Suit Targets Turn Lanes and Signal

Most communities rejoice when their local officials pony up some money for neighborhood traffic improvements.

Not the well-heeled folks along Roscomare Road in the Santa Monica Mountains. After the city of Los Angeles approved $200,000 in March to add turn lanes and a traffic signal on the road, the community sued the city to stop the improvements.

The lawsuit charges that the new lanes and signal at the intersection with Mulholland Drive would improve traffic flow, thus encouraging more drivers to use Roscomare as an alternative to the congested San Diego Freeway from the San Fernando Valley to the Westside. This, the residents argue, would bring more speeding, accidents and noise.

“Who wants 2,000 more cars on their street every day?” asked Steven Twining, president of the Roscomare Valley Assn., the homeowners group that filed the lawsuit in April.

Each year, the city receives nearly 200 requests for traffic signals but, because of budget shortfalls, can install only 10 to 15 annually. Still, transportation officials say they can’t remember the last time the city has been sued to stop a signal.

The lawsuit is the latest example of the neighborhood turmoil that is created in Southern California when commuters seek shortcuts through quiet residential communities to avoid increasingly crowded freeways.

Each weekday, more than 120,000 commuters use residential streets to traverse the Santa Monica Mountains between the Valley and the portion of Los Angeles to the south. In the last 25 years, such traffic has grown about 40%, according to the Los Angeles Department of Transportation.

Residents in other neighborhoods suffering from cut-through traffic have demanded increased police patrols and more improvements, such as signal lights and no-turn signs.

But on Roscomare Road, the residents say more improvements will only serve additional drivers. They cite a traffic study they commissioned that predicts that traffic on the street will increase by 1,800 cars per day with the signal.

City officials dismiss such predictions, saying the improvements would only improve safety at a dangerous intersection.

City Councilman Jack Weiss, who represents the area, said the suit defies logic.

“The reality is: Traffic will increase one way or another,” he said. “It would be foolish to think [that] if we do nothing, our traffic problems will go away.”

Roscomare, a narrow, two-lane residential street, parallels the freeway from the crest of the mountains south into Bel-Air. Despite the installation of speed humps at six places along the road, speeding cut-through traffic continues unabated.

The center of dispute is the intersection of Roscomare and Mulholland. Traffic on Roscomare faces a stop sign at the crossroads. Drivers on Mulholland do not.

Motorists turning left from westbound Mulholland onto Roscomare or left from northbound Roscomare onto Mulholland must wait for traffic on Mulholland to clear to complete the turn.

Intersection Can Turn Into a Bottleneck

When traffic is heavy--particularly during rush hours--the intersection turns into a bottleneck. Aggravating the problem are sharp curves on Mulholland that partially obscure the view of oncoming traffic.

City transportation officials say a three-way signal will address that problem by stopping traffic on Mulholland so motorists on Roscomare can more safely turn left onto Mulholland.

But some members of the Roscomare Valley Assn. say the signal will also accommodate more commuters on Roscomare.

“If it was a lot easier to make that left-hand turn, more of them would be coming,” said Jim Enstrom, an association member who has lived in the neighborhood 16 years. “It’s also going to increase the accident rate on our street.”

The group’s lawsuit demands that the city complete an environmental study before installing the signal. The suit claims that the community plan for the neighborhood requires an environmental study before the city can make street improvements that might increase traffic. No date has been set for a trial.

But city officials reject these arguments, saying the signal will increase safety, not traffic.

“We don’t buy that,” said John Fisher, assistant general manager for the city Transportation Department.

Weiss also rejected the need for an environmental study.

“I don’t believe it makes any sense to claim that the California Environmental Quality Act requires [an environmental study] when one wants to put in a traffic light,” he said.

And not all neighbors on Roscomare support the lawsuit.

Fritz Zeiser, a member of the homeowners association who has lived about a block from the intersection for 45 years, said of the suit: “It’s crazy and it’s stupid.”

He says that some of his neighbors want to keep the intersection as it is, in hopes that the bottlenecks and risk of accidents will keep motorists away.

“Let’s make it safe for everyone,” Zeiser said. “We don’t want someone killed at that intersection.”