Freeway Operations, the forgotten warriors......

Poor mouse, is this the harbinger of yet another vast conspiracy he's uncovered......? Do bears really go doo-doo in the woods, or are there really secret porta potties hidden in the woods, that they share with Sasquatch?

We effectively stopped building freeways in the late 70's, we finished a small handful of lane miles with the I-105, we added about 5% more "lane miles" of net freeway capacity with the HOV system in our LA urban region. San Diego is nearly there, too, "stretching" the ROW envelope with toll/HOV lanes. Meanwhile, because it sucks here sooooo terribly much, CA has added about 40% more folks, over the last 30 years, making 40% more trips, on that 7% "larger" freeway system......

CA apparently "sucks" so much, that ..... "nobody goes there anymore, it's too crowded....".

I worked on the original HOV Plan, I watched the I-110 skyway and the 105 break the budget, and put all regional highway projects basically under the County Transportation Commissions (and, ultimately, the "nimby's"), I watched the 710 tunnel, which could be easily financed with tolls, destroyed by raving morons screaming about the millions of deaths from Valley fever, and tunnel troll unleashed like a zombie apocalypse...... A toll to pay for a tunnel, which wouldn't destroy the Nimby neighborhoods (gridlocked today) to save 25 extra miles on a trip from Pasadena to Orange County, each way.....

We are lucky to be finally building he High Desert Corridor, which can at least get some trucks around LA. And, we now hear murmurs of added lanes here and there, and of these toll lanes her and there. But, we continue to attract more people, and drive up housing prices, because it sucks so much here.

This problem of "we have met the enemy and he is us....", because CA sucks so much, is just one of the reasons for more of those stupid cost effective and more affordable middle distance CA rail passenger corridors, which generate a lot more short and intermediate distance trips, that can be captured by rail. If folks are unwilling to pave some serious highway lane miles (very prohibitively costly), or build an effective first world rail system (not the fiasco sucking up money in the Valley), then you're going to see more traffic on a very limited road network, that will see much greater congestion.