California State Route 110

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(Redirected from Pasadena Freeway)

Template:Infobox CA Route Image:Pasadenafwy110version032406.jpg State Route 110, the Pasadena Freeway, extends from Interstate 10 and Interstate 110 in Los Angeles, California to Pasadena, California, United States. The surface street extension of this route in Pasadena is named Arroyo Parkway, and extends to intersect with Colorado Boulevard, once a part of U.S. Route 66. (SR 110 itself was part of US 66 after it was built.) Route 110 is also known as the Arroyo Seco Parkway, and has been declared a National Scenic Byway.

Even though the whole length of SR 110 is the Pasadena Freeway, Harbor Freeway does appear on signs south of U.S. Route 101 at the Four Level Interchange in downtown Los Angeles.

Interstate 110, the State Route's southern extension to San Pedro, is also legislatively Route 110. A short surface alignment in San Pedro, south of the end of I-110 at State Route 47, was once another section of State Route 110.

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Pasadena Freeway

Image:ArroyoSecoPkwy(CA110)1940.jpg Image:FigueroaStTunnels.jpg A nine-mile (14 km), dedicated cycleway was built in 1897 by a private business to connect Pasadena to Los Angeles. Its right of way followed the stream bed of the Arroyo Seco and required 1,250,000 board feet (2,950 m³) of pine wood to construct. The roundtrip toll was $0.15 (USD), and the cycleway was lit with electric lights along its entire length. The enterprise was not financially successful, so eventually the structure was dismantled and the wood was sold for a profit. The right of way later became the route for the Arroyo Seco Parkway. [1]

The original freeway was designed by Spencer CortelyouTemplate:Ref and was first named the Arroyo Seco Parkway. It had no highway number designation when it first opened and originally had a speed limit of 45 miles an hour (70 km/h). Traffic originally ran in two lanes in each direction with a wide shoulder available for emergency parking. The original route of this Parkway — its 1940 appellation — ran from the Chinatown district in downtown Los Angeles to Pasadena, and was later extended to meet the Hollywood Freeway and Santa Ana Freeway. It was one of the first modern urban freeways built in the United States. The Parkway opened to traffic on December 30, 1940; a writer for the New York Times noted that it was one of the "outstanding highway improvements in the country."Template:Ref

The original portion of the Pasadena Freeway is considered by today's standards to be obsolete and rather dangerous. In its current six-lane configuration, there are no shoulders, although there are periodic turnouts that one can swerve into during an emergency.

Entry or exit from the freeway is a death-defying feat, illustrated by the Avenue 52 intersection in Highland Park. At this point the freeway is depressed and Avenue 52 passes over it. There is one on-ramp and one off-ramp in each direction, each perhaps 100 feet (30 meters) in length. At the bottom of the on-ramp there is actually a limit line and a stop sign. Freeway users must stop at the line, wait for an opening in traffic, and then accelerate from a complete stop directly into traffic moving at 55 mph — there is no acceleration lane.

Exiting the freeway entails pulling onto the off-ramp while still at speed and skidding to a stop. While the freeway is posted for 55 mph (90 km/h), most drivers regard the speed limit as nothing more than guidelines.

When traveling from Los Angeles into South Pasadena, there is a set of sharp, sweeping turns required to keep the freeway within the bounds of the canyon. Since the original design envisioned a much slower traffic flow, these turns are not banked. The speed through them is reduced, but driving this freeway for the first time can be, even for an experienced driver, a hair-raising experience. Despite all this, the freeway is still heavily used by drivers, as it remains the most direct route between Los Angeles and Pasadena for automobiles.

Four medium-sized tunnels (called the "Figueroa Street Tunnels") run under and through the hills of Elysian Park. In the northward direction (toward Pasadena), stairways and bus pads can still be seen to the left before the tunnels. These remnants date from the days when the Arroyo Seco Parkway was first opened, and are no longer in use.

The Pasadena Freeway runs through heavily working-class Latino neighborhoods such as Lincoln Heights and Highland Park, as well as upper-middle-class white populated portions of Pasadena and South Pasadena (these generalizations about ethnicity are drawn from U.S. Census data).

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Extension of route

Since its original opening, the freeway has been extended southwards from the four level interchange near downtown Los Angeles to the port of Los Angeles, in San Pedro. The Harbor Freeway runs through the poorer inner-city sections — with a predominantly African American population — of South Los Angeles. The Harbor Freeway is entirely within the city of Los Angeles except a four-mile stretch where it marks the boundary between Carson, California and an unincorporated area in the South Bay. Because this section of freeway is up to Interstate Highway standards, it is much wider and is far safer to drive than the older Pasadena-to-Los Angeles route.

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Landmarks and filmography

Some famous landmarks along or nearby the Interstate 110 Harbor Freeway include the University of Southern California (USC), Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, Shrine Auditorium (where several major film, TV, and music awards are presented), Staples Center (home of the NBA's Los Angeles Lakers and Clippers and NHL's Kings), Chinatown, Dodger Stadium (home of the MLB's Los Angeles Dodgers), and the Southwest Museum (a museum dedicated to Native American culture).

Tucked within the southwest loop of the intersection with Interstate 10 is the Central Los Angeles office of the California Highway Patrol. It was heavily photographed for the 1970s U.S. television program CHiPs, as it was depicted as the home office of its main characters, Officers Jon Baker and Frank Poncherello. It does not have direct access to or from either freeway, though.

