No-Competition Deal Is Bad News for Commuters

I was alarmed when I read the article, “Tollway Agency-Caltrans Proposal Draws Protest� (Dec. 20) and learned that a no-competition agreement between Caltrans and the San Joaquin Hills Transportation Corridor Agency (TCA) was being negotiated without a public hearing. The proposed agreement is locking in the current transportation plans for roads surrounding the proposed toll road for the next 30 years!

Locking in the current plans assumes that we can accurately predict our needs for 30 years. When the San Joaquin Hills Corridor was proposed in the 1970s, it was based on the assumption that we would continue to depend on single-occupant cars as our major mode of transportation for the indefinite future.

That assumption is increasingly recognized as outmoded. We are faced with a different set of realities in the 1990s than existed in the 1970s; society must now move beyond the use of fossil-burning fuels which cause destruction of the ozone layer, global warming and health-impairing pollution.

Because the corridor route is ill-conceived environmentally and financially, the TCA is now seeking a no-competition agreement with Caltrans so that it can secure funding. With or without the no-competition agreement the corridor proposal is the Orange County version of the Denver toll road disaster.

Clearly, now is the time to rethink our county’s long-term transportation plans. In doing so, Caltrans needs to obtain input from all segments of our county through a public hearing before deciding whether to negotiate a no-competition agreement with the TCA.

GINGER OSBORNE

Laguna Beach