Ortega Widening: Damn The NIMBYs - Full Speed Ahead!
Posted by: Jubal | 07/16/2007 1:50 PM
Reading this article -- "Debate Swirls Around Ortega Widening Plan" -- in today's OC Register reminds me there are certain strains of NIMBYism resistant to even the largest doses of reality.
The situation is pretty basic: Ortega is needs to be widened from two to four lanes in order to safely accommodate increased traffic.
And traffic will increase: from 24,000 vehicles per day now to an predicted 42,000 per day in 2030.
Not such inexorable numbers deter those who are opposing the widening. They're stance is nostalgia-based: they like Ortega Highway just the way it is, and don't want it to become a thoroughfare.
That's a nice sentiment, but you can't based transportation planning on it. It would be like fighting the Interstate Highway System in the 1950s because Route 66 is cool and shouldn't be changed no matter how inadequate it became.
The Ortega Highway, I its present condition, is inadequate to our present needs. We can't wish increased vehicle traffic away. The right thing is to build for it as far ahead of time as possible, in order to accommodate the increases as they occur rather than playing catch-up.
Mr. Ayer registered as a Republican to be electable in an interim election with no incumbents. He did...
That's what's wrong with folks who express opinions based on what they read, rather than what they know. Folks in SJC do not want Ortega "left the way it is" as you say, Jubal - they just want a full environmental study and a project that doesn't leave another freeway through the middle of a town that cares enough about its open space and rural feel that they taxed themselves to pay for it.
Funny how no-growthers and NIMBYs never want to stop anything -- they only want "full environmental reviews."
And once the "full environmental review" is done, they denounce it as flawed and demand another EIR.
And so on and so on.
Oh, you're right. We should never study the impact of anything. Read the report here: 110 mature trees removed in less than two miles; sound and retaining walls up to 25 feet along the road, speed limit increased to 55 mph.
Naw, no need to study that. It will fit into the rural town just fine!
San Juan Cappo is now reaping what it sowed. It voted against El Toro Airport. Now all that cargo from OC has to go out to March Air Force Base in Riverside instead. BTW, The Irvine Co. opposes the tunnel through the mountains. Looks like SJC is stuck with a new freeway. Ouch!
So you're saying it's truck traffic heading over Ortega Highway to Lake Elsinore using the road because El Toro Airport didn't get built?
Really? That's your argument?
More like there's plenty of jobs on this side of the mountains, and people (my son-in-law included) in Temecula, Murrieta, etc travel here for those jobs while the available, affordable housing is on the other side.
The cargo trucks (DHL et al)have to get out to March from OC somehow. Since The Irvine Co. will fight the tunnel, lest their cookie cutter homes would no longer be a monopoly for the Inland Empire workers, then it comes to Ortega Highway. Now were El Toro open for business, then the cargo trucks would not need a way to get to March, they would just be using the existing infrastructure without disrupting SJC.
It would be great to know where the candidates for the 71st stand on this issue.
Hey Phil- look on a map, SJC isn't in the 71st.
I got it..don't build it and they won't come! That'll work! Oh, wait, there are thousands of homes being built to the east of the I-5/Ortega an nary a place for them to travel east/west nor hardly north/south. Well. let's hunker down in NIMBYville and hope for the best.
Jubal is right on and I look forward to the groudbreaking event.
I got it..don't build it and they won't come! That'll work! Oh, wait, there are thousands of homes being built to the east of the I-5/Ortega an nary a place for them to travel east/west nor hardly north/south. Well. let's hunker down in NIMBYville and hope for the best.
Jubal is right on and I look forward to the groudbreaking event.
Poetic,
You obviously have never driven the Ortega to Lake Elsinore.
Large trucks don't. I'm not sure they can.
Large trucks (especially DHL) will be able to go to Elsinore just fine once this project is completed! The NIMBYs said use March, not El Toro. So your wish is now granted.
San Juan Capistrano (SJC) may be engaging in nimby-ism, but it's highly profitable economically rational nimby-ism.
Here, let me break this down for you.
Why are people willing to pay more for a house in SJC than in Elsinore? Two reasons: proximity to jobs, and "niceness."
However, that is really one reason: the folks who get the better paying jobs are more able to pay for "niceness," whatever that is, and bid up the price of the nice stuff so that the lower paid have to live somewhere else. One sees this dynamic in Irvine, originally a "bedroom community," but now a job hub that imports 200,000 employees every day to work for bosses who live in Turtle Rock, Shady Canyon, and Newport Beach.
So the question for SJC obvious: how to increase number of highly-paid folks living in SJC given that geographic growth isn't possible for SJC.
The answer is obvious: get "nicer." Now ask yourself: which is more likely to be considered "nicer" by a Realtor:
"110 mature trees in less than two miles"
or
"a sound and retaining walls up to 25 feet along the road, speed limit increased to 55 mph."
Is it any wonder anyone with a property stake in SJC and half a brain would oppose a wanton widening of the "niceness" treasure that is Ortega Highway?
Could someone please expand on why Irvine Corp is opposing the tunnel?
Assuming the economics work, it would be a huge win: move the traffic *and* keep the "niceness."
Repeat after me:
"Tunnels are cool. Tunnels are cool. Tunnels are cool."
See, that wasn't so hard 8)
Gee, tyler, I dunno. I'd sure hate to be 8 miles in when the Big One hits.
RP: What evidence do you have that the tunnel would be seismologically unsound?
None. But I'd still hate to be in it when the Big One hits.
There will be a main tunnel, a water conduit, and who knows how many ventilation shafts. The Santa Ana Mountains are riddled with faults. I would naturally prefer to be above ground. You know - just in case.
Red,
you do realize that command centers meant to survive earthquakes are placed deep underground?
The difficulty that faults pose for tunnels are due to the poor quality of the rock in fault zones. The direct seismic risk is pretty much nil. The waves pass through you, but don't do much. Sort of like a tsunami: being in th open ocean isn't a big deal, the problem is when the wave hits an interface ( the shore for a tsunami, the surface for a seismic wave).
Now say it with me, Red,
"Tunnels are cool. Tunnels are Cool. Tunnels are cool"
Okay tyler (since you seeem to believe that faults don't slip and don't divert seismic energy - not to mention conducting ground water and gasses) you go through first...saying "tunnels are cool."
See, you got me to say it!