Photos: When Southern California's Freeways Were New (and Empty)

http://southland.gizmodo.com/photos-when-southern-californias-freeways-were-new-an-1567410615

By Nathan Masters, April 25, 2014

 

 

The Southland's freeways hardly inspire optimism anymore. Glance at the shoulder of a slow-moving freeway and among the weeds you'll see shards of plastic and twisted metal—the accumulated detritus of a dozen high-speed crashes. They may (occasionally) be convenient, but whether it's their shabby appearance, the way they balkanize communities, or simply their soul-crushing traffic, it's hard to feel good about the freeways.

But there was a time when Southern California's freeways were new, and feelings were different. Despite local opposition to specific routes, the freeway system as a whole enjoyed widespread political support. L.A.'s infatuation with the automobile hadn't yet waned, so it was only natural for the city to embrace these new monuments to car culture. They provided an alternative to the aging electric railways and traffic-choked boulevards. They promised to improve life in the decentralized city. They represented the region's best hope for the future.

The images above and below—many of them produced for publication in the Los Angeles Times, Examiner, and Herald Express—reflect the unbound optimism of the time. Sure, the concrete is freshly poured, the landscaping is trimmed, and the shoulders are free of debris, but the photographs themselves represent a deliberate celebration of the freeway. Their composition emphasizes open pavement and gently curving lines, implying speedy and graceful travel. And in many of the images, the freeway lanes fill the frame at the expense of the surrounding landscape—a subtle but reassuring message that these superhighways have conquered the long distances of the famously sprawling region.

 

The concrete practically glistens in this 1958 photograph of the San Diego Freeway (then CA-7, now I-405), looking south at its junction with the Ventura Freeway. It's also from the USC Libraries' Examiner Collection:

Here's a newly opened section of the Hollywood Freeway (US-101) in 1958, courtesy of the USC Libraries' Los Angeles Examiner Collection:

From the Metro Transportation Library and Archive comes this 1954 photo of the Hollywood Freeway (US-101) at Vermont:

Here's the Arroyo Seco Parkway (CA-110) in 1940, courtesy of the Los Angeles Public Library's Herald-Examiner Collection:

Here's an early view of the Santa Ana Freeway (I-5) at 1st Street in Santa Ana, courtesy of the Orange County Archives:

And here's a view of the same freeway further south at El Toro in 1964, also courtesy of the Orange County Archives. That commodious median has since been converted into several additional traffic lanes:

Here's another early view of the Santa Ana Freeway at El Toro Road, also courtesy of the Orange County Archives:

In 1951 dignitaries including California's lieutenant governor celebrated the opening of the Hollywood Freeway from Silver Lake to Western (courtesy of the USC Libraries' Examiner collection):

A view of a newly opened stretch of the San Diego Freeway through the San Fernando Valley in 1958, courtesy of the USC Libraries' Examiner collection:

A view of US-101's "Downtown Slot" segment shortly after its 1951 opening, also courtesy of the Examiner collection:

Here's another shot from the Examiner Collection, showing the opening of the San Bernardino Freeway (I-10) in 1956:

Here, courtesy of the Inglewood Public Library, the mayor of Inglewood proudly stands in front of the newly completed San Diego Freeway (I-405) in 1963:

Here's the 1966 opening of the final stretch of the Santa Monica Freeway, courtesy of the Santa Monica Public Library Image Archives:

Top image: an early view of the the Santa Ana Freeway (I-5) at Bristol in Santa Ana, courtesy of the Orange County Archives.

 

Chinese experts 'in discussions' over building high-speed Beijing-US railway

'China-Russia-Canada-America line' would run for 13,000km across Siberia and pass under Bering Strait through 200km tunnel

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/may/08/chinese-experts-discussions-high-speed-beijing-american-railway

By Jonathan Kaiman, May 8, 2014






 A magnetic-levitation train leaves Shanghai. The proposed US rail line would take two days, with the train travelling at an average of 350km/h.

China is considering plans to build a high-speed railway line to the US, the country's official media reported on Thursday.

The proposed line would begin in north-east China and run up through Siberia, pass through a tunnel underneath the Pacific Ocean then cut through Alaska and Canada to reach the continental US, according to a report in the state-run Beijing Times newspaper.

Crossing the Bering Strait in between Russia and Alaska would require about 200km (125 miles) of undersea tunnel, the paper said, citing Wang Mengshu, a railway expert at the Chinese Academy of Engineering.

