Traffic Signals

The days of being stuck in traffic near Fashion Island, on MacArthur Boulevard and some parts of East Coast Highway may be over — or at least less frustrating. Newport Beach embarked on a new era in signal management recently, a project that will eventually update 112 lights at intersections throughout the city to be more modern, accessible and more readily monitored, officials said. The first phase of the project, which has just begun, will update 22 intersections with new traffic signal controller equipment, fiber cabling, special cameras to monitor traffic and direct feeds to a traffic management center.

A power outage swept the areas of Triangle Square up to Wilson Street and Harbor Boulevard Friday night in Costa Mesa. The cause has not been given. The blackout occurred from about 10 to 11:30 p.m. and lasted 90 minutes. No accidents took place despite the fact that traffic signals went out, Costa Mesa Police Sgt. Mike Ginther said. "It was just a pain for the officers who had to go out and direct traffic," Ginther said. "But at that time, the traffic flow wasn't real heavy."

Here are some of the decisions coming out of the Newport Beach City Council meeting on Tuesday. Not so EZ Lube WHAT HAPPENED: A controversial request to build an EZ Lube in Corona del Mar did not get its day in chambers as expected. Though council members were prepared to consider the request Tuesday night, the matter was postponed at the applicant's request. EZ Lube has asked the council to reconsider the Planning Commission's decision to deny the company a permit to build a 2,641-square-foot auto service facility at 3600 E. Coast Highway.

What if we could reduce our dependence upon foreign oil, help clean up our air, increase gas mileage for all vehicles, reduce traffic congestion as well as the time it would take us to get from here to there, and be relatively easy and cheap to bring into effect? Would you be interested? Because such a program exists: Synchronize our traffic signals! What does that mean? We could coordinate our traffic signals so that if cars go at a posted fixed speed, the traffic lights will turn green for them as they approach each intersection on designated main thoroughfare streets.

He spent much of his life devising ways to change our lives for the better. There was the hair straightener and the zig-zag stitching attachment for the sewing machine. There was the gas mask and one of his most significant inventions, the traffic signal. It was a way to prevent collisions created by all those bicycles, animal-powered wagons and new gasoline-powered motor vehicles that were sharing the same roads and streets in the early 1900s. The seventh of 11 children, born in 1877 to Sidney and Elizabeth Morgan in Paris, Ky., Garrett Augustus Morgan was a kid who showed aptitude and a man who never stopped striving for a better life.

BRIEFLY IN THE NEWS Peninsula outage lasts several hours About a mile stretch of the Balboa Peninsula was without power for several hours on Sunday night, Newport Beach police said. Electricity, including to traffic signals, was affected for various lengths of time along Balboa Boulevard roughly between 30th and 15th streets sometime after 6 p.m., a dispatcher said. The outage included the area of the peninsula around Via Lido and Newport Boulevard.

I have two words for the Greenlight Implementation Committee's efforts for the expansion of the Koll properties -- deceptive and misleading. Concerning the proposed project's effect on traffic, the committee, in its literature, stresses the idea that the project is miles from coastal residential areas and will not affect coastal traffic. What about the many Newport Beach residents in neighborhood communities like Newport North, the Bluffs, Eastbluff, One Ford Road, Big Canyon and even Harbor View Homes that are much closer to the project?

Mathis Winkler NEWPORT BEACH -- Concerned about California's continuing energy crisis, community activist Nancy Skinner has been working hard to do her share. She's looked into replacing her refrigerator with a model that eats up less power and bought so-called "green plugs" for herself and her daughter, Susan Caustin, to reduce energy consumption on other household appliances. That move turned out to be somewhat counterproductive, causing $180 in damage to Caustin's dishwasher.

A 41-year-old man died after a vehicle he was traveling in struck a traffic signal pole on Irvine Center Drive, Irvine police said. John Hwan Kim of Laguna Woods was dead when police arrived to the scene of the crash in the 8800 block north of Hubble about 12:40 a.m. Friday, according to the Irvine Police Department. Kim was alone in the vehicle at the time of the crash, police said. Police do not believe alcohol was a factor. Irvine Center Drive was closed to northbound traffic between Research Drive and Bake Parkway on Friday morning and afternoon, and workers continued work about 4:15 p.m. Friday on repairing the signal, Cmdr.

