Scott Road freeway bottleneck: Questions, answers

The third (outside) lane on the southbound 215 Freeway becomes an exit-only lane onto Scott Road to allow more room for construction in preparation for the new bridge. Menifee 24/7 photos: Doug Spoon

By Doug Spoon, Editor

Jonathan Smith knows all about the inconvenience of lane closures and road construction. As director of public works for the City of Menifee, it is his job to oversee road improvements while minimizing effects on motorists during construction.

Talk about an unenviable task...

"I get everyone's frustration," Smith said last week in reference to the latest project, the Scott Road Interchange. "I get calls every day, even from city staff members, about the traffic."

Smith hears the complaints from motorists whose commute at rush hour on the 215 Freeway is a bit longer now that the outside lane both northbound and southbound is restricted to entrance and exits only to Scott Road. Drivers who have gotten used to the widened freeway (from two lanes to three) now must merge back into two through lanes at that point. That leaves the outside lane under the bridge open for construction work.

How long will that last? Well, city officials seem to be learning not to make promises about completion dates on major projects.

"It's too early in the construction schedule to estimate that," Smith about this first phase of the $57.8 million project. "You're talking about building a bridge to put a bridge on top of it."

The new Scott Road bridge over the freeway will actually be built a few feet to the north of the current bridge. What Smith is talking about is the falsework -- the temporary wood framework structure upon which the actual bridge is constructed.

The reason for the outside lane closures near the current bridge, Smith said, is to allow sufficient room for pillars to be erected to give proper support to the falsework that will stand over the freeway during construction. Erecting those pillars without the room of an open freeway lane on each side during construction simply isn't safe, he said.

"One of the lessons learned from the Perris accident was how much room is needed around the falsework," Smith said, referring to the partial collapse of falsework on the Perris/D Street bridge on July 15, 2014, when a truck hit one of the falsework supports in the narrow freeway passage. "They were trying to squeeze too many lanes under the bridge. Trucks with wide loads were too close.

"We learned that you have to allow enough room for the falsework. Once we don't need the falsework anymore, we will restore the freeway back to three lanes."

Details about the rest of the Scott Road Interchange project can found in this story published by Menifee 24/7 Oct. 11.

In July 2014, a truck passing through the narrow lanes under a bridge in Perris struck part of the falsework.