"Right now we're already in discussions. Russia has already been thinking about this for many years," Wang said.

The project – nicknamed the "China-Russia-Canada-America" line – would run for 13,000km, about 3,000km further than the Trans-Siberian Railway. The entire trip would take two days, with the train travelling at an average of 350km/h (220mph).

The reported plans leave ample room for skepticism. No other Chinese railway experts have come out in support of the proposed project. Whether the government has consulted Russia, the US or Canada is also unclear. The Bering Strait tunnel alone would require an unprecedented feat of engineering – it would be the world's longest undersea tunnel – four times the length of the Channel Tunnel.

According to the state-run China Daily, the tunnel technology is "already in place" and will be used to build a high-speed railway between the south-east province of Fujian and Taiwan. "The project will be funded and constructed by China," it said. "The details of this project are yet to be finalised."

The Beijing Times listed the China-US line as one of four international high-speed rail projects currently in the works. The first is a line that would run from London via Paris, Berlin, Warsaw, Kiev and Moscow, where it would split into two routes, one of which would run to China through Kazakhstan and the other through eastern Siberia. The second line would begin in the far-western Chinese city of Urumqi and then run through Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Iran and Turkey to Germany. The third would begin in the south-western city of Kunming and end in Singapore. The routes are under various stages of planning and development, the paper said.

Wang was not immediately available for comment. A man who picked up the phone at his office said he was traveling and would not respond to interview requests."

• This article was amended on Friday 9 May 2014. The project is nicknamed the "China-Russia-Canada-America" line, not the "China-Russia plus America line" as we said first. This has been corrected.

Why Air Pollution Has Always Been a Problem in L.A. (And Always Will Be)

http://southland.gizmodo.com/why-air-pollution-has-always-been-a-problem-in-l-a-an-1572151647

By Nathan Masters, May 13, 2014

 

 

 Air pollution has plagued Southern California for as long as people have been writing about the region. 

A blanket of haze hung over the land that would become Los Angeles on October 8, 1542, when Spanish sailors entered San Pedro (or perhaps Santa Monica) Bay and made the first written observations of the Southland. This early air pollution so impressed the the sailors and their captain, Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo, that they named the area "Baya de los Fumos, or "Bay of the Smokes." (The name, sadly, did not stick.)

Why Did a 1542 Spanish Voyage Refer to San Pedro Bay as the 'Bay of the Smoke'? | LA as Subject | SoCal Focus | KCET When Spanish explorers first visited the Los Angeles shore in 1542, they named the area the… Read on kcet.​org

The haze wasn't photochemical smog, of course; the internal combustion engine and modern industrial factories were still centuries away. Rather, it was smoke emanating from the dozens of Tongva Indian villages that dotted the coastal plain and inland valleys, rising in wispy columns only to flatten out against an invisible ceiling. 

That invisible ceiling was formed by a persistent meteorological phenomenon that continues to threaten Angelenos' lungs: temperature inversion.

A product of the Southland's topography and its prevailing weather patterns, the inversion layer forms when ocean breezes draw cool marine air onshore beneath a mass of warmer air above. Held in place by the mountains that shelter Los Angeles on the north and east, the cool air then stabilizes, unable to rise through the warm air above.

In essence, the inversion layer acts as an atmospheric lid, trapping whatever pollutants—whether automobile exhaust fumes or smoke particulates—happen to rise from the ground below. On average, an inversion ceiling hovers over Los Angeles 260 days a year. (It's also responsible for the city's "June Gloom" marine layer.)

Short of building giant fans to blow the stagnant air over the mountains and into the desert, there's little the Southland can do to disrupt its natural inversion layer. But the region can control the pollutants it pours into the atmosphere. In recent decades, Southern California has made huge strides toward keeping its air clean. Between 1976 and 1980, for example, the South Coast Air Basin recorded an average of 112 stage 1 ozone alerts per year. It hasn't experienced one since 2003.

Another way to illustrate the change—in 1966, this was apparently an acceptable way to drive through Los Angeles:

Describing what LA currently has as "Smog" really doesn't give people now an idea of what LA smog was like when I was growing up in the 60s. It was like Beijing is now. You have to go way inland to get anything even remotely resembling 60s smog. 

