Video Cameras to Help LAX Keep Cars Moving

Curb sitters beware: Police will soon be able to see when you’re hogging scarce real estate in front of the terminals at Los Angeles International Airport. Officers will flush out loiterers using cameras installed above the double-deck roadway.

And they aren’t shy about issuing citations. Traffic officers are expected to write about 70,000 tickets this year in the airport’s crowded central terminal area for everything from illegal parking to speeding. (If one can imagine finding room to speed at LAX.)

About 120 officers patrol the U-shaped roadway as part of a traffic unit created by the airport three years ago. The cameras and the officers are part of a $6-million effort to ease the LAX traffic crunch.

Those are a few of the myriad changes city officials are pursuing to move traffic through the overcrowded airport. A new traffic operations center will control airport signals, an agreement with shuttle services will limit the number of times vans can circle the airport and a system will count and display on electronic signs the number of parking spaces left in each structure.

The task of moving vehicles around the airport is a daunting one. On an average day, about 100,000 cars circle the central terminal’s horseshoe--a number equivalent to the population of Berkeley. During holidays, this figure jumps to about 120,000 vehicles per day--the number of people who call Topeka, Kan., home.

With the passenger load at LAX expected to grow about 3% a year, it’s unlikely that the challenges will wane. Traffic managers say the most they can do is help the huge volume of cars move more efficiently.

The traffic operations center, slated to open this month, is designed to do just that. The unit, hidden in a nondescript office building on the airport’s west side, has six computer terminals and a large video screen on the wall.

“The center was constructed to improve traffic flow,” said Patrick Tomcheck, a transportation engineer with Los Angeles World Airports, the city agency that operates LAX. “There’s no doubt we will be able to move traffic more efficiently, so there will be fewer delays and less pollution and noise.”

The $1.8-million center was constructed through a partnership between the airport agency and the Los Angeles Department of Transportation.

The center’s computer terminals will provide employees with a bird’s-eye view of traffic hot spots using 13 cameras perched strategically around the central terminal area. Several of these cameras are grouped at the airport’s entrance, with others placed around the horseshoe. They can zoom in on traffic on both the upper and lower decks.

They can also pan out and look at traffic at busy locations nearby, such as the San Diego Freeway, Century Boulevard, Sepulveda Boulevard and the Century Freeway. Airport police will use one computer workstation to search for situations that worsen congestion at LAX.

Disc jockeys on the airport’s radio station will use the video wall--which offers views from any combination of the 13 cameras--to provide detailed traffic reports. The station is at 530 on the AM dial. These reports will air during the morning and afternoon rush hours and also from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., the busiest part of the day at LAX.

The new operations center will not only be open longer than the 12 hours a day provided by the current facility downtown, but will place technicians at the airport, give them more information to work with and allow them to override traffic signal operations that will be routinely run by a computer system linked to roadway sensors.

Airport operators also plan to install a system that will help improve the flow of traffic into parking garages. Again using sensors, this time at garage entrances and exits, the system will count traffic. It will then post the number of available parking spaces on electronic signs at each garage’s entrance. This feature is expected to begin operation in 2003.

And next year, travelers will be able to see pictures of traffic on the double-deck roadway by visiting the Los Angeles World Airports’ Web site, where the images will be delivered by two cameras installed above the horseshoe.

Such technological innovations have a proven history of reducing jam-ups elsewhere in the city. A recent evaluation of the 17-year-old system that controls about 3,000 signals at busy intersections in Los Angeles shows it reduces travel time, delays and fuel consumption, said Verej Janoyan, senior engineer for the city transportation agency.

“I don’t want anyone to believe that this is the magic bullet that’s going to solve everything,” Janoyan said. “It’s just a tool to help.”

Airport officials say the best way to reduce traffic in the central terminal area over the long term is through improvements in the controversial $12-billion master plan. These measures include adding a road around the perimeter of LAX, extending the Metro Rail Green Line to the airport and improving roads in nearby communities.

But in the short term, passengers will have to rely on the ongoing three-year traffic plan, which will:

* Increase the number of short-term parking spots in the central terminal area to encourage commuters to stay off the curb. Traffic engineers posted two-hour time limits on parking in the first and third levels of most parking structures at LAX. They raised the rate for long-term parking at these garages from $15 to $24 a day and encouraged travelers to park in lots B and C, farther from the airport.

* Reallocate curb space and revise signs posted on the busy lower deck, where shuttle buses jockey with private vehicles to pick up arriving passengers.

* Reduce the number of times rental car buses and vans for hotels and off-airport parking lots are permitted to circle the central terminal area. Rental car buses alone will reduce their trips by 10%.

These measures have already helped reduce traffic congestion during peak hours, said Michael DiGirolamo, deputy executive director of airport operations.

“Traffic does move here,” he said. “ You just have to give yourself a little extra time.”