Project: Interstate 105/Interstate 110 Interchange

1.0 Synopsis

Interstate 105 in Los Angeles connects I-605 with LAX airport. With a light rail line built in its 40-foot median, I-105 was the last highway built in the LA metro area. Construction started in 1982 and the highway was completed in October 1993 at a cost of $2.3 billion. I-105 is the final piece of a long-term regional plan for an interconnected grid of highways in the Los Angeles region. When I-105 first opened, it improved congestion on nearby routes, but eventually traffic increased to near pre-I-105 levels. Jobs associated with I-105 were estimated to be approximately 50. The low economic impact of I-105 was attributed to a series of events that occurred in the region before and after freeway construction, including a national economic downtown, decline in local industry, civil unrest, and a major earthquake.

2.0 Background

2.1 Location & Transportation Connections

I-105 was the last major freeway to be completed in the Los Angeles area. Also known as the Century Freeway and Glenn Anderson Freeway, the 17.3-mile corridor extends from Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) in the west to I-605 in the east, crossing I-405, I-110, I-710, and Hawthorne Municipal Airport. Although the freeway traverses the cities of Hawthorne, Inglewood, Willowbrook, Lynwood, Paramount, Bellflower, and Downey, it is primarily a pass-through route for commuter traffic between the manufacturing and military industries and the airport in the west and residential areas in the east.

Built in the median of I-I05, the Green Line light rail connects 10 stations in the I-105 median and another five to the west of the Interstate. A carpool lane offers priority to taxis and high-occupancy vehicles. I-105 falls about 1.5 miles short of connecting with Interstate 5, a major north-south route that continues all the way to the Canadian border. The two freeways were not connected due both to opposition from the community of Norwalk and lack of capacity on I-5 at the connection point.

Overpasses constructed on the western flank of I-105 have higher vertical clearance to facilitate freight movement for the aerospace industry which is clustered near LAX. The Port of Long Beach is easily accessed from the western flank of I- 105. From here, the port is 12 miles (15 minutes) south on I-710.

2.2 Community Character & Project Context

I-105 runs east-west connecting the LAX airport with the aerospace and defense industry in the west to I-605, serving commuters who live in neighborhoods on the eastern flank of I-105 Corridor. Due to its proximity to LAX, the aerospace industry has traditionally prominent in the study corridor and is well served by both I-I05 and rail lines. In the mid-90s, shortly after completion of I-105, the aerospace industry experienced a dramatic downturn. This resulted in collapse and relocation of firms, and job loss. Eventually, most aerospace industries closed. Land formerly occupied by the industry has been converted to business parks for lighter industry and offices.

The study area includes nine incorporated cities and towns as well as a large unincorporated area of LA County. Except for El Segundo, Latino populations constitute over 40% of all communities. In Willowbrook, Lynwood and Paramount, Hispanics comprise from 54% to 72% of the population.

El Segundo, which is on the beach, is a relatively high-income community. El Segundo has a higher per capital income and property value compared to Los Angeles County. Average per capita income and property values in El Segundo are $28,790 and $362,450 compared to $18,416 and $216,550 respectively for LA County. In El Segundo less than 5% of the population is below poverty level, compared with rates of over 20% in most of the study corridor. Most of the study area is included in South Central LA. This is an important black history site. It was the center of the 1992 riots that were sparked by the controversial Rodney King case. The LA riots spanned several days during which 55 people were killed and thousands were injured. Property damage was estimated at $800 million to $1 billion.

3.0 Project Description & Motives

I-105 is a $2.3 billion (1993 dollars) multimodal transportation facility. It is an eight-lane, 17.2-mile access controlled highway with a minimum of 40-feet public a transit-way in the median. Other related features include interchanges with and widening of four north-south freeways which intersects the I-105 (Routes 405, 11, 7 and 605), interchanges with many local city streets and relocation of the Southern Pacific Transport Company rail lines in the central portion of the corridor.

