High Rolling

One of the best things about driving on the new elevated roadway on the Harbor Freeway is that you don’t even notice that you’re five stories above one of the nation’s busiest roads.

You can’t see the traffic below. Nor can you hear it.

And, you move a lot faster!

Best of all, you’re on the top. You don’t have to worry about being under the imposing concrete structure in an earthquake, despite Caltrans’ assurances that it is safe.

The Harbor Freeway Transitway, opening today after seven years of construction, is a highway to heaven on what has been a freeway from hell.

The bad news is that it will be open only to buses and carpools--a fraction of commuters who use Interstate 110. Solo commuters, nonetheless, are expected to benefit as carpoolers move into the new lanes.

The $500-million project is a first for Los Angeles, where double decking of freeways may be a means of relieving traffic congestion. The transitway features carpool lanes--two in each direction much of the way--between the Artesia Freeway and the Coliseum.

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I took a spin on the new roadway Tuesday, escorted by a Caltrans official in one of those familiar orange trucks. They wouldn’t let me drive alone in my red Camaro, but at least they didn’t make me wear an orange vest.

Los Angeles’ newest adventure ride is a great escape.

Too bad it lasts only about two minutes.

Only about 2 1/2 miles of the transitway rise to 50 feet above existing traffic lanes--the stretch extending from the Coliseum to Slauson Avenue. The remaining 7 1/2 miles of the new roadway will consist of carpool lanes at freeway level.

The trip started on regular traffic lanes in downtown and as far as the Coliseum, where the transitway begins. It doesn’t go all the way to downtown because there wasn’t enough money, but officials are now studying how to design and pay for an extension.

We got off at Exposition Boulevard, turning onto Figueroa Street and then onto 39th Street, one of two entrances to the transitway. Drivers may also enter from the freeway.

Driving up the ramp, I noticed something unusual: There are no graffiti. Caltrans workers have been out sandblasting the walls clean in preparation for today’s opening ceremony.

Atop the elevated roadway, you forget you’re above a busy freeway. Walls block your view of the lower level and what you see of the city depends on the height of your vehicle. The walls also block out the roar of traffic from below. It was so peaceful that birds lounged in the traffic lanes.

The serenity didn’t last long. Within about two minutes, you are back alongside noisy freeway traffic. The good news is that your ears don’t pop as you come down.

Further along, you’ll pass something else unusual--bus stops in the middle of a freeway. The only one ready to open is under the octopus-like interchange of the Century and Harbor freeways.

There, carpoolers will speed by--perilously close, it seemed--concrete pillars.

The transitway extends to the Artesia Freeway, where motorists can take a long, elevated ramp to a park-and-ride lot and bus stop at 182nd Street or merge into regular traffic lanes for the ride toward San Pedro.

Here, the freeway has been widened, so much so that it looks like it can accommodate one of the 747s constantly flying overhead.

Caltrans engineers insist that the transitway--built with 1 million cubic yards of concrete and 16 million pounds of steel--is designed to withstand a major earthquake.

The 8-foot-diameter Y-shaped pillars supporting the elevated roadway are constructed on top of steel shafts sunk as deep as 70 feet into the ground.

But that wasn’t very reassuring on the return trip as we got closer to downtown and saw a freeway ramp hanging in the air--similar to what you see after a big earthquake.

Actually, it’s a new Adams Boulevard ramp under construction. Although the transitway is opening, work on the Adams ramps is not expected to be finished until early next year.

It took 18 minutes to travel from the Artesia Freeway to downtown on the transitway, about five minutes less than it took earlier in rush-hour traffic in the regular lanes. But we were dodging traffic barriers that should be down today.

Our rating: three tires out of four.