Working on the highway, the OC tram project will take shape in 2022 – Orange County Register

Continued work and future project planning on major freeways and toll roads throughout Orange County promise to make 2022 another busy year for traffic.

The 405 improvement project should ramp up construction – entering its final year before completion – and teams will continue to work on the last two-thirds of the work that will be done on the Interstate 5 Expressway extension. 73rd Street and El Toro Street.

After years of planning, the project to widen a key section of Highway 55 will begin in mid-2022, kicking off a four-year construction process.

And the OC tram, which connects Santa Ana and Garden Grove, will continue to make progress before it is delivered to Orange County in late 2022 or early 2023.

“Overall it will be a busy year,” said Orange County Transportation Authority Executive Director Darrell Johnson, who oversees many projects.

Meanwhile, the Transportation Corridor Authority, which operates the county’s toll roads, has several projects underway, “No. Priority 1” is to improve links between 241 and 91 toll roads, said TCA CEO Samuel Johnson.

Before the end of the year, five more bridges over 405 that are part of a $1.9 billion project to partially widen the highway and improve a total of 18 overpasses will be completed and open to the public. them, OCTA Johnson said. Those five places are at Westminster Avenue, Golden West Street, Bolsa Chica Street, Ward Road and Fairview Road.

The remaining bridges are under construction or have been completed.

The 16-mile project from Costa Mesa to Seal Beach adds a regular lane in each direction and another highway lane in both directions. The existing carpool lanes will be converted to expressways, bringing the total number of toll lanes in each direction to two lanes. Johnson said the project is being funded and is on track for completion in the fall of 2023.

Drivers on Interstate 5 in Southern Orange County will likely see crews working at some intersections and bridges. “Major improvements” at the Avery Parkway, La Paz Road and El Toro Road interchanges will be the focal point by 2022, Johnson said, and “to a lesser extent, improvements and realignment of the interchanges,” Johnson said. through Crown Valley, Oso and Alicia parkway.”

Good news for cyclists: Aliso Creek Bikeway, which was closed during the construction of a bridge over the road for cyclists, is expected to reopen in the summer , Johnson said.

The $580 million Freeway Project, extending from 73rd to El Toro Road, is expected to be completed in 2025.

By mid-year, teams should break ground on a $474 million project to a four-mile extension of Highway 55 Johnson said between 5 and 405. With an expected completion date of 2026, the agency is in the process of bidding on the project for construction contracts.

Work will include the addition of general purpose lanes and carpool lanes to widen the highway and help ease congestion.

Ddowntown Santa Ana will be the epicenter of OC tram construction in 2022 as officials move forward amid delays, Johnson said. While OCTA’s highway projects are “on schedule and on budget,” electric vehicles have encountered a number of difficulties that have raised prices and pushed their expected opening time to 2024.

Unforeseen incidents included the discovery of contaminated soil under the streets of Santa Ana that had to be removed and safely stored, Human body discovery on project site requires sensitive mining and the presence of popular amenities throughout the city, Johnson said.

“We weren’t happy about the delay, but we also knew that we needed to get on with the project,” he said.

The budget cost of the electric vehicle project is currently $509 million. The vehicles are currently being built in northern California, and residents could start seeing them tested here in 2023, Johnson said.

On Orange County toll roads, teams are working to update some final details – “dot Is and cross Ts” – on the Oso Bridge project connecting 241 to Los Patrones Parkway, Open to the public in January, TCA’s Johnson said.

In addition, the expected connector between 241 and 91 is still in the design phase and a final plan should be ready by the end of 2022, he said. The project, funded by TCA and being built in partnership with OCTA, Caltrans and the Riverside County Transit Commission, will be a “flight from 241 straight into the 91 Express, and back,” Johnson said.

TCA spokesman Eugene Fields said Caltrans expects to begin bidding on construction in 2023, and work could begin later that year.

“Models show that this project could significantly save travel time for those traveling on the general purpose lanes on 91 between Highways 55 and I-15,” Johnson said.

Johnson said a projected $380 million price tag for the project — up from an initial estimate of $250 million — will be paid through fee revenue to use Measure M dollars. ”

In the long term, TCA is planning projects on several toll roads to ease traffic. Work to widen Route 241 between Highways 133 and 261, known as the Loma section, is being planned now and officials hope to be completed by 2030, Johnson said.

On August 73, an estimated $40 million project that will improve vehicles and help traffic during peak times at the Catalina View toll station will begin an initial environmental assessment in 2022. , he said.

The pandemic hit OCTA and TCA’s revenue in 2020, but both agencies said they’d recover in 2021.

While fewer drivers will pay tolls in 2020, revenue will rebound in 2021 to pre-pandemic levels on the Foothill Eastern corridor, which includes toll roads 241, 261 and 133, TCA’s Johnson said. know. He notes that the number 73 is also on track to get there.

OCTA spokesman Eric Carpenter said Orange County’s half-cent Proposition M sales tax fell 4.3 percent in fiscal year 2020, from $332 million in 2019 to $318 million in the same period in 2020. But the first half of 2021 saw a strong comeback, resulting in “our highest-ever sales tax year on Measure M,” increasing revenue 8.6% to 345. million dollars, Johnson said.

While the number of transit passengers decreased during the pandemic and OCTA cut some routes and personnel levelsToday, the bus is carrying about 70 percent of the passengers it did before COVID, Johnson said.

“We have recovered to a certain extent,” he said. “But we are really looking closely at what the future of that bus system will look like? So should we refactor it? Are trends and ridership patterns different in the post-COVID environment? ”

The agency is looking at those questions in a study it will run through 2022 to look at potential changes to the transit system. Transportation officials will seek public input next year and plan to compile a report for the OCTA Board of Directors by the end of 2022, Johnson said.

“I think now people are trying to figure out what the transit system looks like in a post-COVID environment,” Johnson said. “Does it work the same way? Are there more online activities for community colleges and schools? Is the work structure the same? And I think we don’t know that yet.”