Bridge to Nowhere wrote on Mar 26, 2008 5:03 AM:Congratulations to city officials for seeing the folly of a pedestrian bridge. They are absolutely right that students wouldn't use it. I've seen a few of those things over regular roads and never see anyone on one.

The real question is what good is widening the road going to be if the bridge over Temecula Creek is going to stay four lanes? You'll have a bottleneck that will still have traffic backing up on Pech. Pkwy. They'll just have an extra lane to spread out on while they wait.

Zygo wrote on Mar 26, 2008 7:40 AM:"School board members speculated that students would not wait for an elevator, but instead run across the road." That is one dumb statement...a pedestrian bridge doesn't have an elevator as the only means of lift. They also have stairs or ramps. People in a hurry will run up the ramps and run across the bridge.

If there is a school on one side of the roadway and kids on the otherside that are required to cross the roadway on a daily basis, then a ramp is definitely in order. The wider the roadway, the more traffic on the roadway, the faster the speeds are, the more likelyhood for disaster regarding a vehicle vs child collison.

An option is to even make it deficult to cross where there is the use of a safety bridge. This would make it safer for peds and make the roadway even more efficient for drivers.


In reply to Bridge to Nowhere: I have worked in areas with pedestrian bridges (they had ramps) and have often seen people using them - both adults and children.

Duh wrote on Mar 26, 2008 7:44 AM:If it doesn't make money for the city, it won't get built.

To Duh wrote on Mar 26, 2008 2:26 PM:"The City" is me, you, and our tax dollars - being quite well utilized, I might add - in the best city, cleanest, safest, newest, brightest, and friendliest in Southern California.
I want my city to be fiscally sound and successful. If you don't, you can simply move two miles north where things aren't nearly as good.

Ed wrote on Mar 26, 2008 2:41 PM:Basically, it will take a child being injured or killed by an inattentive driver to get something actually done. It appalls me that they put blame on the kids for not using it before the bridge is even offered. How about putting a guard to enforce that kids use it during the school hours like they do at cross walks? Better yet, how about the so gracious and generous Pechanga Casino stake holders putting up some of that money as a show of good faith to the community. The roads are already so smooth and traffic already free flowing around the casino that I'm sure they will continue their benevelency towards the local community from which they draw their wealth...

Blah Blah wrote on Mar 26, 2008 5:11 PM:The punishment for including some form of "why don't you move if you don't like it" in a comment is to dodge cellphone-talking soccer Moms and boozed up gamblers driving on Pechanga Parkway.

Build a tunnel while you've got the road torn up.

To Blah Blah wrote on Mar 26, 2008 10:51 PM:Very intelligent. The water table is about 12 feet below the roadway so a tunnel is impossible. The "why don't you move" comment stems from the ignorance of "duh's" (and I suspect "Blah Blah's) admonition that somehow the "city" is only interested in money. GOOD! I want my beautiful city to continue to operate with NO DEBT as it builds the regions most numerous-per-capita and beautiful parks, landscaped medians, public art, amenities like the Duck Pond, two libraries, two museums, a state of the art community theater, free recreation for families, movies in the park in the summer, the 38th highest retail sales tax generation in the STATE, and more, and more. Again - WITH NO DEBT and $13 million in the bank. It's fiscal responsibility and civic management at its best. If "duh" could offer an intelligent comment, I'd welcome a cogent debate. But implying that the "city" is only interested in making money through improving our infrastructure is pathetically stupid. Having so little knowledge of the basics of fiscal management is understandable. But being that ignorant and still attempting to credibly accuse and impune the best run city in Southern California speaks volumes about the education level and basic comprehension of the author. Come to think of it, Blah-Blah is likely a very appropriate name.

Where's PECHANGA? wrote on Mar 26, 2008 10:58 PM:The casino just added 1500 slot machines with 10,000 more to come! They closed two nightclubs just so they could put more slots into those spaces to make more money. They make billions of dollars a year and think they can do whatever they want by throwing $50,000 at our high schools and running TV ads spouting that they are "sharing with their neighbors". HA!! It's a drop in the gambling bucket for those people!! They should be building their own off ramp and road from the freeway so that our neighborhood gets some relief from the gamblers, drinkers, and drug users that drive through 24/7! We should start a campaign!! No freeway ramp - NO more PECHANGA!! I am fed up and so are my neighbors. PECHANGA, BUILD YOUR OWN RAMP AND ROAD. PECHANGA! OUR CHILDREN'S LIVES ARE MORE IMPORTANT THAN YOUR 15,000 NEW SLOT MACHINES!!!!

