710 Freeway Project Celebrated as Decades-Long Debate Continues

A Southern California city celebrated a proposed tunnel on Wednesday that would complete the Long Beach (710) Freeway, despite critics continuing to push against its construction in a decades-long debate over how to "close the gap."

The 710 Freeway currently ends in a populated Alhambra neighborhood, but a pair of proposed 4-mile tunnels would connect it to both the Foothill (210) and Ventura (134) freeways in Pasadena.

The voter-approved tunnel would reduce local traffic significantly, improve air quality, and create around 40,300 new jobs, according to 710 Coalition, a group in favor of the construction.

Supporters gathered Wednesday at the 710 Day Celebration in Alhambra to promote the project, which could cost up to $5.7 billion.

But city leaders and activists have suggested other solutions would be superior, including a light rail, street-widening, and building bus lanes and bicycle lanes to get more commuters out of their cars.

"I think we all recognize that the minute this freeway is built, if it were ever to be built, it would be filled to capacity, and that’s not much of a transportation solution," Rep. Adam Schiff, D-California, told NBC4 last week.

Schiff is part of a group called Beyond the 710 that fights against the tunnels as an answer to the freeway's completion problem — a topic that has been debated for over five decades.

"The reality is that the costs are many times in excess of what Metro thought they would be. It’s really cost prohibitive, and we have an alternative," Schiff said." We can continue this fight indefinitely, and it’s never going to happen, or we can look at things that are immediate that can bring relief that can add to the quality of life in the region."

Alhambra's Vice Mayor Barbara Messina said she does not understand the opposition.

"When it was the surface route I could understand it," she said Wednesday, wearing a T-shirt reading, "CLOSE the GAP, California 710."

"They were protecting their homes and I could understand that," she said.

But Messina said the opposition feels like a "holy war," and doesn't want her city to be a catch-all for traffic congestion.

"We have been the dumping ground from day one, because it ends on Valley Boulevard, so you get all of those hundreds of thousands of cars," she said.

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority board is expected to select one or more proposals next year, although they can also choose to leave the 710 gap as is.

"We're not asking or expecting 100 percent of commuters to dump their cars," said Glendale Mayor Ara Najarian, an MTA board member also part of Beyond the 710. "We only need about 10 percent of those folks to stay out of their cars or to ride the transit, and that's going to free up the capacity of our roadways incredibly."

The alternative proposals come during the environmental review of the tunnel and the four other suggested solutions. The 90-day comment period for the review will conclude on July 6.

Conan Nolan contributed to this report.