California Eminent Domain Report

The City of Agoura Hills is moving forward with its plans for the U.S. 101/Palo Comado Canyon Road Interchange at Chesebro Road.  According to the City,

The City has received approval from the California Department of Transportation (CalTrans) and the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) on the Project Study Report (PSR), which is the document that identifies the deficiencies of the interchange and future issues while identifying the most likely construction improvements that will resolve existing and future traffic issues.

Though the project is still in the design phase, it has overcome one of the major hurdles of any public infrastructure project:  environmental review under both the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA).  In this instance, the project is apparently governed by CEQA, and the City, working with Caltrans, prepared a Mitigated Negative Declaration which was completed in October 2012.  This means the the City does not need to prepare the much more complicated, time consuming, and expensive Environmental Impact Report. 

The City has moved on to the final design stage, preparing detailed designs and the construction drawings.  The City hopes construction will commence in 2014 or 2015.