(March 10, 2009) -- When I learned last Thursday [March 5] that Caltrans and the Orange County Transit Authority planned to close the connector between the 405/22 Freeway and westbound 7th Street for a full year (beginning next January), I couldn't believe so little was known about it.

I inquired at the 3rd and 4th District LB City Council offices, but it seemed no one had heard about the project before last week.

At that point, it became clear to me that that Caltrans and OCTA had underestimated or didn't understand the impacts their plans could have on Long Beach neighborhoods.

It is really difficult to imagine the impact of shutting off 7th Street access to all freeway commuters traveling west on the 22 Freeway or north on the 405 Freeway from Orange County.

Even without considering the Studebaker Rd. route to Belmont Shore or the 7th Street route to downtown, CSULB traffic alone is certain to create gridlock north of the campus. University traffic that would normally exit at 7th Street will have to travel north to the next exit, Palo Verde Ave.

As the Palo Verde exit backs up, southbound 605 traffic merging onto the 405 north will be affected.

The backup on the Palo Verde offramp will also force traffic to travel north to both the Woodruff Ave. or Bellflower Blvd. exits, and Bellflower is already at capacity with traffic from the southbound 405.

It's absolutely impossible to imagine that Palo Verde Ave. or Bellflower Blvd. could accommodate the additional 7th Street traffic for either the morning or afternoon commute.

So what are the officially planned detours? What do OC and state agency officials plan to do to mitigate the impacts of their plans on us? Has anybody asked LB representatives, or LB residents, what we think before dictating plans to us?

OCTA's website includes a chart with a time line of detours that indicates the 7th Street Bridge will be closed between 7/1/2010 and 6/30/2011.

However, Christina Byrne, Community Relations Officer of OCTA, told me in a March 5 telephone conversation that the schedule has been advanced to 1/1/2010. From this, I conclude that the 7th Street Bridge will be closed for basically the entire year of 2010.

Ms. Byrne also indicated that the Long Beach public meeting appears to be "late notice" only because the construction schedule was moved up.

It seems to me that LB, including its City Council, should have received better notice of all this and provided it to the public, prior to the only LB meeting on the subject, scheduled this Thursday evening, March 12 at Kettering Elementary School (550 Silvera Ave., 6:00-8:00 p.m.)

Anyone who commutes from Orange County into Long Beach should plan on attending.

Also, if you use the eastbound 7th Street connector to the northbound 605 or 405, you might also want to attend. They plan on closing those ramps too.