What you get now is slightly tinted water vaper. We had "smog alerts" when I was a kid, where breathing LA air felt like breathing mustard gas. It burned your eyes, it burned your nose, and it especially burned your lungs.

Cleaning up LA's air did come at a cost though. It de-industrialized the area. All of the major employers in South Central LA and the industrial areas to the east pulled up stakes and moved, deepening entrenched poverty in the area. There are plenty of states who don't give a crap about the health of their population, as long as the politicians get bribed through campaign financing. And if they can't find a state that will let them poison their own people, they'll find a whole country that will.

L.A. looking to spend billions to improve traffic

http://www.losangelesregister.com/articles/line-599294-metro-bus.html

By Jordan Graham, May 13, 2014

The way in which people travel to, from and around the San Fernando Valley will significantly transform over the next three decades.

The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority and other agencies are set to pour billions of dollars into beefing up bus and rail lines, freeways and bikeways. The result will better link Valley residents to each other and connect L.A.’s northernmost regions with the rest of the city.








This is a glimpse into the future of transportation to and from the Valley:

1. A Valley-to-Westside bus line that uses I-405’s carpool or shoulder lanes

Projected completion date: One option could launch between June and year’s end. Other options would take more time.

Why it’s needed: It can take an hour to drive from Sherman Oaks to Santa Monica during rush-hour traffic and more than two hours via public transportation. In 2010, the U.S. Department of Transportation listed I-405 as the busiest urban highway in America and the third-most congested. The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority said traffic is expected to increase from its current volume of 331,000 vehicles per day to 430,000 by 2030.

The proposal: Next month, the last leg of I-405’s northbound carpool lane is set to open, marking the completion of a five-year, $1.1 billion Metro project that created high-occupancy vehicle lanes in both directions between I-10 and the 101. Now, Metro is eyeing a way for buses to take advantage of that new space.

 County Supervisor and Metro board member Zev Yaroslavsky recently asked the board to study the possibility of launching bus line 788 – a peak-hour express bus that would run from Panorama City, south on Van Nuys Boulevard, then travel west, parallel to the Orange Line, before running nonstop on I-405 to Westwood.

But those buses would still enter the freeway using regular on-ramps and operate in mixed traffic with motorists. If the carpool lanes and ramps also are congested, bus 788 would be stuck, as well. That’s why Metro also is considering a plan that calls for the agency to build direct-access ramps for buses, which would provide direct access to bus-only lanes. A second plan would allow buses to use freeway shoulder lanes during peak hours.

Funding: Nothing has been budgeted for a new bus line to launch in 2014.

What’s next: Yaroslavsky asked the board to report on its findings about bus line 788 at the board’s May 22 meeting.

2. A tunnel under the Santa Monica Mountains

Projected completion date: Metro’s long-range plan lists the opening year as 2039 because funding for the project won’t be available for at least another 14 years. But if the agency partners with private companies to build the tunnel, the project could be completed much sooner.

Why it’s needed: The Santa Monica Mountains are without a doubt the greatest impediment to fluid travel from the San Fernando Valley to the L.A. Basin, with only a few passes and canyons slitting through the divide. As the Valley population continues to grow, improvements to public transportation on and along I-405 likely won’t provide enough options for those crossing the hills.


The proposal: Three of the options Metro has proposed to improve travel from the Valley to the rest of the city rely on a tunnel. The proposals include:

• Constructing an 11-mile tolled tunnel for buses and automobiles that would run from the 101 to Santa Monica Boulevard.

• Creating a 6-mile tunnel that would provide a path through the mountains for a new 28-mile light- or heavy-rail line that would connect the Sylmar Metrolink Station to a future Crenshaw/LAX Line station near LAX.

• Building two tunnels: a 21-mile tolled highway tunnel with multiple access points from Roscoe Boulevard to near LAX and another 21-mile tunnel for a private rail shuttle with five stations from Van Nuys to LAX.

Funding: Metro has budgeted $2.47 billion to improve traffic flow through the Sepulveda Pass, but the agency estimated that the most basic tunnel option would cost at least $10 billion.

One way to make up the difference would be for Metro to partner with one or more private companies that would help construct the tunnel in exchange for a cut of toll revenue or the rights to operate a private rail shuttle. Metro has discussed the possibility with several privately owned companies.

Another option would be for voters to approve another L.A. County sales tax similar to Measure R. In March, local transportation advocacy group Move LA proposed Measure R2, another half-cent sales-tax increase that the group estimated would raise $90 billion over 40 years and help pay for the tunnel.

