Isn’t There a Better Way to Plan a Road? : * Long-Ago Tollway Decisions Cause Present-Day Rancor

If the San Joaquin Hills tollway were before various planning approval agencies today, would it be considered necessary? Would it take the planned route it has, and at the same size? Would it be approved at all?

The strong official political support for the road suggests that the current Board of Supervisors likely would approve the road, even as its predecessors did in the 1970s. However, a lot has changed since the fundamental decisions regarding this important Orange County artery--at the time, envisioned as a freeway--were made the better part of two decades ago.

And even though there was some controversy, the road didn’t undergo anything like the critical scrutiny it is now in a county with a vastly altered face. We have had recession, a heightened environmental awareness, the emergence of transportation alternatives to the automobile, and a new constituency of citizens who were not here when the original decisions were made.

So what we are seeing today is a kind of catch-up game, many new players and residents basically evaluating for the first time whether they think the road is needed at all. Because the approval process was weighted up front, the most important decisions were made early on in the deliberations. Today, we have a lot of rancor playing out largely in the courts, even as the bulldozers are ready to roll.

In the latest development in a long series of legal maneuverings, a federal judge recently blocked construction of the San Joaquin Hills tollway. The temporary restraining order was granted after attorneys for the National Resources Defense Council challenged the adequacy of environmental impact studies. Previously, the studies were found adequate by an Orange County Superior Court, and that ruling was upheld by the state’s 4th District Court of Appeal.

So it goes. Because so much was decided on the front end years back, the discussion is litigious rather than in the ordinary public arena of public meetings. And delays are costing money.

For 20 years the battle has gone on, and it now exceeds $2 million in costs for opponents and proponents who still are fighting it out. The San Joaquin Hills Transportation Corridor Agency is so concerned about the costs of further delay, estimated at $7.5 million a month, that it has asked the federal court to consider the economic impact.

Is this any way for a county to plan a road, or for those who don’t want it to oppose it? Probably not. This adversarial process is going down to the wire, with a hurry-up offense mounted by road proponents and delaying tactics thrown up by opponents. The result has been some bad feeling that will take time for the county to sort out, even after the legal issues are settled.

A lot has changed in the county, and now understandably some feel they will be saddled with a road they don’t want or need, and that will be an environmental eyesore. Nor is it clear how prepared financially the San Joaquin Hills Transportation Corridor Agency, which oversees the project, is to withstand considerable delays in the project if it gets tied up in the courts.

The road may get built, but the rancor will not go away easily. Orange County is going to be awhile coming to terms with the fallout of decisions made so very long ago.

It may be too much to hope that the opponents could put their differences aside after all is said and done. But for future road planners, the saga of the San Joaquin Hills tollway surely will offer a case study in how rocky the road can be in getting the pavement down.