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Town:
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Compton School District Superintendent to Step Down
Isadore Hall — Sacramento or Washington, D.C.?
A Tribute to Congresswoman Juanita Millender-McDonald
Community Reacts to Millender-McDonald’s Passing
Sheriff’s Department Teams With ABC to Cite Those Selling, Buying Youth Alcohol
Celebrity Collaboration at Compton’s Carver Elementary School
Authorities Buckling Down on Safety Belt Law
City Commissioning Cost Allocation, Utility Fees Study
Earl
Ofari
Hutchinson:
Abandoned Lots, Abandoned Dreams — Pt. 2
Black Comic Book Art Exhibition Gives Glimpse Into Another World
Officials: Time Is Always Right to Make Plans for Disaster Safety
Decades-old
Traffic Signal System Finally on Its Way Out
City has had money to complete project for more than five years but
is only now putting it to use
By
Allison Jean Eaton
Bulletin
Staff Writer
Frustrated
by the archaic traffic signals governing the Hub City’s intersections?
Soon that frustration — and the seemingly endless waiting at red
lights — will be a thing of the past as the city moves forward with
replacing its traffic signal system dating back to the 1960s.
On its way is a brand new signal communication and control system — a
traffic monitoring “nerve center” — housed in a traffic
management operations center slated for set-up at the transit center. According
to city officials, it is here that staff will be able to monitor minute-to-minute
traffic changes for the first time. Signals and traffic will be automatically
monitored, synchronized and controlled.
According to a staff report, a significant amount of the city’s signals
lack basic traffic functions including left turn arrows, traffic activation,
multiple light heads and pedestrian activation.
The system is so old, in fact, that its controllers are obsolete
and parts of its communication system are non-operational, the report reads. “Components
that need replacement largely either are no longer made or are incompatible
with current traffic control systems.”
A recent study reveals signals here are unable to perform a range
of functions considered standard in L.A. County in the 21st century. These
include signal synchronization and coordination with signals in other cities,
varied traffic timing schedules for different times of the day, status
reporting to City Hall and traffic actuation — the bypassing of green
lights on side streets that have no waiting cars.
These shortcomings not only back up traffic, but they can also lead
to dangerous situations for both drivers and pedestrians, officials said.
In the late 1990s, Compton applied for and obtained funding from
the federal government and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA)
to bring the aging signals and controllers up to current standards and
install a traffic management communications system.
So why is it 2007 and commuters are still putting up with outdate
traffic signals?
As with a number of other grants afforded the city during this time
period, the more than $3 million slipped through the cracks and for years
the city has sat on it, apparently unaware it had the money and getting
nowhere with the project.
“A review of Public Works records reveals that prior to 2005, the
city took no action to implement this project, thus putting the capital
improvement infrastructure opportunity in jeopardy,” according to
the staff report.
Public Works Director Chuck Bergson discovered after he came on board
with the city that millions of dollars in grant funding allocated to the
city for various projects had literally been pushed to the side and either
forgotten or ignored.
“The fact that we haven’t done anything for five or six years
has caused some consternation with the federal government as well as the
MTA,” Bergson
said.
Luckily, the MTA in 2005 granted the city a two-year extension, the
time for which is now nearly up, to begin the long overdue upgrades. However,
$3 million doesn’t go nearly as far today as it did back when the
funding was granted, he added.
Sarakki Associates Inc. was hired shortly after the extension was
OK’d to complete the preliminary analysis of the antiquated traffic
signal infrastructure. It found “significant functional and physical
deficiencies.”
Among its findings are that almost half of the traffic communications
system is non-operational, nearly all of the intersection traffic loop
detection is non-operational, a significant number of traffic signal poles
need to be replaced, about 80 percent of the traffic controllers — described
in the staff report as the “on-site brains that control the timing
of red, yellow and green lights at each intersection” — are
obsolete and no longer manufactured and a third of the signal cabinets
need replacement.
Besides the assessment, upgrade and remodel, the terms of the grant
require the new traffic management control system to coordinate local traffic
as well as surrounding regional traffic systems.
The City Council last week approved a contract amendment with Sarakki
to provide the design and construction management services for installation
of the system. According to officials, if the city took the project out
to bid, it would miss its extension deadline and the project, along with
the funding, would go down the tubes. Keeping Sarakki on as the project
engineer is permissible, according to the California Department of Transportation.
Officials estimate the project will be complete by the end of 2008.
The project also brings with it a beautification opportunity in that
the new traffic control boxes are the perfect canvas for city-sanctioned
public art. A request for proposals to liven up the boxes with pigment
will be developed within the next several months, staff said.
The city of Long Beach has a similar public art program, and traffic
control boxes throughout its downtown area boast colorful scenes
painted by local youth and artists.
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