What’s next: Metro plans to conduct a survey to determine how much drivers would be willing to pay to use a tolled highway through the mountains.

3. A rail line, bus lane or tram on Van Nuys Boulevard

Projected completion date: 2018, according to Metro’s Long Range Transportation Plan. But if the agency opts to build a light rail line instead of a bus-rapid transit system, the opening date could be delayed to sometime between 2020 and 2030.

Why it’s needed: Of the 460,000 people who live in the East San Fernando Valley Corridor (a term coined by Metro to describe an area lying roughly between I-405 and Fulton Avenue from Sherman Oaks to the city of San Fernando), 35 percent depend on public transportation. The stretch is the seventh-busiest bus corridor in the Metro system and has the second-highest number of bus boardings of any region in the Valley, behind only the Orange Line.

The proposal: Van Nuys Boulevard is one of the widest streets in the Valley because, during the first half of the 20th century, Pacific Electric operated an electric train that ran on the street’s median until the service ended in 1952. Metro aims to create a similar system; in October, the agency proposed five mass-transit options for the corridor, which included bus-only lanes, a light-rail line or a tram that would run either curbside or in the median from Sylmar to Ventura Boulevard.

Each transit option has various pros and cons. A bus line could have twice as many stops in the corridor as other options but would travel at a lower speed and have less capacity. A light-rail system would run the fastest and hold the most passengers but would be expensive and have fewer stops. A tram could operate in lanes with cars and would have a high rider capacity, but Metro has no experience with this mode of transit.

All options would take lanes away from motorists and remove parking spots, and local businesses and neighborhood groups have voiced concern that the projects could further congest roads, make it difficult for emergency vehicles to travel the boulevard, and take away business from the area. Metro has countered that the dedicated mass-transit lanes would be able to carry more people through the area than cars could.

Funding: Metro’s plan budgets $170 million for the project, but early cost estimates ranged from $250 million to more than $2 billion. Metro has said it could pursue other funding sources, depending on which option it chooses.

 What’s next: Metro is creating an environmental impact report that examines several of the options and is expected to be available for public review this summer.

Unfunded, unplanned or unlikely options 

4. The “Valley U” Proposal: A 5-mile stretch of Ventura Boulevard sits between the southern ends of the 741 and 761 bus lines. The “Valley U” line would fill this gap and provide more access to Ventura Boulevard by creating a seven-day-a-week, U-shaped bus line that ran from Northridge down to Sherman Oaks and back up to Pacoima. This line could also include service to Westwood.

5. The bullet train: California plans to build a $68 billion high-speed rail system from San Francisco to Anaheim, and the California High-Speed Rail Authority has proposed three potential stops in the San Fernando Valley – in the cities of San Fernando, Pacoima and Burbank. The plan calls for the 520-mile line to be completed in 2029, with a train capable of transporting passengers from L.A. to San Francisco in less than three hours. But an ongoing court case and proposed legislation threaten the state’s ability to use money from the $10 billion bond measure California voters passed in 2008, and politicians have proposed everything from proposed public-private partnerships to emissions trading credit income to fund the project.

6. Bob Hope connections: Metro’s 2009 Long Range Transportation Plan is more than a document that simply plots the future of Los Angeles County rapid transit; it also is a wish list for transportation projects Metro and county municipalities would like to see completed, regardless of whether they can be funded. One such proposal is a rail line or dedicated bus lane that would connect North Hollywood to Burbank’s Bob Hope Airport.

 7. Switching the Orange Line to a rail system: The Orange Line bus right-of-way runs along the route once traveled by the Southern Pacific Railroad’s former Burbank Branch freight line. Though the path is a former railway, Metro never had the opportunity to build a light-rail system because California law forbade it on that corridor. But with the success and high ridership of the Orange Line, state Assemblyman Adrin Nazarian, D-Sherman Oaks, sponsored legislation that would allow a rail line to be built on the route.

More bike lanes 

The Los Angeles Department of City Planning’s second-year bike lane implementation plan calls for two new Valley bike lanes: a 1.4-mile lane to be built along Woodman Avenue from Roscoe Boulevard to Sherman Way and an 8.4-mile lane to be built along Parthenia Street from Topanga Canyon Boulevard to Kester Street. At least 15 additional bike paths are planned or envisioned for the Valley.