Panel funds Southwest County roads

By: DAVE DOWNEY - Staff Writer | Monday, November 7, 2005 9:05 PM PST ∞

RIVERSIDE ---- A regional panel Monday set aside $26 million for western Riverside County transportation projects, with half of it to be used for squeezing more capacity out of overtaxed roads in booming Menifee and Wildomar.

The Western Riverside Council of Governments' executive committee voted unanimously to commit $12.7 million for planning, environmental study, design and construction for widening Bundy Canyon and Scott roads between Interstates 15 in Wildomar and 215 in Menifee.

The committee, composed of one official each from 14 cities and four county supervisors, also voted to commit $1 million to planning and environmental work for rebuilding the Newport Road and I-215 interchange in Menifee. The other allocations were for projects in the Riverside area.

While the commitment was a significant boost for the Southwest County projects, they are years away from being built.

The agency intends to pull the money out of $209 million collected from new development by area cities and the county since the debut of a special transportation fee in July 2003. The fees are intended to defray the costs of a backbone of regional boulevards by widening narrow country roads such as Scott Road so they can accommodate growth during the next 25 years. The council holds the fee's purse strings.

The western part of the county extending from Corona to Temecula and from Hemet to Riverside is expected to double in population to 2.4 million people by 2030.

Following the project awards, Darren Henderson, supervising transportation planner for Parsons Brinckerhoff in Houston, gave a presentation to the committee on his firm's October report that states the region's transportation system's cost had swelled to $5.1 billion. Henderson said the price has tag increased by $1.8 billion as a result of soaring land and construction costs, redesigned projects and the addition of new projects ---- such as the 2-mile French Valley Parkway in Temecula and Murrieta, and the 32-mile Mid-County Parkway that is planned to run from Corona to Hemet.

However, because of laws, policies and earlier decisions, the most the agency will be able to generate is $4.4 billion, in today's dollars, Henderson said.

There are several reasons for that. One reason is that about $250 million ---- or 5 percent ---- of the total is aimed at fixing traffic problems in existing neighborhoods and business districts. Therefore, that amount cannot legally be raised by charging new home buyers, he said.

Henderson said the region also lost out on $290 million by electing early on not to charge fees on development projects by government agencies. Agreements struck with some developers before the transportation fees went into effect cost the area another $134 million, he said.

Another $92 million was sacrificed by giving breaks on the fees to office, industrial and commercial developers as an incentive for luring jobs. Those fees are gradually being raised to the full amount, while homebuilders have been paying full freight since the program's inception. The total shortfall is $766 million.

"We cannot go back and ever make that up," Henderson said.

Because of the nearly $2 billion increase in the system's price tag, the regional panel early next year will consider hiking fees across the board. For homebuilders, the current fee of $7,200 per single-family home could rise to $9,319, Henderson said. If approved, the new charges would go into effect July 1, 2006.

More than 90 percent of the $5.1 billion program is earmarked for roads. Officials also plan to spend $124 million on public transit and $107 million buying up land with habitat for endangered species to make up for habitat that will be paved over for roads.

Riverside Mayor Ron Loveridge suggested that the funding scheme is fundamentally flawed because it is set up to perpetuate the status quo ---- a society built around the automobile ---- when the long-term need is a shift to public transit.

"Our urban form of the next century is being set by the transportation choices we are making now," Loveridge said.

Contact staff writer Dave Downey at (951) 676-4315, Ext. 2616, or ddowney@californian.com.

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