Bigger freeways beget bigger traffic jams and more air pollution, as bad urban planning’s shown us time and time again. Yet freeway expansion projects still somehow manage push forward, creating more sprawl and wreaking environmental havoc.
One of these projects is the I-710 expansion project, a Caltrans effort to create a tunnel that will extend the 710 from Alhambra to connect to the 210 freeway in Pasadena. Despite the fact that the project’s been dubbed a “road to ruin” by a 2004 Friends of the Earth report, the 710 expansion proposal is “the battle that won’t go away,” according to environmental and social justice activists.
These activists are now planning an action-oriented educational conference, dubbed The 710 on Trial: Uniting our Communities. The idea is to bring together the communities that would be affected by this expansion to increase awareness about the project and its environmental justice implications in the neighborhoods that will have to deal with all the social and health problems of having a huge, smog-spewing freeway nearby.
When: Sat., Jan. 23, 2010, 9 am – 2:30 pm
Where: Mosher 1, Norris Hall of Chemistry at Occidental College, 1600 Campus Road, Los Angeles (campus map)
Cost: FREE — with, somewhat ironically, free parking — and open to the public. No RSVP required.
The day-long event features a keynote from California Assemblymember Anthony Portantino, an overview of the project, a couple panels looking at the project’s implications for health, environment, housing, and economics, and hands-on workshops. Here’s the full agenda.
Get a quick primer on what the I-710 expansion project is and how it’s proceeding at Streetsblog L.A., then head over to Oxy on Saturday. If you live, work, or play in Eagle Rock, El Sereno, Glassell Park, Glendale, Hermon, Mount Washington, Pasadena, South Pasadena, and many other neighborhoods on that side of Los Angeles county, you’ll be especially want to attend and find out what could happen to your community — and what you can do to shape it.
Image via UEPI
How does connecting the freeways cause more pollution, than people driving the streets in stop and go from exit to entrance of the non connected freeway?
Comment by Brandon Lee — January 25, 2010 @ 7:16 pm
Brandon — You’re assuming that if the freeway’s built, people will stop driving the streets. Time and again, we’ve seen this is not true. A new freeway usually means an initial drop off in traffic jams — but this doesn’t last. Soon, you have another clogged freeway — and streets that are just as clogged as before.
Comment by Siel — January 28, 2010 @ 4:36 pm
According to SCAG’s own assessment, there will be an additional 92,000 daily truck trips to and from the Ports of LA/LB that will be flooding the planned 710 Cargo Freeway and the rest of the freeways in the LA basin with their traffic. Bringing many of our freeways to an “F” grade level of congestion. All this is because the Ports are planning to quadruple in size.
This is why it is in Everyone’s best interest to convince the PORTS that they need to find other modes of transportation for their goods. Electric Freight Rail is one of the best ways to remove both traffic and pollution from our Freeways.
Instead of expanding the lower 710 to 14 lanes, with 4 separate, dedicated, truck lanes, – 2 North & 2 South, why not run grade separated electric rail lines in the lanes planned for trucks? Those rail lines could then meet up with the planned “inland port”. This would remove these 92,000 trucks and their pollution from the whole LA basin freeway system.
ALSO people should be aware that the 710 tunnel “extension” will be a TOLL road – $10 to $15 one-way (again their best assessment) and only 6 lanes wide. So a 7 lane freeway from the Ports in LA / LB that temporarily ends at the 60 freeway will be a massive bottle neck by the time the traffic on it attempts to squeeze into a 3 lane toll tunnel. People (commuter cars) will exit before the tunnel to avoid that toll and end up on the streets of Alhambra and Pasadena anyway. But the creation of this route will have drawn more cars to it who were unaware of the toll and the massive amount of slow moving cargo trucks and the steep grade they have to climb/ descend.
