Did you know that Long Beach has five (5) freeways cutting through its neighborhoods? What a significant price to pay in the name of transportation and progress. It’s too late now, of course, to change what has already been done to our city but we certainly can look for better ways to deal with and control congestion on these roadways, especially when it comes to the movement of all forms of consumer goods. One freeway in particular tops the list of roadways declared the most dangerous and deserving immediate attention. It’s the Interstate 710, commonly known as the Long Beach Freeway. Built in the early 1950’s, it never was designed to meet the demands now being placed on it with the massive expansion of the two ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach. Thousands of trucks go in and out of these ports daily and, for the most part, have no choice but to use the I-710, turning this freeway into a veritable no man’s land for the passenger vehicle if you have any sense of safety for yourself, family and friends.
Most all of the dialogue seems to exclusively point to the Ports of Long Beach and LA as the biggest polluters, but there is plenty of blame to go around. We now know that port growth and shipping activity are targeted as the most concentrated areas, contributing to local and regional truck traffic congestion and related poor air quality. But is just replacing foul air polluting trucks going to completely solve the regions air quality problems? The honest answer is no. The recent action of our own Port of Long Beach to aggressively pursue replacement of old, less efficient trucks with newer ones and respecting the role of the independent truckers is commendable. However, once these vehicles exit the boundaries of the port, the Interstate 710 is the roadway that leaves little choice for those truckers wanting to seek the shortest distance to transport containers to their final destinations – rail yards and distributions centers. This old freeway can’t handle the traffic and even the newer trucks traveling at the same slow speed can’t run to their optimum efficiency.
Our transportation corridors are in a shambles and when we finally commit to dealing aggressively with a comprehensive strategy to upgrade them, foul air will continue to plague the basin and getting to and from anywhere will require a whole lot of patience. Ironically, as the price of gasoline and diesel continue their upward climb, a small reduction in vehicular traffic may be the outcome, but at what cost economically?
As a former council member and Chair of Gateway Cities Council of Governments Interstate 710 Committee, the progress that we had made to work toward renewing the aged and obsolete Interstate 710 now at least has some semblance of a start with the beginning of a multi-million dollar environmental impact report. How long and what costs incurred before this report finally wins approval and then, when will the Interstate 710 make-over actually get started?
Looking beyond the port’s transportation challenges, all the new downtown development with the increasing number of new residences and cars adding to the mix has the potential of adding to the perfect storm. If you live downtown and want to get to Los Angeles, what do you do?
I suppose something is better than nothing, and getting started with the EIR for Interstate 710 took 4 years. If we want to economically survive and thrive, we have to do a better job of streamlining the process. We put a man on the moon in less time than the pace we’re going to solve the 710’s problems.