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Re: Astonishing cost to build 710 tunnel... Not really...by today's costs...
Author: BOB2
Date: 12-18-2019 - 08:10
Now that the 710 tunnel has been killed by the Nimby's, it's a moot point, and nobody's left that I report to, who will fire me for posting this. So, I guess it's safe to look at those numbers.
The 4.2 miles of double bore, double deck, tunnels, with 4 lanes each direction, 710 tunnel would have added approximately 33.6 new "interstate" lane miles connecting the 210-10 with 33.6 "new" lane miles, and an estimated cost of $4.5 billion dollars. Which we used for cost benefit screening. That cost per lane mile is approximately $133 million or, and carry (depending on toll rates) approximately 230,000 daily vehicle trips.
Which when you compare it to some "surface" projects, like the 105 in today's dollars, would only be about 40% higher, for the cost of doing it in a tunnel. ROW in urban areas is now a huge cost.
I was once involved in a "back of the envelope" analysis, in response to issues the Wendell Cox's of the world had raised in criticism of the LA Red Line cost.
So I was with a group that was tasked to do a "quick and dirty" estimate of the freeway lane capacity that would necessary to duplicate the peak capacity of the Red Line/Purple Line out the Wilshire corridor.
And, it turned out to be the equivalent of a 14-16 lane facility, 7-8 lanes each way.
Then we did a "quick and dirty" (no ramp property acquisition, just really the lanes+ only an arbitrary space of about 30 feet, if I recall right, on each side for berm or cut) estimate of how much ROW we'd need, and I can't remember the number of acres or parcels but it was large.
I had a colleague who like to note, though I've never confirmed, that the land area of the Four Level interchange in Downtown LA, took up more land area than the Old Medieval City Center of Florence Italy. But, freeways, as all of us Boomers who remember the vast swaths of LA cleared in the 60's will remember, take a lot of land.
And then, we did a "quick and dirty" estimate the ROW costs (this was back in the early 90's when real estate in LA was a lot cheaper), and ROW costs for going from Downtown LA to the Westside were estimated to be between $4 and $6 billion.
And, we would have ended up with 7 more lanes in each direction that would look exactly like the Santa Monica Freeway, all gridlocked 12 hours a day, running at 40% below design flow rate...
We built the Subway, and not the 14 lane freeway, that would have taken all of that land and "nuked" those neighborhoods.
And now, for another five or 6 billion, we will finally finish the subway to UCLA.
The 4.2 miles of double bore, double deck, tunnels, with 4 lanes each direction, 710 tunnel would have added approximately 33.6 new "interstate" lane miles connecting the 210-10 with 33.6 "new" lane miles, and an estimated cost of $4.5 billion dollars. Which we used for cost benefit screening. That cost per lane mile is approximately $133 million or, and carry (depending on toll rates) approximately 230,000 daily vehicle trips.
Which when you compare it to some "surface" projects, like the 105 in today's dollars, would only be about 40% higher, for the cost of doing it in a tunnel. ROW in urban areas is now a huge cost.
I was once involved in a "back of the envelope" analysis, in response to issues the Wendell Cox's of the world had raised in criticism of the LA Red Line cost.
So I was with a group that was tasked to do a "quick and dirty" estimate of the freeway lane capacity that would necessary to duplicate the peak capacity of the Red Line/Purple Line out the Wilshire corridor.
And, it turned out to be the equivalent of a 14-16 lane facility, 7-8 lanes each way.
Then we did a "quick and dirty" (no ramp property acquisition, just really the lanes+ only an arbitrary space of about 30 feet, if I recall right, on each side for berm or cut) estimate of how much ROW we'd need, and I can't remember the number of acres or parcels but it was large.
I had a colleague who like to note, though I've never confirmed, that the land area of the Four Level interchange in Downtown LA, took up more land area than the Old Medieval City Center of Florence Italy. But, freeways, as all of us Boomers who remember the vast swaths of LA cleared in the 60's will remember, take a lot of land.
And then, we did a "quick and dirty" estimate the ROW costs (this was back in the early 90's when real estate in LA was a lot cheaper), and ROW costs for going from Downtown LA to the Westside were estimated to be between $4 and $6 billion.
And, we would have ended up with 7 more lanes in each direction that would look exactly like the Santa Monica Freeway, all gridlocked 12 hours a day, running at 40% below design flow rate...
We built the Subway, and not the 14 lane freeway, that would have taken all of that land and "nuked" those neighborhoods.
And now, for another five or 6 billion, we will finally finish the subway to UCLA.
