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About Medford mail tribune. (Medford, Or.) 1909-1989 | View Entire Issue (May 11, 1961)
MEDFORD MAIL TRIBUNE. MEDFORD. OREGON THURSDAY, MAY 11. 1961 A 3 Los Angeles Roads Plagued by as Many Cars as There Are People Los Angeles-OIFS-The jopu low . and widespread Lot An geles, metropolitan area stiU u growing and one of its major growing pains -is a king-site traffic' problem which is-a daily headache to most motor ists. :- - ; .:: ' At last count-as of Dec!' 31, 1960-the . city had . an esti mated population of 2,515, 400. An estimated 2.9 million vehicles jam the city's streets every 24 hours. . Los Angeles county, has al most 2.5 million passenger car registrations' - the largest in the nation - plus thousands more vehicles such as buses and trucks.' "'. ! : '. - These figures alone make traffic experts shudder,, but to make matters -worse the area has no mass rapid tran sit system, and people either like to or are forced, to drive their cars more than in other areas. The sprawling city en compasses 457.2 square miles and it seems sometimes like a day's journey, to .go from one end. of it to the; other. , Can't . Improve . ' y ; .- ,i ?l the traffic problem can't Improve because most experts predict the population will in crease to at-least 4 million by 1980. - . - - . - There' are approximately 100 miles of freeway in op eration in the city and the total will soon reach' 278 miles under a construction program coordinated by the State Di vision of .Highways. . ' Construction goes on' daily -new -lanes are being added to old freeways where pos-sible-and: new freeways are near completion in the hope of easing the traffic pressure. In peak hours, morning and evening,, the treeway system is loaded to capacity and trips that take,' half-hour during relatively' light, hours may take twice that long during the. rush. One of the major phases of the over-all plan to ease traf fic is an attempt to lure peo ple into mass transit facilities -the bus and streetcar system operated by the Metropolitan Transit Agency. (MTA). " , MTA carries about 750,000 passengers daily . on some 90 lines, serving a four-county area that covers nearly 5,000 square miles and has a popu lation of 7 million. 'But the service, largely . . on surface streets, cannot be -' called rapid.; '- ;, ?." : ;' j V An engineering' firm1 has recommended a - master plan for rapid transit with an over head high-speed' network branching out' from the heart of the city. The, engineers rec ommend use of electrically propelled cars on pneumatic rubber tires running on con crete tracks. The cars, linked in trains, each would carry 54 ' passengers and would travel at an average of 35 to 40 miles an hour. It is esti mated the traveling time be tween the downtown area and outlying points would be cut in half. Cost of installing the initial 74.9 miles of .the sys- Two From Area Named To Student Senate " Corvallis - Dennis Caird, 602 Third ' it., Jacksonville, and Sonja Lee, 2146 Hillcrest rd., Medford, have been elect ed members of the student senate group at Oregon State university. . . ' The senate is the campus student governing body., It is made up of elected represen tatives from each- school on the campus: Caird will repre sent the school of forestry, and Miss' Lee will represent the school, of home economics. They , are both juniors this year..' , . The new student leaders will take office later this term and serve throughout the 1961-62 school year. Car Safety Belt ; Measure Turned Down Salem - (UPD The Senate Wednesday defeated 19-10 the car safety belt measure. ' It' would have made safety belts mandatory on all new cars sold in Oregon beginning in 1962.. . , tern was estimated at $529,- 700,000. "The big question is how to pay for it," said Ernest R. Gerlach, MTA's chief engi neer. Gerlach, a graduate of Le high University who has work ed on traffic problems in Chicago, Cincinnati and New York, said the area's present traffic trouble is due to lack of planning 20 or so years ago. He said no one foresaw the tremendous growth po tential of the area. Gerlach smiles at the sug gestion that, private car pools can solve the traffic problem. "We have the biggest car pool you could want," he said. "We can take 50 riders at a time, and they have no driving or parking problems." The private car pool idea has not gone over in a big way here, according to another traffic expert, A. L. Hutchin son, acting manager of the City Traffic Department. Common Problem . "It's a problem common to the western United States," he said. "People have been brought up on the convenience of having a set of -wheels handy. . Most drivers don't want to take the responsibil ity of a pool. For instance, the driver can t stay down town after work if he wants to and it interferes with his personal life." Traffic manager Sarh Tay lor recently suggested that car pool drivers be given a "bon us" in the form of a reduction in auto license fees as an in centive, but the-idea doesn't seem to have taken hold. ' Hutchison believes that au tomatic traffic signals are the least costly method of con trolling the stream of vehicles. Automatic computors have been installed to regulate the flow on many main surface arteries. For example; there is one computor at Hutch ison's City Hall office that regulates the flow of traffic on Wilshire Blvd. at 36 inter sections. The mechanical brain receives information from radar receivers and pressure bars on the street and con trols the "go" and "stop" signals. The Traffic Department has tried most of the standard remedies-one-way streets, re verse lanes morning and eve ning, and advocated stagger ed working hours to spread the flow of traffic. Many of them depend on public acceptance. One-way streets, for example, run into opposition from merchants af fected. At present, the city uses what it calls the "share the green" system. Motor and pedestrian traffic go simul taneously at an intersection for a period, but then a light flashes "don't walk" to give cars a chance to make turns unhampered. The men who have the traf fic problems on their hands are convinced of one thlng the full cooperation of the public is needed to make any reforms effective. MTA board Chairman A. J. Eyraud put it this way: "Com munity acceptance will be a major factor in determining the authority's policy. There is no intent on the part of the MTA board to pursue or build a plan unacceptable to the public." Dr. Taylor Elected To Josephine Group Ashland - Dr. Arthur S. Taylor, chairman of the social science division at Southern Oregon college, has been elected an honorary member of the Josephine County His torical Society. - The society operates a mu seum in Kerby, and is plan ning on opening a museum in Grants Pass, Other historical societies of which Dr. Taylor Is a member include Shasta County, Sis kiyou County, Idaho, Mercer County, Illinois, Southern Oregon, and New York State. HEALTH BILL REVAMPED SaIem-(UPD-Voting 19-10, the Senate has approved and re turned to the House a dras tically - revamped mental health bill. THE DANMOORE HOTEL . 1217 SW. Morrison St. PORTLAND, OREGON " All transient guests. All those who com, return. Rate not high, not low. Free garage, TV's and radios. Reputation for cloanlinou. Children Under i Seven No Charge GIFTS TO KEEP MOM 4 Xv tor x 4 i - i if All Year Round Kenmore 3 Speed Hand Mixer S)88 Here's the low-priced key to faster meal preparation. Fancy desserts and cookbook specialties are made easier too. 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