FACTS About the 710 Freeway

The 710 Freeway Brings More Traffic to Pasadena

• According to the EIR, the 710 Extension will attract an additional 109,000 daily through-county trips originating from outside the San Gabriel Valley.

• Caltrans' purpose in building the freeway is to "balance the regional freeway network". In Caltrans-speak, that means they plan to shift traffic off of other freeways to the 710 through Pasadena, 20 percent of the traffic (50,000 cars daily) off the I-5 Freeway alone. Despite propaganda from freeway proponents, Caltrans is not in the business of reducing traffic on neighborhood streets. It is in the business of moving traffic statewide.

• The 710 will substantially increase traffic on the 210 and 134 Freeways, to our city borders and beyond, per a city of Pasadena study by Korve Engineering, dated October 1992.

• From 50 to more than 1,000 percent increases in traffic will occur on Villa, Orange Grove, Washington, Del Mar and California, to east Pasadena and beyond, due to "spillover" traffic during peak periods, per Korve Engineering.

• An origin/destination survey commissioned by the city of Pasadena and conducted by Meyer-Mohaddes Engineers showed that only 25 percent of the traffic in the corridor is commuting from "stub to stub", that is, from the 710 terminus in Pasadena to the 710 onramp at Valley Blvd. 45 percent of the traffic is local from within the corridor (not bound for freeways), and 30 percent is bound for the 110 Freeway (which will be partially shifted to the Metro Blue Line when it is completed in 2003).

• There will be no 710 Interchange with the 110 Freeway. There will be no on-ramps or off-ramps from the 710 between Del Mar Blvd. in Pasadena and Huntington Drive in Northeast Los Angeles. This means that 75% of the traffic noted above will not be served by this freeway, nor will the added traffic generated by new developments in Pasadena. The 710 Extension is nothing more than a bypass to relieve other freeways.  See Eye Opening Quotes from the EIR.

The 710 Freeway Puts Pasadena in the Middle of a Major Truck Route

• The Route 710 Mitigation Advisory Committee recommended that trucks be banned from the 710 Freeway Extension, but let's be real, the 710's original purpose was to create a truck route from the port.   Trucking interests responded to that recommendation by immediately threatening then Governor Pete Wilson to sue if they attempted to ban trucks from the route.  In December 2000, the Southern California Association of Government's Draft Long Range Regional Transportation Plan was released and it states on page 76 that the 710 Extension will be a truck route. In fact, SCAG predicts that 40,000 trucks will eventually use the 710 Extension DAILY by 2025.   You can see it for yourself by looking up www.scag.ca.gov

• This major truck route would intersect residential neighborhoods from El Sereno to Sunland, increasing noise and emissions next to no less than 13 public and private schools adjacent to the route.

• More big rig trucks will park overnight on residential streets, which is already a problem in the Northwest area of Pasadena.  

• There will be pressure for development of trucking services, including truck stops, transient motels, and repair facilities.  In fact, an express motel is already proposed at the 210 exit at Fair Oaks.

The 710 Freeway Costs Pasadena

• The 110 Freeway will be closed from Ave. 64 to the Glenarm terminus for a period of up to six years during construction, in order to accommodate the 710 Freeway crossing, according to the EIR, Section IV, Page 3 and Section V, Page 3.  Caltrans has to either lower the 110 Freeway, considerably since the 710 is designed to be below grade in that section, or raise the 110 Freeway, for the length of .3 miles.  They have not reported in the EIR to date as to how they plan to do that.  

The closure of the 110 Freeway will cause lengthy detours for Pasadenans as well as commuters from the San Gabriel Valley  for many years.  110 Freeway bound trips will likely use Ave 64, or any of the north/south streets in the city that lead to Huntington Drive which is the alternate route to downtown Los Angeles.   Nearly all of these options involve using residential streets.

 

• A recent study by the Surface Transportation Policy Project concluded that the substantial delays caused by years-long traffic detours during freeway construction are never recaptured when freeway construction is completed. East-west streets that cross the 710 Freeway construction site will be alternately closed.  Pasadena Avenue and St. John will be closed and traffic detoured to parallel arterials as well.  

• The $2 billion price tag of the freeway drains crucial funding for rail, bus, intersection improvements, and grade crossings. (The Blue Line to East Pasadena is roughly 3 times as long as the 710 Freeway at half the cost and far less destructive to the city).

• There will be dramatic loss of business during the unattractive, gridlocked, six to ten year construction period. Old Pasadena will be heavily impacted as construction and traffic detours will make it difficult to get to and from the shopping district.

• A canyon-one quarter-mile wide and almost five miles long-will be carved to make room for the eight-lane freeway. Caltrans must excavate and haul 9.5 million cubic yards of dirt, according to the EIR. Given Caltrans' estimate of a 6-year contruction period, this translates to one double trailer truck departing the "canyon" for the gravel pits in Irwindale via the 210 Freeway every minute, eight hours a day, five days a week.
  

• Millions more tax dollars will be spent to maintain Caltrans homes in the right-of-way, homes that could be privately owned and contributing to the city's tax base.

• Communities in the route will experience further loss of tax base as flight and blight continue along a six-mile stretch of neighborhoods during and after the construction of the freeway.

The 710 Provides No Significant Benefit for Regional Traffic

• The 710 Freeway will add less than one percent capacity to the regional freeway network at a cost of more than $2 billion (recent updated figure by MTA). The 710 Freeway is an outmoded remnant of freeway plans made more than 50 years ago. Caltrans' own current traffic modeling shows that the 710 only increases speed through the corridor by one mile per hour.

What Kind of Community Will We Be if the 710 Freeway is Built?

• 7,000 mature trees will be clear cut for the freeway.  What kind of effect will the loss of these trees have on air quality?
  
• The volumes of traffic at the 210/134/710 Interchange will be similar to that of the 10/405 Freeway Interchange…..drowning surrounding neighborhoods, and Old Pasadena in the din of freeway noise and pollution, degrading quality of life.
  
• Nearly 5,000 residents will be displaced, nearly 1,000 homes will be destroyed, and six historic districts will be gutted. (Caltrans promises to relocate some of the historic homes, however, they have not been able to locate new sites for them.  The ones they claim they will replace on top of cut-and-cover tunnels have no plans for where they will be stored and how they will be kept safe from vandalism during the construction period.  There is no precedent in the country for successfully marketing homes on top of cut-and-cover tunnels, in fact, it has never been done before.)

The 710 Freeway Isn't the Best Transportation Option for Pasadena

• The number one transportation priority for Pasadena is the construction of the Metro Blue Line Light Rail project from downtown Los Angeles through east Pasadena. It has the greatest capacity to relieve congestion on freeways and neighborhood streets, as the line can transport the same number of people as a four-lane freeway during rush hour - at half the cost of the 710 Freeway, with far less negative impacts.  For many other ways to improve Pasadena's traffic circulation, see What can be done to fix traffic now?

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