concerns.”

Brown said the environmental report submitted by the toll road planners last year was “ridiculously inadequate.” Her group and others mounted more than 1,100 separate challenges to it, she said, pointing out such things as the lack of designated crossings for animals.

Those concerns, she said, are not lessened by the independent report that revealed the new cost estimates.

The report, a draft of which was obtained by The Times, attributes millions of dollars of cost increases to the need to redo the environmental reports. The extra work has already added $52.4 million to the amount that must be raised for pre-construction financing, the report said, and another $50 million to the amount needed for construction costs.

The report is the first detailed study of the financial feasibility of the toll road and was required by the California Transportation Commission as a condition of the project’s receiving $46.5 million in state money.

The financial plan laid out in the document involves a cautious, three-phase financing plan that calls for $122 million in bonds to be sold late this summer and a $655-million bond issue once the environmental documents have been approved. The total amount of the bond issue exceeds the total estimated cost of the program, which is calculated in 1988 dollars.

Part of the debt incurred through the project will be paid off with developer fees and part of it through tolls, once the road is opened.

Nestande said Tuesday that there is nothing in the report to shake the state’s commitment to the project.

He said he expects the document to be approved Thursday by the San Joaquin Hills Transportation Authority and in May by state transportation officials, clearing the way for the summer bond issue.

Under a revised schedule, construction on the tollway is scheduled to begin in early 1991. Completion is expected sometime in 1993.