Earthquake: The Long Road Back : U.S., State Release Funds for Recovery : Aid: Money will go for highways, schools, housing. ‘We don’t want to see any slowdown’ in road repairs, federal official says.

U.S. Secretary of Transportation Federico Pena released $50 million in emergency federal funds Thursday to assist in the demolition and reconstruction of damaged freeways--the largest allocation yet for transportation systems crippled by the earthquake.

Pena’s announcement came as state Controller Gray Davis issued $100 million in checks for government, transportation, educational and church agencies in Los Angeles County and as Federal Emergency Management Agency Director James Lee Witt said checks totaling $27.6 million have been disbursed for housing assistance.

The money released by Pena, combined with $45 million made available last week, is intended to help state officials continue their freeway rebuilding efforts while Congress mulls a $1.35-billion federal allocation for transportation.

“Caltrans is close to bringing on board construction companies, and we want to make sure they don’t lose one day of the momentum they have started,” Pena said in a telephone interview from Washington. “We don’t want to see any slowdown in the demolition or reconstruction work.”

Pena announced the emergency allocation during a Senate hearing in Washington on the Northridge earthquake.

At the hearing, called by Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), Pena said arrangements were being made to add 25 locomotives and train cars to accommodate commuters riding the Metrolink system. Pena said he was also working on securing federal waivers to increase the average speed of Metrolink trains from 25 m.p.h. to 30 m.p.h. on the route between Palmdale and Los Angeles.

Pena emphasized that the long-term plan to rebuild the Los Angeles area’s transportation network must include efforts to persuade as many commuters as possible to park their cars and use mass transit.

Earlier in the day, the Senate Public Works Committee passed on a voice vote Boxer’s proposal that would make highway bridges eligible for federal funds to cover earthquake retrofitting. Under current law, a freeway structure must be damaged before it is eligible for federal funds. Although the proposal would not set aside any federal money to retrofit California freeways, Boxer called it a necessary first step.

Administration officials hope to win congressional approval for a $6.6-billion aid package by mid-February.

Pena said transportation officials are particularly eager for early passage because they have nearly exhausted emergency funds for Southern California.

“We are hopeful that the majority of Congress will recognize the severity of the calamity in California and the importance for the nation to once again respond to people in need,” Pena said. “The fact of the matter is that the transportation system in Southern California is crucial to our nation.”

*

Jerry Baxter, director of Caltrans’ rebuilding operations, said the work was continuing at a rapid pace. He said detours around freeway bridges that collapsed during the earthquake were functioning fairly well, but engineers were having to rethink some of their ideas that had produced mixed results.

Baxter said that on Tuesday, northbound evening commuter traffic routed around the shattered interchange of the Golden State and Antelope Valley freeways in Sylmar experienced delays of more than two hours. By Wednesday evening, he said, that delay had been trimmed to just 13 minutes.

He said the big improvement on Wednesday was because of the addition of three lanes of traffic--one that was added to the truck route bypass by re-striping and two more that were added by converting the two southbound lanes of Sierra Highway into northbound lanes.

That worked fine for northbound traffic, he said, but southbound traffic, which had to be diverted to other routes, was a mess.

As a result, Sierra Highway remained open to traffic in both directions Thursday night, and the delays for northbound traffic increased again.

Baxter said re-sequencing of the traffic lights on the surface street detours around the disabled Simi Valley and Santa Monica freeways was moving traffic through at speeds of up to 25 m.p.h. He said car pools using the special, shorter detours around the breaks in the Santa Monica Freeway were getting to and from work about 20 minutes faster than those using the other detours.

Caltrans will continue to adjust detours around the broken freeways until the best possible routes have been found, Baxter said.

Metrolink officials said a fourth station will open Monday on the newly activated commuter line to the Antelope Valley.

The station, at Vincent Grade on the southern edge of the Antelope Valley, was built in four days by a Navy Seabees construction crew, assisted by Los Angeles County road crews. Metrolink stations usually take three to six months to build, the officials said.

Mary Lou Schmidt, a FEMA spokeswoman, said 156,273 applications for housing aid had been received by telephone and at disaster assistance centers by midafternoon Thursday.

Schmidt said FEMA opened its 20th center, in Pacoima, on Thursday. Another center is expected to open today in the Simi Valley.

“The checks are going out,” Witt said. “We’re very proud of that. We’ve speeded the process up. But we still have a lot of need out there.”

*

Davis said the state checks he issued Thursday included $10 million apiece for Cal State Northridge, the Los Angeles Unified School District and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.

About 75,000 customers in the northern San Fernando Valley, the Hollywood Hills, the Santa Monica Mountains and Pacific Palisades were still being advised to boil their water before drinking it.

Light rain fell in scattered areas of Los Angeles before dawn Thursday, turning portions of the already soggy encampments for earthquake refugees into quagmires.

The population of the five encampments at city parks was gradually shrinking as the refugees began straggling back to their homes, but the National Guard said 1,869 people were still housed in 176 Army tents.

Rainfall was heavier in Laguna Beach, one of the areas hardest hit by last fall’s devastating brush fires, and there were mudslides in several canyons where the blazes had stripped hillsides of the vegetation needed to prevent erosion.

The slides forced the closure of Laguna Canyon Road, one of Laguna Beach’s principal arteries. Mud and water stood as much as three feet deep in some areas, Laguna Beach police said.

Times staff writer Dean E. Murphy contributed to this story.