Re "Irvine's PSA seeks to deter wrecks," Feb. 19: Irvine traffic signals are exquisitely asynchronous. They are impeccably interminable as eight lane directions (through and turn) languidly separately proceed, plus time delays. Drivers park in place or stomp gas pedals. Lowered mileage with increased component wear gorge Irvine sales tax. Pollution emissions empower heinous regulation and its political gains. Paralyzed traffic enrages and entraps, feeding traffic court productivity.

In 2004, I took an unpaid leave of absence from my duties as a trial court judge and ran for U.S. Senate as a Libertarian. I knew I would not win the election, but I was so upset at the direction our country was headed that I wanted to be a part of the discussion. Frankly speaking, it was a waste of time and effort. President George W. Bush's conceding the election in California virtually from the outset resulted in the senatorial campaign of Republican Bill Jones simply never getting off the ground.

Police have arrested a man on suspicion of stealing batteries from traffic signals located in Newport Beach and Costa Mesa, officials said Thursday. An officer who stopped Ricardo Urizar, 28, of Los Angeles, for a traffic violation July 12 noticed 22 batteries in the bed of the rented truck Urizar was driving, according to a news release from the Newport Beach Police Department. Police said Urizar intended to sell the batteries he allegedly stole from the boxes, which had locks that he cut off. The batteries are used as backup in case of power failures, according to the release.

A San Clemente woman is asking for Costa Mesa to pay more than $42,000 in medical expenses because she was hit by a car while riding her bicycle at Fairview Road and Fair Drive in November. In the claim filed against the city March 17, Katelyn Obbards, 18, blames the signals at the Costa Mesa intersection for not giving her enough time to cross before she was hit by a Dodge Intrepid after midnight Nov. 18. Obbards claims that when she and her friend were riding their bikes eastbound on Fair Drive and when they got to the corner of Fairview Road, the Fair Drive light turned green, permitting them to cross.

A swath of Costa Mesa residents experienced a power outage Tuesday afternoon after a power line on Fair Drive short-circuited, Southern California Edison officials said. From 1:43 to 4:17 p.m. an undetermined number of Costa Mesa customers went without electricity as Edison workers worked to restore power. The outage also darkened many traffic signals in the area. The Costa Mesa police station and City Hall ran on back-up generators during the outage, officials said. Homes between Harbor Boulevard and Santa Ana Avenue and between Wilson Street and Arlington Drive were affected.

The days of being stuck in traffic near Fashion Island, on MacArthur Boulevard and some parts of East Coast Highway may be over — or at least less frustrating. Newport Beach embarked on a new era in signal management recently, a project that will eventually update 112 lights at intersections throughout the city to be more modern, accessible and more readily monitored, officials said. The first phase of the project, which has just begun, will update 22 intersections with new traffic signal controller equipment, fiber cabling, special cameras to monitor traffic and direct feeds to a traffic management center.

He spent much of his life devising ways to change our lives for the better. There was the hair straightener and the zig-zag stitching attachment for the sewing machine. There was the gas mask and one of his most significant inventions, the traffic signal. It was a way to prevent collisions created by all those bicycles, animal-powered wagons and new gasoline-powered motor vehicles that were sharing the same roads and streets in the early 1900s. The seventh of 11 children, born in 1877 to Sidney and Elizabeth Morgan in Paris, Ky., Garrett Augustus Morgan was a kid who showed aptitude and a man who never stopped striving for a better life.

What if we could reduce our dependence upon foreign oil, help clean up our air, increase gas mileage for all vehicles, reduce traffic congestion as well as the time it would take us to get from here to there, and be relatively easy and cheap to bring into effect? Would you be interested? Because such a program exists: Synchronize our traffic signals! What does that mean? We could coordinate our traffic signals so that if cars go at a posted fixed speed, the traffic lights will turn green for them as they approach each intersection on designated main thoroughfare streets.

Here are some items the board will consider tonight: PLANNING COMMISSIONER In November, Planning Commissioner Michael Henn was elected to the City Council, leaving a vacancy on the planning board. The council will vote tonight to appoint a replacement on the Planning Commission for Henn, whose term expires June 30, 2009. At its last meeting, the council confirmed the nominations of Timothy Stoaks and Bradley Hillgren. Stoaks is an architect for the pharmaceutical company Allergan, while Hillgren has been the chief executive of the Lowe Enterprises Real Estate Group since 1986.