Saratoga News

Draft report suggests some solutions to freeway noise

By Sarah Lombardo

The roar from Highway 85 traffic is one step closer to being muffled: A draft report prepared for Caltrans finds that at least three methods could be used along the highway to reduce noise.

The report, written by Acentech Inc. of Thousand Oaks, concludes that resurfacing the existing roadway, adding surface absorption to existing noise barriers and increasing the height of noise barriers could reduce the level of noise by between one and five decibels, depending on the method used. A combination of methods would result in a greater reduction in noise.

The report, which cost about $105,000, was commissioned by Caltrans after it agreed in March 1996 to look into methods of hushing the highway under pressure from the Cupertino and Saratoga city councils, Assemblyman Jim Cunneen, Assemblyman Byron Sher and the Freeway Noise Abatement Committee, a citizens' group.

The draft report has been distributed to the FNAC and Caltrans for comment. It will then go back to Acentech to have questions or comments addressed, and, according to Victor Zeuzem, Caltrans branch chief of environmental engineering, a final report should be ready in about a month.

Reactions to the report have been mixed.

"It's OK," Zeuzem said. "I think it's heading in the right direction. It hasn't provided any surprises."

The sound-reduction methods suggested by Acentech are the same ones recommended more than a year ago by members of FNAC. Although the group's co-chairwoman, Joan Hershkowitz, said she is encouraged by the report and its findings, she also said it has been frustrating.

"They could have gotten started on this a year and a half ago," she said. "But on the other hand, I am very grateful that we have been validated ... and that now we have a direction to go."

Zeuzem said the Acentech's purpose was not just to find methods of quieting the freeway, but to search for alternatives that might not yet have been tried by Caltrans.

"I think it doesn't take a rocket scientist to look at the situation out there and see that you are limited in options," he said. "I think the real challenge of the study is to be able to determine how effective these measures would be and how much they would cost."

And cost is going to play the next role in the quest to quiet the freeway. Although Caltrans paid for the study, it is not yet decided who will foot the bill for the noise-abatement measures. Acentech's report estimates that the cost of resurfacing the highway would be about $600,000; adding sound-absorbing material to the sound walls would cost about $3.6 million; and raising the height of some areas of the sound walls would be about $1.5 million.

George Korbay, co-chairman of the FNAC, said it has always been their position that Caltrans should be responsible for the cost of implementing sound-reducing measures. But Caltrans feels differently about who will pay for it.

"One of the issues that will be discussed after this report is finalized will be who, if anyone, is liable to provide the money," Zeuzem said, stressing that Caltrans maintains that it built a freeway that meets or exceeds requirements. "I'm certainly not the person to ask about that."

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