Sound walls would cost too much, Caltrans says
And Caltrans is offering them no relief.
In 2003, the California Department of Transportation identified 41 areas along the 20-mile expansion route from Escondido to south of Miramar Marine Corps Air Station where traffic noise would be loud enough to require a sound wall.
But plans for all but seven walls were jettisoned, not because they weren't needed but because Caltrans decided they would cost too much.
The freeway project's total price tag was estimated at $800 million, but that has soared to nearly $1.3 billion because of rising costs for materials, including concrete and steel. Federal, state and local tax money are paying for the expansion, which will accommodate 380,000 cars a day once it is finished in 2012. In its busiest sections in the county, I-15 now handles 300,000 cars a day.
By the end of this year, the work between Centre City Parkway and state Route 56 will be completed, but residents of one Rancho Bernardo neighborhood say traffic noise is already unbearable and will only get worse once more lanes open.
Last month, Caltrans began work on the southern section of the project from Route 56 to south of the Marine base. Caltrans Director Will Kempton, who attended a groundbreaking ceremony beside the freeway Feb. 29, said he considered bringing a blank check from Sacramento because costs have grown so much.
Residents of a Rancho Bernardo neighborhood known as Bernardo Heights say that with Caltrans already paying far more than expected for the project, the state agency should be a good neighbor and reconsider a sound wall that would allow them to sleep at night and use their backyards.
“There is no sense of accountability,” said Kira Golin, a Rancho Bernardo resident who lives on Corte Sosegado, which backs up to the freeway.
Had all 41 sound walls been built, it would have cost about $19.4 million, about $6.7 million more than Caltrans budgeted. The seven walls approved cost about $5.1 million.
Caltrans is also building a sound berm and wall beside the Doubletree Golf Resort in Rancho Peñasquitos, even though the golf course wasn't eligible for noise abatement. The agency said material excavated for the freeway project will be used and will save Caltrans money because it won't have to pay to haul the material away.
Anything but quiet
Corte Sosegado has the look of a quiet suburban street, with homes neatly painted off-white with rust-colored trim and well-groomed yards. But there's nothing quiet about it.
Since lanes were added to I-15, neighbors hear the constant roar of tires thundering on pavement, truckers heartily downshifting and applying air brakes, and motorcyclists revving their engines. By the end of the year, the freeway will grow to 14 lanes, up from nine.
So far, Caltrans has opened lanes on an elevated section in the middle of the freeway and replaced a single northbound exit lane to Bernardo Center Drive with two that are higher and closer to Corte Sosegado than the old exit.
The neighbors long for the days when all they heard was the low rumble of white noise from the freeway. Dave Smith, who lives at the end of Corte Sosegado, about 100 feet from the freeway, sleeps with earplugs and a homemade sound wall propped against the sliding glass door in his bedroom.
A 984-foot-long, 12-foot-tall wall that would have lowered the traffic noise on Corte Sosegado by up to 6 decibels would have cost $487,000. It would have replaced a 6-foot wall that backs up to yards closest to the freeway. Caltrans was willing to pay $189,000, or $21,000 for each of the nine homes in the neighborhood that qualified for noise relief.
In recent months, Smith and Golin appealed to Caltrans, and Golin said she sought help from her state legislators, Sen. Dennis Hollingsworth, R-Temecula, and Assemblyman George Plescia, R-San Diego. Frustrated, Golin also contacted Just Fix It, a column in The San Diego Union-Tribune that tries to help people solve problems in their neighborhoods.
Gustavo Dallarda, Caltrans' corridor director for the I-15 expansion, said the state had no choice but to strictly follow its formula for determining how much it would spend on sound walls.
“It's not an open checkbook when it comes to noise abatement,” Dallarda said.
Residents on Corte Sosegado said they aren't asking for that, but they believe Caltrans' formula is too low and almost guarantees that a wall won't be built.
Although Dallarda said the costs forced Caltrans to reject most of the walls, the Traffic Noise Analysis Protocol in place when the agency decided which I-15 sound walls would be built allows for exceptions and urges “common sense and good judgment.”
Dallarda said Caltrans used solid judgment. Walls that are up to 10 percent over the allowed cost are approved, he said. In the case of Corte Sosegado, the wall would have cost 2½ times more than the agency would authorize.
In light of Golin's complaint, Dallarda has agreed to conduct more testing at Golin's home next month.
And Plescia and Hollingsworth have asked Caltrans to conduct additional sound tests once construction in Rancho Bernardo is finished at the end of the year. If the tests show that a sound wall is needed, Plescia said, “then we have to fight for the funds.”
Dallarda reiterated that the agency must strictly follow guidelines on how much it can spend on a sound wall.
“The bottom line is there are rules in place and we are following them,” he said. “There is no wiggle room.”
66-decibel standard
Caltrans considered sound walls in areas where noise was expected to reach at least 66 decibels, the level at which noise abatement must be weighed. (The decibel level for a chirping bird is 44, while the grinding of a garbage disposal is 80 decibels.)
All of the 41 walls that were considered would have lowered traffic noise by at least 5 decibels, the amount Caltrans requires.
Each wall was judged separately and could be nixed if its cost exceeded the amount Caltrans allowed under its formula. One of the walls was denied because it would have cost $13,000 more than the agency would pay.
Thousands of houses, condominiums and apartments border the expansion route. After doing noise tests at hundreds of locations and using a computer model to predict future levels, Caltrans decided 472 homes would be affected the most by the project.
Caltrans' formula for calculating sound-wall construction costs is tied to the state's Construction Price Index. The allowance covers any easements needed for a wall and demolition of any existing wall.
The amount Caltrans will pay per home is adjusted every two years; the minimum allowance for homes was raised to $32,000 in 2006.
Caltrans has refused to provide sound walls in other areas of the state. More than 500 property owners along a section of state Route 210 through San Bernardino County are suing the agency over noise and other issues.
Paul Stevens, an attorney for the residents, said Caltrans has spent millions fighting the lawsuit, filed in 2003.
“To take a stonewall approach in the political process and the legal process makes no sense,” Stevens said. “Who are they actually serving? They are supposed to be serving the people.”
One of the seven areas where a sound wall was approved along I-15 can easily be seen just across from Corte Sosegado on the west side of the freeway. The estimate for the 3,280-foot-long wall was $1.5 million, about $500,000 more than Caltrans was willing to pay.
George Cooke, who lives in the neighborhood known as High Country West, said residents were persistent in lobbying the agency. He said the price included significant legal costs to secure an easement on which the wall would be built. Residents offered the easement without legal wrangling, which reduced the cost to an amount acceptable to Caltrans.
A visit to both neighborhoods offers a loud-and-clear example of what a sound wall can do. While High Country West is hardly quiet, it's significantly quieter than on Corte Sosegado.
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