PPCC Hosts Presentation Addressing Changes Along Chautauqua

Left-Turn Signal to be Installed at Sunset Intersection, LADOT Presents Potential Ideas for Improvements at PCH

By SARAH SHMERLING | Editor-in-Chief

At its most recent virtual meeting on Thursday, October 22, Pacific Palisades Community Council hosted a presentation by CD11 Transportation Policy Director Eric Bruins and Los Angeles Department of Transportation Senior Transportation Engineer Tim Fremaux about upcoming and potential changes to Chautauqua Boulevard.

Bruins first spoke about a left-turn signal that will be placed at the intersection of Sunset and Chautauqua boulevards for vehicles traveling westbound on Sunset, “which should address the primary cause of collision that we’ve seen at that location.”

During his portion of the presentation, Bruins referred to a fatal incident in April 2017 involving a motorcyclist that was hit by a Mercedes Benz heading westbound and turning left, prompting then-PPCC At-large Representative Lou Kamer to begin a petition for LADOT to conduct a survey at this intersection.

PPCC Secretary Chris Spitz took a minute to thank Kamer for “staying on” CD11 and LADOT to make sure the signal was put in.

Fremaux then took over to present about the intersection of Pacific Coast Highway and Chautauqua Boulevard—which he referred to as a “constant source of complaints” within the community—as well as West Channel Road.

“What we were told was there’s often confusion because of the sort of unusual nature of these three roadways and the way that they converge,” Fremaux explained. “We did meet with Caltrans and Eric as well, and we walked through some of the concerns and tried to come up with potential solutions that would not break the bank that we could implement relatively quickly.”

The first portion of the road that he addressed was turning right from Pacific Coast Highway onto either Chautauqua Boulevard or West Channel Road, which currently has two right lanes that allow for turning onto Chautauqua.

“What we don’t really allow in the city anymore—although you still see them around, we’re trying to get rid of them—is situations where … there are two right-turn lanes crossing a crosswalk while a walk sign is on for pedestrians,” Fremaux explained, “because in those situations, what you have is a … lack of adequate visibility by motorists in order to see the pedestrians because a lot of times they’ll be obscured by the driver next to them making a right turn.”

LADOT’s proposal included making the right most lane, which today is either a right turn onto West Channel or Chautauqua, be a right-turn only onto West Channel and the lane next to it would either be to turn onto Chautauqua or proceed on PCH.

“Speaking from personal experience, that far right lane significantly decreases traffic time wait for people coming up Chautauqua because we don’t have to deal with people going straight on PCH,” PPCC Area 6 1st Alternate Karyn Weber, a resident of the Huntington, responded, taking into account comments that were being shared by fellow community members within the Zoom chat.

Youth Advisor Zennon Ulyate-Crow suggested the department look into making the right most lane a single right turn onto West Channel and the second most right lane a single right turn onto Chautauqua to alleviate this issue.

“I feel that this idea that you all have proposed is very promising because it solves both of the issues of pedestrian safety and channelizing the space appropriately and avoiding the backup on PCH,” Fremaux concluded before heading into the second half of his presentation.

“Coming down Chautauqua, it’s not intuitive for the driver because normally left lane means left turn, right lane means right turn,” Fremaux said. “Here we have sort of a U-turn movement or a hard left that is actually, according to the counts we have, very heavily used.”

Two suggestions Fremaux shared were pushing everything over to provide a separate right-turn lane for vehicles to turn onto PCH as well as making the arrow from West Channel Road onto Chautauqua more of a U-turn symbol than the current marking, which Fremaux said looks more like a right-turn arrow.

“If you ask every single person who lives in this neighborhood, the U-turn versus left turn onto PCH is the biggest thorn in our side that everybody in this community deals with from a traffic perspective,” Weber shared, adding that, in her experience, about 50% of the people in that lane continue onto PCH instead of making the U-turn onto West Channel.

Several members of the community then offered suggestions, covering everything from more obvious signage to a ticketing camera, which is not a possibility due to the program being terminated and it not covering improper movements.

“From Chautauqua down to southbound PCH, is the arc entering into the paddle zone and the K-rail the maximum or can it be shortened so that only that one lane can enter safely?” Kamer asked. “Right now, the paddle zone starts basically further down the road, so it allows the number one and number two lane to go in there, but if it were shortened further north or lengthened, wouldn’t that allow only one to go in?”

Fremaux responded that this would be a good idea to discourage people, concluding that he would consult with Caltrans representatives regarding what could or could not be done on PCH with feedback he gathered during the meeting in mind.