Pechanga wrote on Mar 27, 2008 3:45 PM:Pechanga is on pechanga Parkway, its that hotel by the mountains where the golf course is being built. Build an off ramp to the casino LAFFS.... Do you know how far the freeway is from the casino? Why would anyone live in those homes by the casino, they are pretty run down over there. Oh and didnt the Indians have that land 100's of years ago when temecula didnt exist? NO bridge is needed, kids DO NOT USE them and a tunnel would be a safety hazrd underground with stalkers int hem. They have closed all the tunnels in LA that go to schools. The parents need to educate their kids to wait for the lights and then look both ways. be a parent and do you job!

Blah Blah wrote on Mar 27, 2008 8:16 PM:Hey, nice comments. Beats the heck out of the inane type of comment I referred to. I'm not sure how my flippant remark could possibly be construed as a commentary on how the city conducts their business, but we'll not dwell on that.

So a few of you either don't like the tunnel idea, or consider it to be an impossible endeavor. My initial response is - that's fine. You definitely aren't getting a bridge, which is the preferred option. That leaves your kids the only option of crossing the busy, high-speed thoroughfare in the potential path of the aforementioned cellphone-talking soccer Moms and boozed up gamblers who are generally oblivious to everything around them.

Hey, why should I care? They're your kids, not mine. I'm not sure it's quite as simple as waiting for the lights and looking both ways. Drive around town and take a look at how many drivers don't wait for the lights and don't look both ways, not to mention drink, speed, dart through traffic, blah, blah. It's not your kids you have to worry about, it's the morons behind the wheel. The good news is if your kid can outrun the car, you've got absolutely nothing to worry about.

Sure, LA has closed early 1900's tunnels because of safety issues and overall structural deterioration and inadequacies with current building codes. I think technology has advanced somewhat over the past 70 or 80 years, and tunnels can be built with better safeguards, greater open design, and can be monitored before and after schools just like a crosswalk.

Incidentally, LA also closes streets because of regular drive-by shootings and puts bars on their schools to keep vandals out. Maybe we should compare Temecula to Baghdad next and really get ridiculous with our rationale why it won't work, with statements like "Terrorists will plant IED's in the tunnel!"

Finally, please tell me you weren't serious with the comment that a tunnel is impossible with groundwater at 12 feet, or any depth for that matter. If you were serious, please tell me that you're not an engineer and aren't qualified to make that statement, and you just wanted to give a real engineer a good laugh. If you are an engineer, please tell me you don't work for the City of Temecula and confess that you got your engineering degree from a box of Lucky Charms.

Stick with the prose which you appear to be quite adept at, and refrain from pretending to know anything about how things are built and whether or not they are possible to build. The limitations in the realm of possibilities lie only in the mind of the individual. Or as Harry Callahan put it: "A man's got to know his limitations". Don't say something is impossible just because you're not smart enough to figure out how to get it done.

Zygo wrote on Mar 29, 2008 12:23 AM:Regarding a tunnel. Even if there is water 12 feet down, a tunnel can still be built. A tunnel can be several feet down, a few feet down, or even ground level with the roadway raised to pass over it. A fence can be constructed in the center divider to inhibit people from crossing the roadway. I do not know the cost comparison of a tunnel vs a bridge, but I do know that children crossing a fast wide road complete with a higher percentage of drivers that have been drinking and/or sleep deprived (both casino products) are a formula for disaster.

