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By Gary Richards Mercury News Posted: 01/09/2011 12:00:00 AM PST Updated: 01/10/2011 08:32:24 AM PST If you're a commuter who loves metering lights, you'll relish this. If not, you might want to soon find another way to commute to work. In the biggest expansion of ramp metering in a decade, Caltrans is preparing to install traffic signals on 86 Bay Area freeway ramps by this time next year and at another 266 locations over the next three to six years -- more than doubling the number of metered ramps, from 298 to 650. Most will be installed in Santa Clara and Alameda counties and cover some of the region's most congested freeways -- Interstate 880 south from Montague Expressway to I-280, Interstate 680 between I-580 and Highway 237, I-280 through downtown San Jose and the 92-880 interchange in Hayward. Not only will there be more meters, but some lights will be working as late as 10 am and 7 pm instead of being turned off at 9 am and 6:30 pm, as they are now at many locations. About $100 million is needed to meter more ramps in the Bay Area. That's not a lot of money when spread out over nine counties, but traffic engineers see metering as a way to decrease congestion at little cost. Cheaper than lanes The bill to add 15 meters along I-280 in San Jose will be less than $5 million. Adding a lane in each direction from Highway 101 to I-880 could cost as much as $20 million -- probably more. "Metering ramps is the most cost-effective way to optimize the efficiency of the freeway Advertisement system," said Hans Larsen, head of the San Jose Department of Transportation, which has pushed hard for meters on routes through the city. The big test will be on southbound Interstate 680, where 50 meters will be turned on later this year from Stoneridge Drive to Highway 237, where backups have been horrific since the opening of the toll lane last fall. In three more years, another 32 meters will be installed on the northbound side, where traffic jams are even worse. "Metering lights do work, as much as I hate sitting behind them," said Kevin Campbell of Fremont, who added that all one needs to do is drive I-680, which today has no working lights. "Traffic on 680 slows down or stops at every onramp, and then after everybody merges, traffic speeds go up again, only to slow down at the next onramp." When Highway 85 opened in 1994 from South San Jose to Cupertino, it was the first freeway in the South Bay to have every ramp metered. Many drivers were incensed at having to wait as much as 10 minutes at onramps. Local officials joined the protest and told Caltrans to turn off freeway-to-freeway meters and speed up those at ramps from city streets. So instead of one car going every eight or 10 seconds, they began flowing onto 85 at a rate of one car every four seconds. But the 25-mile drive from the 85-101 interchange in South San Jose to the 85-101 interchange in Mountain View got significantly worse. It went from about 40 minutes during the morning rush hour to nearly an hour. Within a few weeks, the meters were switched back to their original settings. When meters were turned on along I-580 last year, peak travel times from the 580-680 interchange to east of Livermore dropped from 40 to 25 minutes. And since lights were activated on Highway 87 two years ago, peak travel times have fallen by as much as 39 percent. But the story appears different on the South Bay's most congested road -- Highway 101 from the San Mateo County line to I-880. Meters were turned on last year, and many drivers say they've seen little if any improvement. "It's just as bad as ever," Trisha Lopez of San Jose said. Be patient And there are mixed reactions on the northbound 101 drive in the morning. "It takes 15 minutes to get to the freeway to drive five minutes to downtown," said Rob Glanville, who lives in the Evergreen area of San Jose. Be patient, said Eileen Goodwin, who headed the agency that oversaw the installation of meters on 85. The trick, she said, is for Caltrans to tweak the number of seconds per car and other variables until they find the "sweet spot," the combination that works perfectly.
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