O.C. Gets Green Light for 2 New Toll Roads : Transportation: State to let private firms build highways in flood plain and Riverside Freeway median.

Orange County emerged the big winner Friday when Gov. George Deukmejian announced that it would receive two new private toll roads as part of a unprecedented effort in which entrepreneurs would be allowed to build and operate $2.5 billion worth of private expressways around the state.

One of the Orange County proposals, made by a consortium headed by Texas computer magnate H. Ross Perot, is to build an 11.2-mile, $700-million elevated toll road in the middle of the Santa Ana River flood plain. It would link the Santa Ana Freeway near Anaheim Stadium with the Corona del Mar Freeway near John Wayne Airport.

The other proposal, by a team including CRSS Inc. and Citibank, is for a 10-mile, $88.3-million toll road in the median of the Riverside Freeway, from the Costa Mesa Freeway in Anaheim to the San Bernardino County line.

The completion date for the projects would be 1994.

The projects were among four selected by state Department of Transportation after an unusual competition to see who could best plan, pay for, build and operate transportation projects before eventually turning them over to the state. The other two projects selected are in southern San Diego County and in a fast-growing suburban corridor east of Oakland.

Deukmejian hailed the winners of the competition Friday as part of a “historic public-private partnership” that would give congestion-weary commuters an alternative to overburdened public freeways. Tolls on the new roads are expected to range from 10 to 20 cents a mile.

“While privatizing roads is not something totally new in the country, California’s approach, I believe, is unique,” Deukmejian said. “Rather than dictating which projects should be bid upon, we allowed the private sector the flexibility to go out and determine the projects that would best serve the public.”

Deukmejian won the right to take toll roads statewide last year in exchange for his support for a 5-cent-a-gallon gasoline tax increase.

Caltrans Director Robert K. Best also said that “there are a lot of economic incentives” for large landowners near the proposed toll roads to cooperate with the projects.

He added that he had not realized before Friday that the winning proposals are all in heavily Republican areas.

But that coincidence did not escape Assemblyman Richard Katz (D-Sylmar), who said Caltrans’ bidder selection showed “a pro-development-at-all-cost attitude. It’s a Caltrans giveaway to Republican supporters.”

Friday’s action was just the first step toward building the toll roads, giving the companies the right to negotiate with Caltrans. They still will have to seek local environmental and planning agency approval.

Katz said he is upset that Caltrans passed over a proposal to build a high-speed, high-technology train system from Los Angeles International Airport to Palmdale. The project was the only one among seven submitted to the transportation agency under the privatization program that did not encourage the use of cars.

Los Angeles County deserved some extra consideration in the competition because its residents voted in June to support the 5-cent-per-gallon gas tax, the proceeds from which are being used to supplement the state’s transportation budget, Katz argued.

Orange County voted against the tax measure, which passed statewide nevertheless.

“We’ve definitely been screwed,” Katz said of Los Angeles County voters.

Also rejected was a proposal to rebuild San Francisco’s Embarcadero Freeway, damaged in the Oct. 17 earthquake, and another Los Angeles-area entry, for a 15-mile toll road through Simi Valley in Ventura County.

Orange County officials hailed their two new proposed toll roads as crucial links in a freeway system overwhelmed with congestion but anemic in construction money.

“I would have been shocked if these two projects in Orange County didn’t make it,” said Bruce Nestande of Arnell Development and a member of the California Transportation Commission.

Friday’s announcement brings to five the number of toll roads approved for Orange County, giving it the lead in private California roads. Two years ago, the Legislature grudgingly approved the first three such roads, which would serve southern Orange County. Construction and operation of these previously approved roads are locally controlled.

The toll roads unveiled Friday would relieve two Orange County traffic pressure-points. One would cut through the heart of the county in the Santa Ana River flood plain, starting near Disneyland and Anaheim Stadium, through Costa Mesa and ending near the airport. The project would be built in conjunction with the Army Corps of Engineers, which is just beginning construction of an ambitious flood-control project along the river channel.

James E. Erickson, attorney for the Perot group planning the project, said commuters can expect to pay $2.50 to travel the road’s entire length.

He also said Friday that the consortium now plans to ask Disneyland, Anaheim Stadium, large office towers and South Coast Plaza to chip in.

“We’re going to tell them,” the attorney said, “ ‘If you want to get an off-ramp into your parking lot, there’s some value here. . . . We may be able to put an off-ramp to your parking lot. Do you want to pay for it?’ ”

Erickson said the proposed road could also tie into the Amtrak station near Anaheim Stadium, where the proposed California-Las Vegas high-speed train is expected to terminate.

The other Orange County project would be a bid to deal with growing congestion on the Riverside Freeway, where thousands of commuters travel through newer, more affordable neighborhoods springing up in San Bernardino and Riverside counties.

Tolls would range from $2 during peak hours to $1 during less congested periods; limited free access would be given to car pools, public transit buses and motorcycles.

Other approved projects are:

A 10-mile, $400-million toll road to be completed in 1995 from the Mexican border to California 54 through vacant land in southern San Diego County.

A $1.2-billion, 40-mile toll road stretching from Sunol in Alameda County to Antioch, on the edge of Contra Costa County. The road would be the first phase of a proposed 84-mile loop through a fast-growing suburban corridor that stretches from Oakland to Sacramento.

Best, the director of Caltrans, said Friday that all of the toll projects would receive no state or federal money.

Although the state could assist by condemning property, he said, the winning proposals are planned for existing public rights-of-way or are in favor with neighboring landowners.

Once completed, the roads would be deeded over to the state, then leased back to their builders, who would have the right to charge tolls for the next 35 years. Tolls would be set to guarantee a reasonable rate of return and would be changed only with state approval, Best said.

Asked whether the state would bail out a private project gone broke, Deukmejian quipped: “We’ll let the next governor worry about that.”