Here in the land of bottlenecks and brakelights, everyone has an intersection they love to hate. Some are simply annoying; others, downright dangerous. A few examples come immediately to mind...
- The one with the left-turn signal that doesn't let enough cars through each time.
- The blind intersection where moving forward means risking a wreck.
- The four-way stop that needs a signal.
- The street corner where drivers regularly run red lights.
- The signal where traffic backs up forever.
- The metered freeway on-ramp that seems interminable—or the off-ramp that backs up to Mexico.
For several weeks, Patch has been asking readers to vote on their favorite places around town. (In case you missed it, we've already covered and .)
But we also want to hear about unfavorites—from the yuckiest public restroom to that recurring graffiti—in hopes of spurring public officials, merchants or others in the community to fix things up.
We’re kicking off our Patch Patrol feature with your least favorite traffic intersections. Here are a few suggestions to get the conversation started:
- Pacific Coast Highway at Anderson Street
- Seal Beach Boulevard at the 405 Freeway
- Seal Beach Boulevard at St. Cloud Drive
- Lampson and Seal Beach Boulevard
- Katella Avenue and Los Alamitos Boulevard
- Katella Avenue and Bloomfield Street
- Los Alamitos Boulevard and Cerritos Avenue
Tell us about the streetcorner you dread the most: where it is and why you hate it. Vent, fume and fulminate all you like, but please keep the language clean. We’ll take nominees this week and vote for the city's worst cross streets next week.
—Roy Rivenburg contributed to this report.
What's the worst intersection in town? Why? What is needed to make it more efficient or safer? Tell us in the comments.
But I agree -- this is a tough turn to make, especially on a bike. There's no button on the right side (SW corner), so I have to go to the left side, push that button, and cross on the left side of the street, which always has me worried about those cars turning left in front of (or into) me.
In Rossmoor the same thing should also happen at Piedmont & Wembley by Weaver Elementary & Wembley & Shakespeare for Lee Elem. Of course there are quite a few intersections not running by the schools in Rossmoor that should have a stop sign. The dips in the road going in one direction do not = a stop sign, like at Donnis & Quail Run Rd, or Saint Albans & Silver Fox! There is a Traffic committee with the Rossmoor Homeowners Association, I'll call up Ralph & see if we can finally do something about this. If Orange County won't pay for more stop signs, I say we get a quote & pay for them ourselves as residents, divided by all homeowners it can't be more than a couple bucks each!?
And there is the very long line of traffic waiting in the northbound lane of Seal Beach to turn right on Katella to reach the high school every school day.
The turn into Rossmoor Centre Way(the turn into Sprouts). The idiots in Seal Beach public works and planing dept. need to extend this turn stall 5 car lengths and also the main entrance into the Shops at Rossmoor. Traffic backs up on the boulevard and is super dangerous. They have known about this problem for the last TWO years but have done nothing. While I'm at it, here is a list of other problems in the new Shops at Rossmoor. 1. Add a street right turn boulevard exit in the In N Out parking lot at the exit of the drive thru. The cars leaving are blocking the main shopping center road. 2. Add a four way stop at the exit in the In N Out parking lot. Most cars leaving assume it is a four way stop! Almost was hit twice here. 3. Add rear store entrances to ALL the new shops so cars can use the rear parking areas. The shopping center designers really dropped the ball on this! They should have a rear store entrance and check out like the Trader Joe on Strearns. 4. The four way stop next to Sprouts is dangerous since the stops signs are set way far back. You can not see cars stopped by PEI WEI since a palm tree blocks the view! Please clear. 5. Extend the four lane main entrance all the way back to Toys R Us so there won't be a right turn bottle neck. 6. Add a parking lot right turn entrance next to Panera on Rossmoor Centre Rd. Would drain the cars wanting to go to the shops on the right side making the 4way stop work faster.
They (Seal Beach Public Works) need to extend the turn stall as far back as they can to hold 10-11 cars, not the current 5-6. It is the second busiest entrance due to Sprouts. Somebody is going to get rear-ended and killed there. The main entrance will also need expanding thanks to the poorly planned In N Out and the other new stores. There go the nice planters and trees in the center dividers do to over development, too much traffic, and pure city greed. Thank YOU Seal Beach. Maybe we can return the favor someday!
Also, they are getting ready to tear down the old Edge Water Inn. I heard they wanted to build a huge commercial development there. Most people don't want it. However, somebody must be getting paid off because they are not giving up. They need more open space in that area not less. The traffic is super bad since you lose lanes going into Naples. There are way to many vacant businesses in all the nearby shopping centers to add businesses. Just look at Marina Pacifica, Alamitos Bay Landing(Seaport Village) and Peters Landing. Plus the Market Place lost Jimmys and other shops. I say turn that land into a park so the Farmers Market can use it on weekends instead of the Marina Parking lot. The city needs to fix the old shopping centers, not build new vacant messes! Long Beach is SO corrupt and they can't manage their way out of a paper bag. It will go bankrupt if they keep doing stupid things!
When the going gets tough on Katella those "in the know" beat it down to Farquar. Now this wouldn't be so bad if.. 1) The alley was closed. 2) The first entrance to the BofA lot was inbound only 3) The second entrance to the BofA lot was in and out 4) There was a u-turn pocket lane on Los Al heading northbound at Farquar (not my suggestion, that was from Cat Driscoll when she was on the City Council. The idea is that people could then exit from the southern most Vons exit and have a chance to get across the three lanes, move to the turn lane and make a U-Turn to then go southbound on Los Al. Thus reducing the need to go across the parking lot and exit Farquar to Los Al in order to head southbound.) While there is little that can be done with the Katella non-waiters transverse to Farquar, the intersection could be made to flow much smoother with these simple changes (and whomever put the two fast food pads there should be shot from a cannon). Oh, and for real fun, try exiting Ticonderoga to Katella Eastbound at say 5PM. It's sort of like russian roulette with five chambers filled. That egress serves in excess of 200 homes. The answer for many is to of course zip (and I use that word on purpose) down residential Howard to Lexington, or better yet Barrington to Siboney where some try to take the Barrington north 90 degree turn on two wheels. Yippie!
On the positive side. Well there is no positive side.
Another wayward lane paint job is Katella westbound at the 605. Why is it the LEFT hand lane ends when at one time before the street was resurfaced, the right lane (which makes more sense) ended at the freeway on ramp? This creates a lot of crazy braking, tight squeezes at the last moment and frayed nerves for those headed westbound into Long Beach. With the freeway construction, this is sometimes the only alternate.