Playa del Rey Road Collapse Snarls Traffic
A two-mile section of a busy oceanfront thoroughfare in Playa del Rey was closed to all traffic Friday in the midst of the rush hour after a broken sewer main caused the roadway above it to sink. The road was expected to be shut down through the weekend, authorities reported.
City personnel barricaded all roads leading onto Vista Del Mar between Culver Boulevard and Imperial Highway, said Kevin Walton, a communications supervisor with the Department of Transportation.
The incident, which did not involve any sewage spill, occurred when sewage gases finally ate through the top side of an old concrete outfall line installed in 1922, according to Ray Jellison of the city’s Department of Sanitation. He said the road directly above the ruptured pipe then sank, eventually opening a three-foot-wide hole in the street.
Jellison said the damage to the pipe was “not enough to cause any real problems with sewage, which is still flowing.”
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