I am writing to make you all aware of a ridiculous and potentially dangerous situation on Pacific Coast Highway. I travel from Zuma Beach to West LA to my office. The trip usually takes between 35 to 45 minutes. This past week it took an average of two and a half hours both ways due to the slide just south of Topanga on PCH.
As you probably know the two lane highway narrows to one lane in both directions causing a tremendous bottleneck. This is also the area where residents of Topanga wait for the roadway to open at 3 p.m., so long lines of commuters back up here as well.
I have left and returned at various times during the week hoping to not be caught in what I measured as a three and one half mile backup in each direction. I have left at 8 am, 6 am, 10:30 am and returned at 3 p.m., 7 p.m., 4 p.m. and various other times. At no time was there a Caltrans worker clearing the dirt. There was an empty truck with a jacket in it sitting by the slide on Friday, but no live bodies at any time during my commute were seen at the site. Is this area supposed to clean itself up? Are you waiting for commuters to begin getting out of their cars and fighting with each other or worse. Do you know that people are driving down the center divider to bypass the mess thus enraging me and many other drivers? I would say no. Do you know that the cones are all over the road indicating that people are driving on and over them to get around the mess? Probably not.
Further, there is another slide just past Porto Marina, which has inched into the roadway more each day and is now in the right lane.
But no police will notify Caltrans about this because when the signal goes out at Coastline, which it does frequently, LAPD, the Sheriff Dept. and the Highway Patrol all disavow claim to this section of PCH. I have yet to see any law enforcement the entire week on PCH in this area. This is probably why the cones are all over the road and no one has acted.
This situation can no longer exist. Someone better start paying attention or it is likely that residents will take the law into their own hands. Get those Caltrans workers who normally stand with their hands on a shovel looking around with nothing to do to start driving the equipment that will move the dirt. We cannot take much more of this.
Susan Tellem