The overall objective of the project was to provide safe, orderly, efficient, integrated and systematic movement of all persons, goods and services, regionally and within the corridor- with due regard to for regional and local, social economic and environmental goals and policies. Detailed objectives included:

• Reduction of local street congestion by over 20 percent, Redistribution of traffic to improve operational efficiency of regional freeway network;
• Providing a choice between high-speed highway or transit modes as well as improved surface street vehicular operation for automobiles, trucks and buses;
• Reduction in accidents (fatal, personal injury and property damage) by 560
• Short-term reduction in annual taxes;
• Property tax - $760,000; Sales tax - $314,000; School Districts - $628,000;
• Enhanced economic viability of recently planned commercial, industrial by the private sector.

4.0 Project Impacts

4.1 Transportation Impacts

4.2 Demographic, Economic & Land Use Impacts

Anticipated economic impact associated with the project was hindered by various external and unrelated events. These events included economic programs pursued by Caltrans in response to community opposition; social unrest (described in Section 5.0 below); and the economic recession of the early 1990s. The latter particularly affected the aerospace industry that dominated the Los Angeles economy and comprised 20 percent of manufacturing jobs in Los Angeles in 1987.

5.0 Non-Transportation Factors

I-105 opened during a period of broader economic trouble in the Los Angeles area. The national recession, collapse of the local aerospace and military industries, civil unrest following the Rodney King trial, and the Northridge Earthquake disrupted economic activity along the I-105 corridor and throughout Los Angeles.

The aerospace and military industries west of the corridor were so strong during the 1980's that the route's vertical clearances were built to accommodate their anticipated cargo. The Cold War ended less than two years before the Interstate opened, which shuttered many of the aerospace and military businesses that had been anticipated to provide demand. The national recession affected other industries, as well, but the loss of the aerospace industry in Los Angeles hit the area and the I-105 corridor particularly hard.

Two years before I-105 opened in 1994, the riots following the Rodney King trial left 55 dead, 12,000 arrested, and $1 billion in damages. Civil unrest continued well into 1993, and I-105 traverses the center of the affected area. The Rodney King riots not only reduced economic activity immediately following the unrest, but also impacted the long-term economic performance of the City of Los Angeles as well as the reputation of the neighborhoods in South Central ten years after the riots, the cumulative continued loss of taxable sales were estimated at $3.8 billion in taxable sales and over $125 million in lost sales taxes.

6.0 Resources

6.1 Citations

Anderson, Anthony, Analysis of the 1992 Los Angeles Civil Unres, University of Southern California,http://www.usc.edu/libraries/archives/cityinstress/analysis/main.html

BBC News. 1992: LA in flames after 'not guilty' verdict http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/april/29/newsid_2500000/2500471.stm

Boarnet, Marlon G. Institute for Transportation Studies, University of California, Irvine.

Bureau of Economic Analysis, CA 04 Personal Income and Employment Summary.

Business Losses, Transportation Damage and the Northridge Earthquake. August 1996, http://www.uctc.net/papers/341.pdf Caltrans, Traffic Data Branch, http://traffic-counts.dot.ca.gov

Faigan, Daniel, Routes 105 through 112. California Highways,http://www.cahighways.org/105-112.html

Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority, Metro Green Line http://www.metro.net/around/rail/green-line/

Matheson, Victor A. Journal of Urban Studies. Race and Riots: A Note on the Economic Impact of the Rodney King Riots. 2004. http://usj.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/41/13/2691

Rand Corporation, 1996. Life after Cutbacks: Tracking California's Aerospace Workers, http://www.rc.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/MR688

Reinhold, Robert. New York Times, Opening New Freeway, Los Angeles Ends Era. October 14, 1993. U.S. Census Bureau, Selected Historical Decennial Census Population and Housing Counts,http://www.census.gov/population/www/censusdata/hiscendata.html

6.2 Interviews

Organization

Footnotes