Having attended the meeting regarding the closure of Bouquet Canyon Road with traffic being detoured into a residential section of Copper Hill, it has become distinctly clear that the City Council approved the plan without due regard to the traffic hardship this will place on the community — or they simply do not care.
The article quoted Assistant Traffic Engineer Joel Bareng as stating that adjusting signal timing is the city’s main mechanism for addressing the traffic problem, which will be monitored by cameras. The resulting gridlock is not a signal timing issue; it is a volume issue in which too many vehicles will be forced into too little space. Bouquet Canyon is a highly utilized gateway for Antelope Valley residents to access the Santa Clarita Valley, in addition to local commuters.
The first opportunity to rejoin Bouquet Canyon will come utilizing Haskell Canyon Road, which already becomes inundated with traffic during load-in times for Saugus High School and Rosedell Elementary. The additional vehicle load from the Bouquet Canyon detour will overwhelm Haskell Canyon, which was originally designed as a traffic capillary, not an artery. Taking away bike lanes to restripe for a second auto lane will not accommodate the additional capacity.
The detour will force Bouquet Canyon traffic that would normally turn left onto Plum Canyon Road to instead take David Way to Copper Hill Drive, then travel 1.4 miles to Haskell Canyon, then 1.2 miles back to Bouquet followed by another 1 mile back to Plum Canyon. This 3.6-mile detour also subjects the motorists to numerous additional traffic lights and is repeated in the opposite direction for the return trip. This fiasco also applies to southbound Bouquet Canyon motorists who wish to patronize the businesses between Plum Canyon and David Way, which will certainly lead to financial hardships.
Per Lennar, the detour is required due to flood control regulations, yet this issue is solely caused by where they intend to place excavated dirt during construction of a new Bouquet Canyon segment. Audience calls to move the dirt somewhere else — or move it twice — in order to avoid the flood control issue, thus negating the need for an 11-month detour, were dismissed.
During the meeting Lennar spokesperson Brian Bencz expressed the city’s concern and hard work regarding the detour’s traffic fallout yet nobody from the City Council cared enough to be present and hear residents’ concerns for themselves, including Councilman Jason Gibbs who represents the area.
Apparently, Lennar’s profits and timeline rank higher in their priorities than protecting our quality of life.
Having lived in Saugus for 33 years, I have seen too many tolerable commutes turn cringeworthy. Often, traffic is not the actual problem but is the result of the problem, which is poor planning. This would be yet another example of poor planning leading to commuter ire.
Douglas Zabilski
Saugus
