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Northbound 710 Freeway In East L.A. Will Be Closed For Eight Weekends
On the 710. (Photo by Doug Kerr the Creative Commons on Flickr)
The northbound lanes of the 710 freeway between the 5 and 60 freeways will be closed during weekends for a large chunk of the fall, Caltrans announced in a release.
During each closure, the lanes will be shut off from 10 p.m. Friday to 4 a.m. Monday. Caltrans says these closures will happen for the upcoming eight weekends, excluding the weekends of October 7 to 10, October 28 to 31, November 11 to 14 and November 25 to 28. (Halloween and Thanksgiving FTW!).
For drivers who really need to go north, Lauren Wonder, a spokesperson with Caltrans who spoke to LAist, says to take the 110 and 605 freeways. You can still connect from the northbound 710 to the 5 freeway, then go north on the 5, but Wonder doesn't necessarily recommend it—it's gonna be pretty jammed over there, since it'll be right by where the closure is.
You might be wondering, why? Why is this world such a wantonly cruel and unfair place? Global warming isn't slowing down. Super bacteria is sprouting up. Vin Scully retired. And now we're getting more freeway closures?
As explained by Wonder, it's all for the best. The projects are part of a $120 million pavement replacement plan that will repair a section of the 710 freeway that stretches from the 105 to the 10. "This definitely addresses damage on the roads. There's a lot of truck traffic there, so we've been gradually rehabilitating it," she said to LAist. Large concrete panels are being inserted into the roads to make the lanes new again. Wonder estimates that these concrete slabs last roughly 30 to 40 years on average.
Here's a pretty straightforward map of what's going down. The northbound lanes will be closed here:
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