Commuters Find Ways to Run to Daylight

Freeways clogged? Do what Kit Paradis does. Find an escape route.

Paradis figures that he knows nearly every time-shaving shortcut between his home in Rancho Santa Margarita and his job at an electronics firm in Fountain Valley. He’s rarely caught at a dead stop on an interstate.

His list of alternatives: Residential streets, commercial thoroughfares, curving country lanes--anything short of a back alley strewn with trash cans.

“I’ve got dozens of them,” said Paradis, who will often cruise down streets paralleling the freeway just long enough to skirt congestion, then find the nearest on-ramp back on. “I’ve lived in Southern California all my life, so I’ve grown up with these escape routes.”

Paradis is not alone. Thousands of South County motorists opt for a network of surface streets and byways as they dance their daily commuter rumba.

California’s top transportation official even endorses the principle. Last year, Caltrans director Robert Best issued a challenge to drivers up and down the state to shorten commuting times and more effectively utilize available roads by finding the best combination of freeways and streets.

However, Keith Gilbert, the Automobile Club of Southern California’s highway engineering manager, cautions that motorists diverting off freeways often end up as an oppressive parade of traffic through quiet neighborhoods.

“More traffic on surface streets puts more traffic in neighborhoods, and that degrades the quality of life,” Gilbert said. “One of the original intents of the state freeway system was to get traffic out of the neighborhoods. We’ve really gotten away from that concept.”

But with South County freeways growing more crowded, drivers have no where else to turn. Officer Ken Daily of the California Highway Patrol’s San Juan Capistrano office said four streets in the area are relief valves:

* From Dana Point and Laguna Niguel, motorists often skirt the freeway by heading up Street of the Golden Lantern to Moulton Parkway, then onto Irvine Center Drive and points north.

* To bypass the El Toro Y, drivers travel twisting Laguna Canyon Road, entering from the coast or El Toro Road.

* From inland communities from Mission Viejo to Coto de Caza, Trabuco Road and Irvine Boulevard are alternatives to the I-5.

* From San Clemente to Laguna Beach, drivers take advantage of Coast Highway.

Other motorists have their own favorites.

Heading south in the evening down the San Diego Freeway, James Hendron used to follow a maze-like path to save a few minutes. First he would turn north onto the Laguna Freeway for a few miles, then reverse back south on I-5 and get off at Alton Parkway. In following the roundabout route, Hendron was consistently able to save five or 10 minutes by avoiding the El Toro Y.

Unfortunately, Hendron’s favorite escape route no longer exists. A few months back, Caltrans closed the little-used ramp connecting the northbound lanes of the Laguna Freeway to southbound I-5 to make way for a series of interchanges linked to nearby surface streets. But the path has a fond place in Hendron’s memory.

“Distance-wise, it was three times as far, but it still saved you time,” Hendron said. “It was just a little loop that would let you bypass all the nonsense going on at the Y.”

Even on normal days, though, it’s questionable whether the alternatives really save time.

John Meyer, executive director of the agency planning three tollways in South County, drives Moulton Parkway north in the morning from Laguna Hills to reach the San Diego Freeway and head into his office in Costa Mesa. Most days, the 13-mile trip takes an hour.

“If there’s any snag--a major accident, an overturned truck--it may take me 1 1/2 hours,” Meyer said.

Although comparisons between travel time on crowded freeways and escape routes are difficult, the average speed on even the most congested freeways in Southern California is about 28 m.p.h., versus 21 m.p.h. on surface roads, according to the Auto Club’s Gilbert.

“In pure numbers, staying on the freeway is not that bad an option,” he said. “But I understand why people don’t want to. As for me, I find it frustrating to sit in freeway traffic. It’s less stressful to get onto the surface streets.”

James Hendron’s wife, Laurie, avoids the freeways altogether these days, opting for a rural shortcut up Santiago Canyon Road. For a time it helped, but now the route is often as traffic-choked as the freeways.

“At one intersection traffic backs up so bad that I’ve got a book sitting next to me that I thumb through,” Hendron said. “I figure if I have to sit more than a minute I might as well be reading something.”

Norm Grossman, a Laguna Beach resident and slow-growth activist who works at a Santa Ana aerospace firm, points out South County has fewer alternatives than the north, where a gridiron of streets is laid across flat terrain.

“There’s just no north-south routes, and that’s part of the problem with South County,” said Grossman, who likes to take the Coast Highway home because of the side streets he can use when traffic backs up in Corona del Mar or Laguna Beach.

Laguna Beach Mayor Robert F. Gentry, meanwhile, has only one consistent escape. He takes Amtrak when he goes to Los Angeles for a meeting.

He doesn’t bother trying to find freeway alternatives. “There are none anymore,” Gentry declared. “Everyone knows about them.”

South County: Alternative Routes The four most popular alternatives to near-gridlock freeway conditions in South County, according to the California Highway Patrol.

1 From inland communities from Mission Viejo to Coto de Caza, Trabuco Road and Irvine Boulevard are the most popular ways to break free from the stop-and-go of I-5. 2 Commuters use Laguna Canyon Road to bypass the El Toro Y, where I-5 and I-405 come together. Motorists reach the twisting thoroughfare, used by more than 36,000 cars each day, either from the coast of El Toro Road. 3 From Dana Point and Laguna Niguel, motorists often skirt the freeway by heading up Street of the Golden Lantern to Moulton Parkway, then turning onto Irvine Center Drive. 4 Residents of seaside cities from San Clemente to Laguna Beach often use Coast Highway to reach points north.