New Engineering May Put Life Back in Monorail Plan : Transit: It is believed the line could be built in the freeway median without disrupting rush hour. Backers say it would be cheaper than a subway extension.

Monorail, seemingly consigned to the ashcan of San Fernando Valley history just nine months ago, might be making a comeback, reopening the years-long debate over what kind of rail line to build in the Valley.

In March, the Los Angeles County Transportation Commission appeared to have assured the death of a proposed monorail line along the Ventura Freeway’s south shoulder when it voted instead to extend the downtown-to-North Hollywood Metro Rail subway west to the San Diego Freeway in Van Nuys.

But thanks to a series of small decisions by engineers who have continued studying monorail, advocates of the futuristic system are becoming optimistic that they might yet prevail over the planned subway extension, which is to begin in 1996 and be completed in 2001.

Now engineers believe the line could be built in the freeway median, supported by thinner than expected pillars. They also believe the line could be built without disrupting rush-hour traffic.

The cumulative effect of the decisions, monorail advocates say, is to make a monorail system cheaper and easier to build than the subway extension.

“If the study turns out as positive as we think it will,” said William Korek, chairman of the Van Nuys-based Citizens Committee for Monorail, “things will finally be starting to look good for monorail.”

But Richard Close, a Sherman Oaks homeowner group leader, said: “I think they should stop studying it. I see it as a dangerous diversion. We should instead be getting on with building the subway. The decision has been made.”

Gruen Associates, the consultant hired to continue studying monorail, is expected to deliver a draft of its report in late December and the final report in January.

In the view of most rail experts, monorail, which would travel on rubber wheels on a concrete guideway instead of the steel wheels and tracks used on light-rail systems, came up short compared to the subway extension the last time the two were studied.

That was in a beefy environmental impact report, completed one year ago, that commissioners used in March as a basis for selecting the subway as the Valley rail project.

In that report, the proposed 16.5-mile monorail line elevated along the south shoulder from Universal City to Warner Center was projected to cost $1.6 billion and serve 35,000 riders a day.

By contrast, the proposed 5.6-mile subway extension to Van Nuys along the Southern Pacific railroad right of way that roughly parallels Chandler and Victory boulevards would cost $1.1 billion and generate equal ridership, rail experts said.

In the subway’s favor, several key homeowner groups along the proposed subway route reluctantly agreed to support the underground extension, largely out of relief that an earlier proposal for a ground-level, light-rail line on the same route was no longer under consideration.

On the other hand, homeowner groups along the Ventura Freeway remained vigorously opposed to any elevated line along the freeway--whether monorail or light rail--a position they continue to maintain because of the freeway’s proximity to residences and the projected congestion around stations.

At the insistence of Caltrans, which at the time wanted to reserve the freeway’s median and north shoulder for a possible future upper deck for buses and car-pools, the monorail line was studied last year for the freeway’s south side.

Experts found that the southside location would have created massive traffic jams at every station as monorail-bound motorists from north of the freeway tried to reach parking lots south of the freeway. Most of the patrons of a monorail system are expected to come from the north.

Also, building the monorail on either shoulder would bring the rail line close to hundreds of residences. In addition, engineers found the southside design would interfere with intersecting roadways such that it would force the line underground in three areas--in Studio City, at the intersection with the San Diego Freeway, and between De Soto and Canoga avenues.

The resulting 3.5 miles of tunneling added $300 million to $400 million to the project’s cost, commission rail experts say.

“The design was so needlessly expensive that we never felt that monorail got a fair shot,” said Rosa Kortizya, deputy to Supervisor Mike Antonovich, whose district includes most of the Valley and who has been the monorail’s chief proponent.

Although it turned aside the monorail plan in March, the commission mollified Antonovich by authorizing the additional study. Subway proponents, believing they had achieved victory, offered only mild protest.

In June, even before the new study began to produce results, monorail got a lift when Valley voters overwhelmingly chose it in a non-binding referendum placed on the ballot at Antonovich’s behest.

To Antonovich’s delight, 47.7% of the voters chose monorail, while 21.1% favored a light-rail line in a shallow trench from North Hollywood to Warner Center, and 21% voted for no rail line at all. Only 10.2% voted for the already-approved subway extension.

Kortizya said a study of precincts along the Ventura Freeway showed that voters there favored monorail by a slightly higher margin than did all voters in the Valley, “suggesting that despite what homeowner leaders say, there is strong support for monorail from those who would be most affected.”

Monorail’s fortunes got a second boost when Caltrans announced during the summer that it no longer opposed locating a rail line in the freeway’s median.

Walter Rothbart, Caltrans chief of project studies, said the road-building agency’s view “has evolved over time. We now feel that if a rail line is built along the freeway, we probably will not have to add a second level.”

Peter De Haan, a commission rail expert overseeing the study by Gruen Associates, a consulting firm, said the median site “changes quite a few things,” most importantly eliminating the need for the costly subway segments.

He said the median design also makes it possible to build stations over the Ventura Freeway and to locate parking areas either over the freeway or on the ground north of the freeway--in either case eliminating the street-clogging effect of rail-bound motorists from the north trying to get south of the freeway.

More recently, engineers have concluded that a monorail line could be supported by 28-inch-wide steel columns placed in the existing median every 90 feet.

In the earlier study, columns were presumed to be concrete and 54 inches wide--too wide to fit within the existing median. Rothbart said squeezing pillars that wide into the median would have forced Caltrans, which is in the process of widening the freeway to 10 lanes across the Valley, to widen the pavement even further and to tear down and replace many of the outside retaining walls now under construction.

Rothbart also said that Caltrans’ experience during the current widening projects, in which lanes are closed only at night to accommodate construction, has convinced the agency that the same could be done during rail construction.

“We are sure that if this rail line is built, all freeway lanes could be kept open during daylight rush hours,” he said.

Korek, a close associate of Antonovich, said his group is planning to raise up to $500,000 starting in January to support a lobbying effort on behalf of monorail.

He said in addition to organizing efforts, a video superimposing a monorail on the freeway will be produced for presentation to business and civic groups.

“Release of this report is going to be our signal to go into action,” he said. “We think the fight is just beginning.”

Close, president of the Sherman Oaks homeowners, said: “The best place for a Valley line is underground, away from homes, and no report is going to change that. Antonovich had his say and his views were rejected.”

BACKGROUND

In March, the Los Angeles County Transportation Commission concluded seven years of debate by voting to extend the downtown-to-North Hollywood Metro Rail subway west 5.6 miles to Van Nuys. But commissioners also voted to continue technical studies of a rejected option--a 16.5-mile monorail elevated along the Ventura Freeway from Universal City to Warner Center. In a June advisory referendum, Valley voters overwhelmingly chose the monorail over two other rail options. Advocates hope to reopen the debate.