Temescal Canyon Road was uneven and unsafe. This photo was taken after the first resurfacing.
John Cockcroft and Ernest Walton started bombarding targets with high-energy protons in March 1932 and by April of the same year, it appears they succeeded. It took a month to split the first atom.
It took the Apollo 11 Mission, four days, six hours and 45 minutes to put a man on the moon, after travelling 240,000 miles.
Although Dostoevsky wrote Crime and Punishment in a year and a half, his novel Gambler was written in 26 days.
It appears that paving a road in Pacific Palisades is a more difficult task than the most complicated scientific or literary endeavor.
Circling the News has been following the repaving of Temescal Canyon Road,
The road was in bad shape and had not been redone since August 1990. StreetsLA gave it a “poor” rating. There was no question the road had to be repaved. There are only three ways in and out of the Palisades and Temescal Canyon Road is one of them.
Resurfacing started in November 2022.
It was soon apparent to everyone driving the road that after that repaving, the lower half was uneven.
One reader wrote: “The middle third is still unrepaired and that is where the dangerous ‘lip’ is. BTW, that lip is a driver surprise going down to PCH and a tire/wheel destroyer going toward Sunset. The rest of that middle third remains darn near impassable.”
Mike Bonin was the Councilmember in office with the repaving process started. Councilmember Traci Park replaced him, and her office tried to come up to speed on a road that was not safe.
It was deemed the road needed to be redone again and at the end of March it was repaved.
CTN asked for the cost to repave the road twice, but never received a figure. (Note: Why should the City be responsible for spending taxpayer dollars?)
Then, just like “War and Peace” there was another twist to the plot. Actually, there were two twists.
It appears that the lines to warn bikers of possible car doors opening were painted correctly on one side of the canyon, but incorrectly on the uphill side.
Then a downhill lane was taken away because of a water issue. Water buckled the pavement, making it unsafe to drive.
Water leaking on the roadway, undermined the newly-laid asphalt.
After it was rumored that several accidents happened at that site, the city snapped to action and put up barriers.
The City placed barriers to warn drivers of the unsafe conditions.
Marisol Rodriquez, director of external relations StreetsLA, sent a note to Pacific Palisades Community Council President Maryam Zar on July 3, “Per our crews, this location has been on our radar for a few months now. Our resurfacing crew did resurface the roadway, however the roadway started to fail once again soon after most likely due to additional water coming from the hillside and onto the street. Some of that water is getting under the roadway and causing the large road failure. This is a larger issue that needs to be addressed, possibly in conjunction with other departments, such as BOE.”
CTN sent a July 13 and July 17 note to Dan Halden, senior advisor external relations StreetsLA and Councilmember Traci Parks office, asking when the road would be fixed. No one responded.
On July 20, Halden sent a note to Zar, “I wanted to let you know that the Bureau of Engineering (BOE) is coordinating and preparing a mitigation plan with recommendations for how to best address this situation.
“I expect to have further information from BOE sometime next week and I will update you when I do.”
Nine months into the repaving of Temescal, CTN wonders if the BOE has contemplated a moat.
Readers ask: What’s the cost for this constant roadwork? (Who cares? It’s only taxpayer money.)
When will the project finally be finished? (Who cares? City workers are not paid according to merit.)
Will bike lanes be repainted? (Who cares? The City will just keep telling everyone it was done correctly the first time – don’t believe your eyes.)
FACT: It appears that it is easier to split an atom than repave Temescal.
Good Report.
Just a thought…
‘Major US highway in Philadelphia reopens after deadly fire.
Jun 23, 2023 … Part of Interstate 95 collapsed after tractor-trailer caught fire, … A stretch of a major US highway in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, …’
This was a major highway that collapsed into a huge chasm. All the pundits said it would take months to fix this road that handled thousands of cars every day. (Those folks must have dealt with our Temescal Canyon Road workers and management. The Philly folks had it completely repaired, up and running perfectly in 2 weeks.
Maybe we need to import some folks from Philly to fix Temescal.
Would it be possible to identify those responsible for this inaction or FUBAR who are elected? Civil servants can’t be fired, but elections can make some personnel changes.
Ground water from the heavy rains this winter.
Temescal between the old Y and PCH was once a creek vs street
I’ve lived here a long time. The problem of Temescal pavement being moved around and eroded by water in rainy years has certainly been here as long as I have. It pops up in different places and destroys the road. It is after all a creek that was paved over without putting anything in to handle the natural water flow as far as I can see. If it were not that we have such serious dry years so frequently it would probably never be drivable. But surely there must be some engineer with an understanding of this kind of problem and how to deal with it. We have to make a place for the water to go – make a center lane that is a creek – something. Just repaving all the time is simply stupid as well as expensive.