710 Tunnel: A private affair?

There's a new twist in the decade-long drama of finishing the "missing link" of the 710 Freeway through South Pasadena. The Star-News says a private firm is now interested in building it:

A radical proposal to build an underground highway funded entirely by the private sector has revived the perennially delayed 710 Freeway extension project. Metro officials have confirmed they have been approached by a financial broker representing major international corporations interested in investing in the plan, which would use giant tunnel-boring machines to build a completely subterranean 6-mile, multi- lane roadway. The route would link the current terminus of the northbound 710 in Alhambra with a short northern segment of the freeway in Pasadena, extending south from the 210 Freeway. "They told us there is potential in the private sector to make a deal, and we were happy to talk to them," said Metro spokesman Marc Littman, adding that the discussions were very preliminary and more details about the plan would need to be hashed out before a private-partnership could even be considered.

Comments

[PW]

Who said justice is blind? Here is a good example of what is happening in the good old US of A. And may I ask how long have "they" Caltrans been trying to complete the 710 Freeway extension now? 20, 30 years now? That's to show us all how powerful and a little greenback / lobbying effort can do. The affluent So Pasadena community has kept blocking Caltrans' many proposals to complete this sagment. But, my friends, we all know it will not work, NOT BEHIND MY BACKYARD . . . Again, if you will just look at the other side of the coin; The Correctional Detention Twin Towners where it currently stand. No matter how much efforts and demonstrations put up by the poor and discarded hispanics and asians communities, trying in vain to block the building of the Towers, they went and shoved it down their throats and built the Towers anyway. Mind if I tell you; I learned that it was orginally planned to build in them at . . . you guess it, Westside communities of West LA. Again, justice is blind in the good old US of A, only if you have money . . .

[mr g]

Hey! I live next to the area. Whats going to happen as the drill? I guess no sleep for the next 7 years.

[Tim K.]

Not likely - the tolls will be going to the company, but they will demand giant up-front tax breaks and bond measures which ensure they get paid first.

You'll be paying this company through your taxes AND through tolls!

[Bryan T]

If a private firm invests money to dig the 710 tunnels, then this new roadway could be paid for entirely through *tolls* rather than out of our tax dollars. That's the way that it should be.