A two-week construction closure at the Sunset Boulevard exit of the southbound 405 Freeway begins on Saturday, after Friday’s completion of the first phrase of closures at the exit.
4
UCLA commuters from the San Fernando Valley will be most affected, said David Karawaski, senior associate director of UCLA Transportation.
The construction delays are expected to end Oct. 29.
There will be night and day closures of North Church Lane between Sunset Boulevard and the southbound 405 ramps, as well as closures of westbound Sepulveda Way between Sepulveda Boulevard and Sunset Boulevard.
The southbound Sunset Boulevard off-ramp will also be closed from 6-10 a.m. Monday through Friday. Northbound and southbound ramps will not be affected.
Bryan Rockwell, a returns manager for the Associated Students UCLA Textbook store, said the upcoming closure will not affect him much because the Sunset exit is normally closed early in the morning when he arrives for work.
He said, however, he would expect the closure to make it difficult for people trying to get to class.
UCLA commuters have a number of options, Karawaski said. Students may choose to arrive before or after the closure if their schedules allow, or exit from another location.
The official detour is the Wilshire Boulevard exit, but Wilshire is constrained as it is, Karawaski said.
While students may choose to exit earlier at the Getty, there are construction projects occurring on Sepulveda that will reduce it to three lanes.
“It’s a hiccup either way, and some students may take the third option for the Santa Monica Boulevard exit,” Karawaski said.
The upside to the closure is that its duration is relatively short, Karawaski said. The real delays won’t occur until November, when the ramps at Wilshire Boulevard begin to close for construction.
The Saturday closure comes after a first phase of construction at the Sunset exit. During the past two weeks, from Sept. 30 to today, there have been closures of eastbound Sunset Boulevard to the southbound 405 on-ramp.
With reports by Jake Greenberg, Bruin contributor.