Limit freeways to limit fires in CA

Freeways were known to cause sprawl in the process bring development to the next onramp. City infrastructure can barely keep with the development. At Sprawl Central in 2007, three of the ten fires in LA were caused by downed power lines.

But freeways themselves are the cause of many fires frequently when grass on the side of the road catches fire. Yesterdays Stockton fires started on Interstate 5 and blew out of control. In other blazes today the CHP had to close a lane on 680 so firefighters could get to work.

And a Glenn County blaze was caused by a tanker explosion along highway 32.

Reducing freeways will reduce our exposure to fire as the state dries out from a water shortage and changed rainfall patterns which increase the winter runoff and decrease snowmelt.

HOT Buslanes or complete the HOV system

The HOV lane on 101 from the South Bay ends just before 92 when traveling north bound. The result is a backup in traffic and congestion at this location at almost all times of the day. This backup is the primary cause of the delay in express bus service that uses the freeway.

Getting the HOV lane completed to San Francisco would entail a large cost because present legislation requires that HOV lanes be implemented with road expansion. Since this area is built out the cost of land acquisition is huge.

Even better would be convert the HOV lane and the fast lane to SF into an HOT lane. There is no loss for Single Occupant Drivers of lane capacity since the option to buy ones way in is still available. To balance out the equity issue the money should be used to provide enhanced express bus service in these lanes now call HOT Busway lanes.