SOUTH COUNTY : Stonehill Drive Opening Welcomed

Twyla Mowery has waited 18 months for the extension of Stonehill Drive to be completed.

Mowery, a secretary employed by the city of Dana Point, has been forced to use a zigzag commute along crowded surface streets to her Mission Viejo home. But with the opening of the roadway this morning, she and hundreds of other northbound commuters from the Dana Point area will be able to shortcut across San Juan Creek right to Interstate 5.

“It’s wonderful,” Mowery said Thursday. “I can leave my office, take a left on Stonehill and I’m almost home.”

Today, 35 years after a county transportation planner scratched the extension on an arterial highway map, dignitaries from all over South County will gather for the grand opening of the new $10.5-million, four-lane roadway. Along with making access quicker, it should alleviate traffic congestion on Pacific Coast Highway and Del Obispo Road--until now the only other ways to get across the creek to the freeway, say local planners.

Commuters are not the only ones who have been eyeing the new roadway. Business owners in the sleepy Doheny Village area of Dana Point have been banking on the new access to their neighborhood for years.

“The Stonehill extension offers a major opportunity for the development of the Doheny Village area,” said Councilwoman Karen Lloreda.

Then there are the San Juan Capistrano traffic planners who have long considered the new link between their city and Dana Point the answer to their downtown traffic problems. According to the city’s estimates, the extension will reduce peak-hour downtown San Juan Capistrano traffic, which comes mostly from Dana Point commuters, by 40% to 45%.

The most ecstatic celebrants of the new road are likely to be the county engineers who have spearheaded the project for the past 11 years. While the construction project involved the building of two bridges--one over San Juan Creek and the other over the 102-year-old Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe railroad--county planners say the paper chase of red tape dwarfed the actual construction problems.

Because of the road’s location, 21 different bureaucracies--from the city level to the federal level--were involved, said Richard Hart, the county’s lead engineer on the project. Because the road spans San Juan Creek, for example, the Orange County Flood Control District, the Army Corps of Engineers, the state Department of Fish and Game and the state Regional Water Quality Control Board all had to be involved, Hart said.

The toughest agency to win approval from proved to be the Public Utilities Commission, the planner said. Because the road crosses the railroad, the PUC had to bless the plans and that alone took 2 1/2 years, Hart said.

Funding for the 2,545-foot roadway came from a variety of sources, but the largest block, $7.2 million, came from the Federal Aid Urban Finance Program administered through the state Department of Transportation. Both cities chipped in 6% of the total cost.

Mowery, for one, believes it is definitely worth it.

“I’m excited,” she said.