CALL BOXES: You’ve just had a flat...

CALL BOXES: You’ve just had a flat on the freeway, and you’re about to have a fit. What’s a panic-stricken motorist to do? Easy--use the call box. After all, everyone else does. In fact, people make more than 40,000 calls per month on county freeways. . . . In the Valley, boxes near the San Diego Freeway and Sepulveda Boulevard get plenty of action, and are among a variety of devices that improve flow and safety of area freeways. See Valley Briefing. (B2)

DUMP PROTEST: About two dozen environmentalists protested at Sunshine Canyon Landfill north of Granada Hills for the second day Saturday, as work crews continued clearing 3,000 California live oak trees to expand the dump. Browning-Ferris Industries Inc., the dump’s owner, began using a fire road to get equipment in and out of the remote site after the city ordered BFI not to use a city-owned road. . . . Tying up the fire road is dangerous, said Rosemary Woodlock, lawyer for the North Valley Coalition of Concerned Citizens, an environmental group. “We’ll certainly raise that issue,” Woodlock said, when the group goes back to court Monday in a second bid to keep BFI from removing any more trees until several legal issues are resolved.

STALEMATE: Valley-area Reps. Henry Waxman (D-Los Angeles) and Carlos J. Moorhead (R-Glendale) have opposite--and strongly held--views on health care. Waxman favors the Clinton approach, which would require employers to pay to insure their workers. Moorhead is adamantly against it. . . . Despite the stalemate tying up their congressional committee, Waxman thinks Congress will pass some kind of health care bill before the November elections. (B1)

COOL THREADS: La Mesa Junior High School may have started a fashion trend when it adopted school uniforms. . . . At least two other Santa Clarita Valley school districts are thinking of following suit. (B6)

Call Box Usage

In Los Angeles County Total boxes: 4,085 Calls per month: 40,876 Calls per day: 1,344 Calls per box: 11 Avg. call time: 5.82 min. Avg. ring time: .53 min. Source: Metropolitan Transportation Authority