Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass on Monday, Nov. 13, again urged businesses to allow employees to work remotely, if practical, to avoid driving to or through downtown L.A. while part of the 10 Freeway remains shut down indefinitely following a massive fire over the weekend that caused significant damage.
State transportation officials pledged Monday that the California Department of Transportation would work “24/7” to reopen the damaged portion of the freeway as quickly as possible.
“This remains priority No. 1 for us in state government,” Toks Omishakin, the state’s secretary of transportation, said during a midday briefing with reporters.
Omishakin said Caltrans engineers had taken concrete and rebar samples from the site for analysis to determine the best course of action for reopening the bridge.
Shailen Bhatt, administrator of the Federal Highway Administration, said during the briefing that he was keenly aware of the impact the freeway closure is having on a local, regional and national scale. An estimated 300,000 people travel through this stretch of the freeway daily.
“Driving in, it was very clear that there’s a real traffic impact in the L.A. metro area,” Bhatt said. “There’s a lot of goods that come in through the ports of L.A. and Long Beach. They’re going to be impacted.”
Bhatt reported that President Joe Biden had been briefed and that U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg had been in contact with Gov. Gavin Newsom and Mayor Bass.
“We will provide whatever funding is needed to get this bridge and this section of interstate opened as quickly and safely as possible,” Bhatt said on behalf of the federal government.
Earlier in the day the mayor of L.A. acknowledged while speaking with Ryan Seacrest on KIIS-FM’s “On Air with Ryan” morning show that the time it takes to repair the freeway would have “severe economic consequences.” Bass suggested telecommuting like businesses did during the coronavirus…
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