CALIFORNIA | LOCAL
December 23, 2009 | By Dan Weikel
In a landmark court settlement proposed Tuesday, Caltrans agreed to spend $1.1 billion over the next 30 years to repair and improve state-controlled sidewalks, crosswalks and park-and-ride facilities so they are accessible for people with disabilities. The settlement, filed at the federal courthouse in Oakland, was a major victory for civil rights activists, who have been battling for years with the transportation agency to provide equal access to public rights-of-way for the blind and those who use wheelchairs, canes or walkers.
CALIFORNIA | LOCAL
September 17, 2009 | Dan Weikel
Civil rights advocates asserted in federal court Wednesday that California's highway agency has denied people with disabilities equal access to sidewalks throughout the state by failing to install wheelchair ramps and warnings for the blind at street corners. The class-action lawsuit, which went to trial before U.S. District Judge Saundra Brown Armstrong in Oakland, alleges that Caltrans has violated the 1992 Americans with Disabilities Act, a federal law that requires improvements in accessibility whenever sidewalks and roads are built or undergo major repairs.
CALIFORNIA | LOCAL
August 10, 2009 | Patrick McGreevy
The message of the proposed freeway signs doesn't seem controversial, memorializing individuals killed in traffic accidents and urging California motorists to drive safely. But a proposal to allow families to pay the California Department of Transportation to put up dozens of such signs along state highways has been caught up in a revolt by environmentalists against what they see as the growing clutter of signs and billboards along California roadways. The latest flare-up involves plans to expand a program that allows families to pay $1,000 to cover the cost of signs that read, "Please Don't Drink and Drive -- In Memory of . . ."
CALIFORNIA | LOCAL
January 19, 2009 | Jean Merl
It's the freeway controversy that just won't quit. The fight over whether to finish the 710 Freeway -- which stops just short of South Pasadena -- has been going on for more than half a century, with the records in a 1998 federal court case so voluminous that they filled some 500 cardboard file boxes.
CALIFORNIA | LOCAL
July 26, 2008 | Molly Hennessy-Fiske, Times Staff Writer
An anti-illegal-immigration group's Adopt-a-Highway sign was re-posted this week on Interstate 5 near the Border Patrol checkpoint in San Clemente after a federal judge ruled that it did not pose a danger to the public. State transit officials had moved the San Diego Minutemen's sign to a less-busy highway in eastern San Diego County, saying they were concerned that it would become a gathering place for protesters and clog the busy interstate.
CALIFORNIA | LOCAL
June 24, 2008 | Susannah Rosenblatt, Times Staff Writer
Caltrans has abruptly suspended its popular Adopt-A-Highway program several months after an anti-illegal immigration group sued the state agency for discrimination after it was forced to move its stretch of highway farther from a U.S. Border Patrol checkpoint along Interstate 5 in San Diego County.