What’s in a Name? Not Always the Correct Information

Dear Street Smart:

I recently returned from a long-term overseas work contract and was delighted to see the completed Santa Ana Freeway improvements between the Costa Mesa and Orange freeways.

Being a longtime Orange County resident, I was surprised to see a new overhead sign on the southbound Santa Ana Freeway near Grand Avenue in Santa Ana listing the 55 Freeway as the Newport Freeway. If my memory serves me correctly, I recall that the 55 Freeway was renamed in the late 1970s to the Costa Mesa Freeway. Is Caltrans renaming it back to the Newport Freeway, or was this an accidental oversight?

John W. De Witt

Costa Mesa

*

Caltrans goofed.

Agency officials checked the sign on Friday because of your letter. By the time you read this, the sign should be covered, and a new one will be in place in a month or two, Caltrans spokeswoman Maureena Duran-Rojas said.

“There’s no argument about what the name of the freeway is,” she said. “In all of our literature, we refer to it as the Costa Mesa Freeway, Thomas Bros. refers to it as the Costa Mesa Freeway and that’s the name by which everyone knows it.”

Duran-Rojas couldn’t explain how the mistake occurred, but said it probably happened during the recent widening of the Santa Ana Freeway.

Caltrans apologizes, she said.

“When motorists bring things to our attention, we go out there and try to correct them as quickly as we can.”

*

Dear Street Smart:

I thought you’d like to know that La Palma, the city with the largest number of car washes per capita in the world, will now probably garner another world record. The mayor and City Council have announced that a new traffic light will be installed on Walker Street near Byrne Drive.

Installing that light will mean that La Palma will have four (count ‘em--four!) traffic signals within one-fifth of a mile. And, if you travel another one-fifth of a mile north on Walker, you’ll hit a fifth traffic signal! Don’t you think this is a bit much?

Mayor Duane Schuster was quoted by The Times as saying: “Imagine 126 [illegal] crossings at 7 p.m., when there are thousands of cars on Walker Street.” What he failed to mention was that none of those 126 people was struck by a car and, much more to the point, none of them were ticketed by his Police Department. If the mayor would ticket jaywalkers, instead of counting them, maybe the city could stop installing signals every 250 feet.

Lou Cohan

Cypress

*

The 126 jaywalkers were counted during a survey of the site one day from 7 to 8 p.m. The problem with ticketing them, the mayor said, is that the police have better ways to spend their time.

“We’ve got one of the lowest crime rates around because our police officers are out patrolling the streets rather than sitting at a corner somewhere,” Schuster said. “They’ve got other things to do rather than watch jaywalkers.”

That light was installed, he said, after a number of pedestrians complained that they couldn’t get across the street at that point.

They could, of course, walk the 50 or so yards to the nearest light but, the mayor said, “people don’t do things like that. It’s human nature; they want to continue straight across the street from one sidewalk to the other because they like walking through the greenbelt.”

The new light will be triggered only when pedestrians are waiting to cross.

You are right that no one has ever been hit there, but there have been some “awful close calls,” Schuster said.

“Nobody has ever sued us,” the mayor said. “But why not take care of it before it happens?”

*

Dear Street Smart:

Is there someone who can switch off an onramp signal? One in particular is the Camino las Ramblas onramp to northbound Interstate 5, designed to be a high-speed onramp to join the flowing traffic. Now we have a high-speed stop sign.

Another example is the southbound Costa Mesa Freeway at Edinger Avenue. As you round the curve and gain speed, there’s the stoplight. Being a driver, I could point out many more examples.

David Flanagan

Capistrano Beach

*

The short answer is, yes, there are people who can switch off onramp signals, but not very easily. The long answer is why they don’t want to.

There are two types of metered signals on Orange County freeway onramps, both designed to evenly space merging traffic. The first type is timed according to the average traffic flow at a given point on the freeway as determined by traffic surveys. The second is timed according to the actual flow of traffic as measured by electronic sensors embedded in the pavement.

Both of the onramps you mention are the second type and do an excellent job, Caltrans spokeswoman Pam Gorniak said.

“People should know that they’re coming onto a metered ramp because of the warning sign and should be slowing down,” she said. “There’s other traffic to contend with. It’s a safety issue; we’re not turning it off for him.”