Won’t Be as Bad This Year, Planners Say : A Marathon L.A. Traffic Snarl

If the Los Angeles Marathon had one real problem last year, it was the traffic.

It was a problem created, in large part, by the marathon’s circular route, which served to isolate several hundred thousand residents in an island at the center of the city.

“The route . . . virtually cut east, west, south and north traffic into streams of U-turns at blocked-off intersections in all directions,” Rufus Baker of Santa Monica complained then in a letter to the editor of The Times. “The gridlock trapped and divided the city of Los Angeles for many long hours.”

Tom Conner, an engineer with the city’s Department of Transportation, conceded that traffic was not handled too well last year, but he said that this year, things should be better.

“Last year, there was little planning,” he said. “They didn’t anticipate the problems. They thought traffic could cross the route in the gaps (between runners), but there weren’t enough gaps. This year, there’s been more planning.”

With this year’s route much the same as last year’s, many of the same difficulties remain.

Surface streets intersecting the race route near the starting line on Figueroa Street at Exposition Boulevard will be closed off well before the 8:30 a.m. starting time. Since the racers will be bunched at the beginning, street closings there will be relatively short--less than two hours. Freeway and surface street overpasses and underpasses to carry traffic across the race course are relatively numerous along the first half of the course, so congestion in the Civic Center area is expected to be relatively manageable.

But as the race progresses, the runners will begin to string out, meaning that street closures over the second half of the course will range up to four hours, Conner predicted. And in the second half of the course, there is only one way for traffic to cross the race route--the Santa Monica Freeway underpass at Crenshaw Boulevard.

Last year, Conner said, traffic piled up near the race course as motorists discovered, too late, that the surface streets they were attempting to use to cross the route had been closed. “When the RTD buses found out they couldn’t cross,” he said, “they just piled up along the edge.”

In the resulting confusion, each dead-end created by the race route generated its own little gridlock as drivers tried, unsuccessfully, to reverse their direction. In some places, motorists were stuck for hours.

This year’s planning should ease all that, Conner said.

For the last week--using flyers (200,000 of them), posted notices, detour signs and advisories disseminated by news media--city and race officials have been warning the public about the road closures and offering advice on alternate routes.

Unlike last year, detours will be set up at major “off-route” intersections to steer traffic away several blocks from the race course, thus avoiding many of last year’s dead-ends.

Instead of waiting for hours before completing their normal routes, RTD buses will simply stop and unload on either side of the course. When gaps appear between runners, traffic officers will escort the passengers across the course to complete their trips on buses waiting on the other side.

A total of 270 city Department of Transportation traffic officers will be assigned at planned pedestrian-crossing points and major intersections near the race course, at a cost to race organizers of about $76,000. About 150 police Explorer Scouts will be at smaller intersections and hundreds of volunteers will assist in crowd control. The organizers will pay approximately $100,000 for about 80 Los Angeles police officers assigned to crowd control, crime suppression and traffic duties.

“We haven’t solved all the traffic problems, but we have made things better,” Conner said. “You’ll be able to move in and out if you look at a race map and plan ahead. I think it will go well.”