I say DON”T build a tunnel with a steep, dangerous “grade” for trucks or expand the lower 710 so dramatically. INSTEAD plan for the future with clean electric rail now, to be converted to Maglev in the future and make use of inland ports. Truckers would be happy with this because they stay out of costly inner-city traffic. Commuters would be happy with less traffic. The powerful Goods Movement Industry would be happy with the time/cost savings. And the consumers and the taxpayers would be happy with the lower costs.
The Freight Rail solution is the REAL Win Win solution that we are NOT being told about by these representatives (CEDILLO, ENG, CHU, TEN) who are all pushing this 710 TOLL CARGO TUNNEL concept:
Senator Gil CEDILLO (representing SD22 – LA, S. Pasadena, San Marino, Alhambra, Vernon, Maywood)
Assemblymember Mike ENG (representing AD49 – Alhambra, Monterey Park, El Monte, Rosemead, San Gabriel San Marino, South Pasadena),
Congresswoman Judy CHU (representing D32 – El Sereno, East LA, Montery Park, Rosemead, El Monte, Duarte, Azusa, Covina, West Covina, Irwindale, Balwin Park)
Councilman Mike TEN (South Pasadena)
Why are our representatives pushing the building of a freeway for CARGO and not fighting to implement the better alternatives instead? Come on CEDILLO, ENG, CHU, TEN, get on board before the train leaves the station without you!
Please think about this when you vote!
Comment by JIM — January 29, 2010 @ 8:43 am
Do you have a link to the plans that show the tunnel being a steep dangerous grade? Wasn’t the 210 extension that took 50+ years to build a worthwhile freeway?
I understand that over time the freeway can become clogged. But that might also be that suddenly more developing can happen because it’s more convenient for commuters to get from one place to another. In that regard I would rather see the area surrounding that freeway become more dense than watching the outskirt cities become more dense causing even more traffic coming from 60 miles away.
Toll roads do seem to work as it seems like people in Orange County use them.
I follow this freeway because I always see the houses that are in the way of this project in Pasadena and always wonder, what will this place look like if they do approve the project one day.
Comment by Brandon Lee — January 29, 2010 @ 12:51 pm
all i know is that suburbs suck. urban planning is the main problem.
Comment by pete — February 10, 2010 @ 9:55 pm
You mean BAD urban planning is the main problem?
Comment by Siel — February 12, 2010 @ 5:49 pm
NO, Brandon, actually toll roads are not “working” run a search on “Failed tollways, toll roads, and toll tunnels” they are going under and the taxpayers are left to absorb the losses.
Ask Australian’s if toll tunnels have worked for them, better yet, watch this video on YouTube – it is a glimpse into “future” for the neighborhoods that border the planned 710 toll-tunnel.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDyE6o8iKhM
This video is just one of many reports about the killing effects of cargo transport pollution in Melbourne and Sydney Australia (also Brisbane and Victoria).
The results of the toll tunnel are:
1. Trucks exit the tollway to avoid the tolls and use residential street as a bypass…
2. The pollution emitted from an “emission stack” from a 4 Km (2.4 miles) tunnel, which handles 90,000-100,000 cars daily makes the residents sick.“Polluted air is a contributing factor in the deaths of 1,400 people each year in Sydney aloneâ€.
Other reasons for failed tollways:
“flawed” toll cost estimates and increased congestion: Incorrect cost figures analysis based on “free” roads vs “toll” roads led to a total of “eight the toll-road PPPs that have caused losses to investors, lenders and taxpayers in the past five years.” and congestion on surrounding streets from cars not willing to pay tolls.
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/04/15/1050172596490.html
Bad contracts: “About Highway 407 in Canada” “99-year lease agreement, unlimited control of the highway and its tolls, as well as a clause protecting the corporation from any competition, not the least of which includes a ban on construction of any nearby provincial highways that may reduce toll revenue.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highway_407
and corruption: “Australia: Traffic Lights Modified to Funnel Traffic Into Toll Tunnel” Traffic lights in Sydney, Australia were modified to create gridlock forcing frustrated motorists into a controversial toll tunnel.
Comment by freeway tunnel deadly — November 7, 2010 @ 5:50 pm