During the 1992 Los Angeles riots, a white truck driver named Reginald Denny was pulled from his truck and beaten on an intersection, Florence Avenue and Normandie Street, about a mile (2 km) west from the 110 Freeway. The incident was broadcast live via news helicopter.

The Pasadena Freeway can be seen in the introduction of the 1971 Steven Spielberg film, Duel. Dennis Weaver's character drives through several tunnels before entering the Interstate 5 interchange (which leads to Sacramento and beyond).

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Citizen involvement

In 2001, Richard Ankrom, a local artist, who repeatedly got lost trying to get onto Interstate 5 North from the 110 Freeway because there was no clear official signage labeling access to the 5 North, solved his frustration by covertly modifying one of the overhead signs on the freeway just before the tunnels. Using official government sign specifications, Ankrom fabricated two sign pieces, one being an Interstate marker shield with the number '5' on it, and one with the word "NORTH", and affixed them to the left side of the sign. He performed his modifications in broad daylight, disguised as a CalTrans worker, and the results went unnoticed for nine months, until his friend leaked the news to the Los Angeles Times.

Prior to Ankrom's work, the only signage directing motorists to the 5 North off-ramp came at a quarter-mile before the exit, thus forcing many to merge across multiple lanes in a very short distance. The unofficial modifications remain on the sign to this day, after having been inspected by CalTrans to ensure it would not fall off onto the road below. CalTrans is gradually upgrading all California freeway signs to a newer, more reflective form; when this happens on the 110, Ankrom's work will be lost, but the new sign will include "5 North" icons.

Ankrom was never charged, despite statements from officials that his actions were illegal.

See http://www.thisistrue.com/freeway.html for a picture of Ankrom's work.
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State law

Legal Definition of Route 110: California Streets and Highways Code, Chapter 2, Article 3, Section 410 Template:CAFESAlt

Route 110 from Route 10 to Pasadena is known as the Pasadena Freeway. [State Highway Commission (11/18/1954)]

Source: 2004 Named Freeways, Highways, Structures and Other Appurtenances in California (PDF)

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Trivia

The name Arroyo Seco in Spanish means Dry Wash.

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Alternate transportation

There exists an alternate way of getting from Los Angeles to Pasadena. The Metro Gold Line, on the former AT&SF Pasadena Subdivision right-of-way, offers "quick, convenient transit" from Pasadena to Los Angeles, with various intermediate stops.

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Exit list

Postmile<ref name="bridge log">January 1, 2006 California Log of Bridges on State Highways</ref> Municipality #<ref>Cal-NExUS Interchange Exit Numbering</ref> Destinations Notes
LA 21.44 Los Angeles Image:Interstate 110 (California).svg Interstate 110 south - San Pedro southbound exit and northbound entrance
LA 21.44 21 Image:Interstate 10 (California).svg Interstate 10 - Santa Monica Freeway; Santa Ana; Santa Monica southbound exit and northbound entrance
LA 22.12 22A Olympic Boulevard southbound exit and northbound entrance
LA 22.27 22-23A Downtown - 9th Street; 6th Street northbound exit and southbound entrance; old exit 22A
LA 22.27
LA 22.44 		22B 8th Street; 9th Street southbound exit and northbound entrance; old exit 22B
23B-C 4th Street; 3rd Street northbound exit and southbound entrance; old exit 22B
23C-B-A 6th Street; 4th Street - Wilshire Boulevard; Downtown; 3rd Street southbound exit and northbound entrance
LA 23.73 24A Image:US 101 (CA).svg U.S. Route 101 north; Interstate 5 south; Interstate 10 east - Hollywood; Santa Ana; San Bernardino Four Level Interchange
24B Sunset Boulevard southbound exit and northbound entrance; old exit 24A
LA 24.55 24C Civic Center; Hill Street no southbound entrance; northbound exit is combined with exit 24B; old exit 24B southbound
LA 24.73 24D Stadium Way - Dodger Stadium; Hill Street exit 24B northbound; old exit 24 northbound and 24C southbound
LA 25.04 25 Solano Avenue; Academy Road old exit 25 northbound
LA 25.75 26A Image:Interstate 5 (California).svg Interstate 5 north - Golden State Freeway; Sacramento northbound exit and southbound entrance
LA 25.78 26B Figueroa Street northbound exit and southbound entrance; old exit 26
LA 25.91 26A Avenue 26 southbound exit and northbound entrance
LA 25.75 26B Image:Interstate 5 (California).svg Interstate 5 - Sacramento; Santa Ana southbound exit and northbound entrance
LA 27.12 27 Avenue 43
LA 28.05 28A Avenue 52
LA 28.38 28B Via Marisol
LA 28.76 29 Avenue 60
LA 29.28 30A Marmion Way; Avenue 64 northbound exit and southbound entrance
LA 29.50 30 York Boulevard southbound exit and entrance
30B Bridewell Street northbound exit only
LA 30.59 South Pasadena 31A Orange Grove Avenue
LA 31.17 31B Fair Oaks Avenue northbound exit and southbound entrance
LA 31.17 31B Fair Oaks Avenue - South Pasadena southbound exit only
LA 31.9<ref name="cah 110"/> Glenarm Street at-grade intersection
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References

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External links

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