LA Could Take Aim at Waze Users to Reduce Dodgers Traffic
According to a recent story by the Eastsider, the Los Angeles City Council will vote on a motion to deal with ever-increasing traffic during Los Angeles Dodgers baseball games in surrounding neighborhoods.
While the remote location of Dodger Stadium has always lent itself to some traffic issues, it’s easy to spot the recent uptick in congestion around the park. The Dodgers are pursuing their fifth-consecutive division championship and currently hold the best record in baseball. With frequent sell-out crowds, attendees are looking for creative ways to get around the crowds and into the stadium’s vast parking lot.
Areas like Echo Park and Solano Canyon in the immediate vicinity of the ballpark are being inundated with through traffic as apps like Google Maps and (Google-owned) Waze redirect fans through residential neighborhoods. If approved, the City Council vote would create a new traffic plan to close certain residential streets from non-residents, keeping game traffic to freeways and main roads. In the plan, 10 intersections have been identified for resident-only access.
As the Eastsider points out, it’s still not clear how this vote will directly deal with drivers using traffic apps to get to Dodger Stadium. While road closures can assist in some ways, apps like Waze mark those instances and direct users elsewhere as necessary. Plus, closures of nearby streets while directing traffic to freeways could create far more congestion at those on-ramps as well.
While the Dodger Stadium Express buses around LA were implemented to help cut down on traffic in the city and into the ballpark, patrons that use that free transportation are still far outnumbered by those that drive to games. Less than 200,000 fans took the Dodger Stadium Express, which still has to sit in traffic to and from the ballpark, in 2012. That number has not grown significantly in the years since.