You've Got to Be Kidding wrote on Mar 29, 2008 6:06 AM:This is a Federal in charge combined input with the State/County/City of Temecula Project of an Interstate Expressway Connecting Freeway to the I-15 Freeway all the way to the I-10 Freeway at the Beaumont/Banning Off Ramp, folks.
If Roberts could stand up in 2002/03 at the Dept. of Transportation Meeting at County Offices and be on public record stating, "You can't put two freeways within the the City of Temecula. You have to move the RCIP final selection of Butterfield Stage Rd. over to Anza Rd."
Roberts and all his buddies sure as halibut should be demanding a cross over bridge for safety...from 100,000 cars per day coming at our children! The City plans they are going to put crossing guards!! Give me a break! What a scam to quiet the parents.
Their 20 year forecasting of the City of Temecula plans held several meetings of the EIR/NEPA...etc. of what they would allow within the city with this freeway. The six lanes you need to visualize the 605 Freeway at 5:00 Friday night every day 24 hours per day.
I know what the City of Temecula Planning Commissioners asked as their specks for the freeway. I attended all of their meetings both at City Hall and three years of Riverside County Integrated Plan Road Transportation Study Meetings. The RCIP selected Butterfield Stage Rd. The selection process took 1.5 years.
Roberts and his gang wanted the Wine Country to have it…and to link up to Hemet the way Robin Lowe wanted as well. Never mind what 100,000 car’s exhaust will do to eatable crops with particulate solid particle contamination.
If Rancon’s Real Estate four employed City Council Members DO NOT CARE ANYTHING ABOUT THE SAFETY OF OUR CHILDREN'S ODDS MAKING IT ACROSSED THE STREET TWICE A DAY VERSES 100,000 CARS....WHAT DO THEY CARE ABOUT OTHER THAN MAKING MONEY FROM AND WITH DAN STEPHENSON'S EMPIRE, CALLED RANCON?

To "you've got to be kidding" wrote on Mar 29, 2008 11:41 PM:Kids who have lived in these neighborhoods near the casino for years have been crossing the unimproved Pechanga Parkway forever with heavy traffic and no problems. Kids need to learn to look both ways and make sure the traffic is stopped for them. Intersections all over the country are similar and are perfectly safe. Of course, accidents CAN happen anywhere - like the diabetes impaired driver who struck and killed a child on Winchester Road who was riding bikes with his mother on a Sunday afternoon with virtually NO traffic. No pedestrian bridge could have prevented that terrible incident. Things CAN and DO happen. But it's not the government's job to spend millions protecting us from ourselves in a perfectly safe and normal daily activity.

To Blah Blah wrote on Mar 29, 2008 11:57 PM:I should have clarified that a tunnel impacted by ground water and possible Indian cultural resources would simply be too expensive. The intersection is a safe one, so any perceived benefit would be in the minds of about 40 parents who are too lazy to walk their kids to school. Any benefit would be completely offset by the millions in costs to construct a pedestrian bridge.

I've seen children struck by cars; Never leaves you wrote on Mar 30, 2008 12:03 AM:We need a crossing bridge in order to keep our students safe across Pechanga Parkway and Wolfe Creek.

We need to activate the PTAS, parents, students, staff, principals to get the Bridge to pass safely. 100,000 cars coming off the I-15 all the way to I-10 Banning Beaumont off ramp in the near future.
If a turn is put near the old trailers before Pechanga Casino....many of the cars will stay on the new expressway. If the cars are on their ways to work, etc......... no telling in XXX years.

Who sits on the committee to approve what is done by the Federal Government in our area is:
Representative D.arrell Issa att. Mary Pritschaw
Mary.Pritschaw@mail.house.gov

Representative Mary Bono att. Anne Bryant
anne.bryant@mail.house.gov

These are the lead assistants e-mails.
When you want immediate action and help.... you send to Issa and Bono this way. Otherwise.....your e-mails are in huge piles.....may not seen for weeks.

Great Oaks, the residents of homes along Pechanga Parkway neighborhood's and James Gardner Middle School have very little time left.

They also need to go to Pechanga....to ask for their assistance.

Priorities wrote on Mar 30, 2008 11:28 AM:The City of Temecula has spent, and are going to spend money, float bonds, and do all kinds of fiscal shenanigans, on projects that make dollars for the developers who really run this place. It seems to me it's not the taxes, it how they are spent that matter. A bridge across that busy Parkway is certainly a prudent thing to build, it will save lives. I guarantee if a council members Child or Grandchild had to cross that road everyday, the money would be spent. I feel a joint project comprising the City and Pechanga might be in order.