Regional Transit Study Puts O.C. Projects at Risk

A third of all county road projects, including plans to widen the Garden Grove Freeway and build a light-rail system, are threatened under a regional transportation study unveiled Monday.

The draft report, prepared by the staff of the Southern California Assn. of Governments, leaves dozens of key Orange County transportation projects off its long-range plan. If the SCAG executive board approves the plan in its present form, the projects will lose funding and either be abandoned or face long delays. Instead, the report favors a new freeway to Riverside County, to be built through the Santa Ana Mountains in South County.

Alarmed county officials on Monday demanded that the SCAG master plan incorporate the jeopardized projects, which also include the Moulton Parkway “smart street,” improvements to the interchange of the San Diego and Corona del Mar freeways, several North County railroad grade separations and plans to build a rail and bus center at El Toro Marine Corps Air Station.

“It would be a disaster for transportation in Orange County,” said Supervisor Charles V. Smith. “These projects are done in a coordinated and scheduled way. If you take away a piece of the puzzle, the whole thing crumbles.”

The latest report caps a history of acrimony between the county and the regional agency. Although SCAG previously had approved a larger measure of local projects, Orange County officials long have chafed at the agency’s power over county transportation improvements and complained that it continually favored Los Angeles County over its neighbor to the south. Several years ago, the county clashed with SCAG over the widening of the Santa Ana Freeway, because while the county was widening the aged road up to the Los Angeles County border, no regional plans had been made to widen it farther north.

In 1989, the Orange County Board of Supervisors voted to withhold dues from SCAG for a year over a dispute concerning the agency’s growth projections. In 1992, the county supported unsuccessful state legislation that would have allowed counties to secede from SCAG.

SCAG officials on Monday stressed that the report is only preliminary and will be fine-tuned based on response from government agencies.

They also note that their report includes two-thirds of the county’s projects, most notably the Santa Ana Freeway widening through Anaheim. The report calls for more studies into toll lanes on some existing freeways, an idea Orange County is also examining.

But SCAG planners also defended their proposal as an effective way to improve traffic flow between counties, especially between Orange and Riverside counties.

“We have to look at where the demand is the greatest,” said Bill Huddy, a SCAG senior planner. “If we see housing growth patterns continue in Riverside County and the job growth patterns continue in Orange County, we are going to have to do something. The 91 Freeway is already impacted, and the Ortega Highway is not a good alternative.”

The so-called Cajalco Corridor supported by SCAG calls for tunneling through a portion of the Cleveland National Forest, eventually connecting the Foothill Transportation Corridor in Orange County with Interstate 215 in Riverside County.

Stan Oftelie, chief executive officer of the Orange County Transportation Authority, said his agency and the county studied the Cajalco tunnel concept in 1990 and found it prohibitively expensive and environmentally unsound.

“You don’t build freeways through a national forest,” Oftelie said. “We don’t see any support of that.”

SCAG estimates the project would cost at least $1.3 billion, but county officials said the price tag would run much higher. At Monday’s OCTA meeting, several board members expressed concerns about how a tunnel under the Santa Ana Mountains would fare during a major earthquake.

SCAG is a regional planning agency comprising government officials from Southern California’s six counties.

Its regional transportation study is a 20-year blueprint of area projects required by state and federal law. Projects not included in the final plan, which SCAG is empowered to perform, cannot be built with state or federal funds--even if local governments already have the money in hand.

The OCTA board voted Monday to oppose several elements of the SCAG staff proposal, including a suggestion that motorists be charged a 2-cents-per-mile tax beginning in 2012, determined by annual odometer checks.

Supervisor Jim Silva described the tax as “farfetched” and “wrong.” He also expressed concerns about an association of officials from six counties making decisions about Orange County’s transportation projects.

“A majority of people on this board aren’t from Orange County,” he said. “Orange County projects are not their priority.”

Ronald Bates, a Los Alamitos councilman and head of SCAG’s transportation committee, said some local officials are overreacting to the draft report, which was designed simply to “prompt discussion and determine the best plan” for the region.

“We are trying to facilitate a dialogue,” he said. “This is just the beginning of the process. . . . We will see a lot of changes before it is finalized.”

Bates and other SCAG officials defended their emphasis on Riverside County-Orange County traffic problems, noting that the Riverside Freeway will be swamped with three times its capacity by 2020.

He also insisted that the Cajalco tunnel is feasible. “You never say never. There is always a possibility,” Bates said. “Some people thought the San Joaquin Hills Transportation Corridor would never be built, but it was.”

The county projects now in jeopardy are designed to smooth traffic flow across the county. The grade separations, for example, would elevate Orangethorpe Avenue and Imperial Highway above rail tracks, where increased freight train activity is causing gridlock.

The 22 Freeway widening includes building carpool lanes.