Hearings on Express Lanes Sale Could Be . . .

For lawmakers examining the proposed sale of the private 91 Express toll lanes, the most important question at today’s legislative hearing may be this: Did the director of Caltrans sacrifice commuters’ safety to benefit a private business?

Caltrans had planned to widen the Riverside Freeway near the private toll lanes to correct what it first described as a “severe” safety situation on the road.

But faced with a $100-million breach-of-contract lawsuit filed by the toll lanes operator, Caltrans Director Jose Medina delayed plans to do major improvements on the heavily congested road for at least 15 years.

Lawmakers say they want to know why it happened, particularly in light of Medina’s decision two days after settling the suit to approve the transfer of the private road to a nonprofit group of businessmen.

“It appears that Mr. Medina took it upon himself to go farther than what the state intended and has deliberately endangered public safety to benefit the toll road operators,” said Assemblyman Tom Torlakson (D-Antioch).

Medina plans to defend his actions at today’s joint hearing in Sacramento, saying his role approving the transfer of the toll lanes from the California Private Transportation Co. to a group called NewTrac was simply a “ministerial act” that included a review of the company’s application as well as supporting letters from Riverside and Orange County transportation boards.

“Nothing in the agreement allows me or any other state official, for that matter, to become involved in the sale transaction,” Medina wrote in the Jan. 10 letter to state Sen. Betty Karnette (D-Long Beach), chairwoman of the Senate Transportation Committee.

Medina did not address why he agreed to settle the suit and thus delay safety improvements.

Caltrans engineers had hoped that adding two westbound lanes and one eastbound lane along the heavily congested stretch that spans the border of Orange and Riverside counties would cut down on what they described as dangerous merging in the area.

Whether the six-mile section Caltrans planned to improve is dangerous depends on who is doing the talking.

With more than 220,000 commuters using the stretch, one Riverside County politician calls the narrow section “bumper cars” for adults.

Caltrans internal documents released recently show a significant spike in the accident rate along three sections of roadway slated to be improved--in one case as much as 183% higher since the opening of the toll lanes in late 1995.

The problem spots are at junctures where a large number of motorists are forced to merge to and from the toll or carpool lanes within a short distance.

But operators of the 91 Express Lanes have cried foul about the use of those statistics, saying Caltrans skewed the data by purposefully leaving out sections where the accident rate was lower than expected. The toll lane operators say accident rates are lower than expected in all but one westbound section of the 91 in Riverside County.

Accident rates are based on the number of crashes that can be expected on any given highway per 100 million vehicle miles traveled.

A Times analysis shows that the number of serious accidents has increased along nearly every segment of the six miles of the Riverside Freeway where Caltrans planned to add lanes.

In a section of the freeway near the county border where the work was planned, injury accidents more than doubled from 1995--the year before the toll lanes opened--to 1996, the first year of operation.

Commuters say they don’t need statistics. Their anecdotal experience tells them their daily trip from their homes in the Inland Empire to jobs in Orange and Los Angeles counties is abysmal.

“You’re looking at 15 mph on a good day with people desperate to cut in and out,” said Rich Ackerman, a Corona resident and attorney who has sued the toll lanes group over conditions on the freeway. “Every time I think about it, I get mad. I think there’s a gross disregard for the quality of life for the citizens of Corona and the surrounding communities.”

Legislators hope today’s hearing will be a step toward the first comprehensive review of the now nearly 11-year-old law, AB680, that made private road building possible on California highways.

Some hard questions lawmakers plan to ask may go to the heart of what role, if any, private roads should play in the state.

Transportation committee members say they hope to find out why Caltrans officials turned a blind eye to what seemed to some a sweetheart deal that would have given the private operators of the money-losing lanes up to $90 million in profit.

They also plan to raise the noncompetition agreements the state entered into with private road builders as well as the Orange County toll roads agencies. Such agreements cover two-thirds of Orange County, where Caltrans is under strict limitations when it comes to expanding state highways.

Some high-ranking state officials, including state Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer, say the noncompetition clauses were too high a price to pay.

The operators of the 91 Express Lanes, however, say they believe private road building still has an important place in the future of California’s highway system.

“Personally, I don’t believe the state can do it alone and I think the public will only bear so much taxation,” said Greg Hulsizer, general manager of California Private Transportation Co. in remarks prepared for the hearing.

Hulsizer added that the company’s Dec. 13 decision to withdraw the proposed sale to NewTrac “remains a source of disappointment and frustration to CPTC and its investors.”

Meanwhile, Orange County Transportation Authority staff members reversed their earlier position and will send their external affairs director, Bill Hodge, to Sacramento to attend today’s hearing. The agency had said its officials had nothing to contribute, but legislators were angry that Orange County transportation officials had declined the invitation.

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Updates on today’s legislative hearing will be posted on the Times Web site, https://www.latimesoc.com.

Times staff writer Meg James contributed to this report.

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Crossing Paths

Weaving traffic abounds on the Riverside Freeway near the county line and the Eastern Toll Road. A look at maneuvering on the westbound side of the freeway: