highway expansion

The Senate panel in charge of transportation spending has just released its version of the budget bill that passed the House last week, giving less to high-speed rail and more to highways than the lower chamber of Congress.

While environmentalists and smart growth advocates focus on the I-710 Tunnel Project, the one that would "complete" by closing the 4.5 mile gap between the current end of the freeway and the 210 Freeway; another massive expansion project for the I-170 is more quietly moving though environmental review.

Last week, community forums were held in Glendale and La Cañada Flintridge on the proposed project that would construct a tunnel connecting the I-710 and I-210 freeways in Pasadena.  The Glendale News Press reported, in two separate stories, that opposition to the project is as strong as ever and that Caltrans isn't happy that the opposition is speaking up now.

Trumpeting the dubious claim that the answer to regional car congestion is funding highway expansion, Orange County politicians and press are celebrating the federal government's decision to allocate $68 million in stimulus funds for the expansion of the I-91 between Riverside County and the 241 Toll Road.  As we've seen in the past, the governments claims that road widenings are good public policy go completely unchallenged in the press even as the state tries to devise no ways to battle sprawl development.

Last Friday, local media outlets participated in a rally for the Sepulveda Pass Widening Project, that would widen the I-405 to connect carpool lanes between the I-10 and I-101, with Governor Schwarzenegger, Mayor Villaraigosa and various other union and public officials.  Using an uncritical media to amplify their claims, our elected leadership promoted the largest road widening project to use stimulus funds as a Godsend to not just I-405 commuters, but also the environment, the economy and even alternative transportation.

Yesterday, the Bottleneck Blog publicly released the changes to Metro's Long Range Plan that will be voted upon by the Metro Board at the end of the month.  Steve Hymon noted that there were many changes to the timelines to complete projects, and many of them weren't acceleration notices.  Below is the timeline, with various comments that were collected from around the Internet and news reports included.

Rendering of Project Produced by the Save San Onofre Coalition

The Congress for New Urbanism released a highly entertaining top ten list today: the North American highways most in need of demolition. At the top is Seattle's Alaskan Way Viaduct, a structurally damaged elevated highway that, if removed, would free up 335 acres of public land by Elliott Bay.