Deirdre Newman
City officials are redoubling efforts to get two long-planned bridges
deleted from county maps to avoid having a decision on the
controversial construction made for them.
The two bridges at issue would connect Gisler Avenue to Garfield
Street, which divides Huntington Beach and Fountain Valley, and 19th
Street to Banning Avenue in Huntington Beach.
On Monday, the Orange County Transportation Authority postponed
for 30 to 60 days its decision on providing funding to Fountain
Valley to study the Gisler bridge.
The delay was to give the three cities that would be affected one
last chance to come to a consensus. Costa Mesa and Huntington Beach
oppose the bridge.
The only way to agree to eliminate the Gisler bridge is to agree
to eliminate the 19th Street bridge, since both removals have been
examined previously, Costa Mesa Mayor Gary Monahan said. This
requires coming up with ways to lessen the traffic in the region
without bridges and is also predicated on the approval of Newport
Beach, since it supports the 19th Street bridge.
Fountain Valley's request for funding is forcing a decision on
thorny issues that have stalled for years, which is a positive step,
Monahan said.
"Costa Mesa does not believe the bridges needs to be built and is
doing everything we can to delete them," Monahan said. "There will be
give and take on both sides. There will be some mitigation measures
we may not be happy with, but they will be better than a bridge and
less expensive, and the cities need to sit down and hammer it out so
it's not hammered out for them by [the authority]."
The Gisler bridge pits Fountain Valley against Huntington Beach
and Costa Mesa.
Costa Mesa officials and some residents are concerned about
cut-through traffic racing through their neighborhood to the Costa
Mesa Freeway. Residents on the Huntington Beach side of Garfield
Street also adamantly oppose the bridge. But officials in Fountain
Valley, which owns the other side of Garfield, want to alleviate
increased traffic in their city.
The 19th Street bridge pits Newport Beach against Huntington Beach
and Costa Mesa.
Newport Beach wants the bridge to expedite traffic flow between it
and Huntington Beach. Residents around Banning Street in Huntington
Beach are against it, and Costa Mesa officials again fear it will be
only used as a cut-through.
A study of the bridges, the Santa Ana River Crossing Study that
the four cities commissioned to research the effects of removing the
