Parking Lot Repaving Lags Behind
Construction crews working at Will Rogers Beach are expected to complete construction on the L.A. County Lifeguard Headquarters and a public bathroom by the end of this month. The parking lot east of the beach’s entrance was scheduled to be repaved this month, but crews will have to rush to meet the deadline. In the next three weeks, workers will put ‘interior finishes’ on the headquarters as well as the adjacent newly redesigned and rebuilt public bathroom. The beach’s large eastern parking lot remains unleveled, with large piles of gravel. Officials and crews seemed less certain of making this month’s deadline. Community members are watching this January deadline closely for early signs of what it might mean for the public’s access to the beach this summer. The county began the nearly $13-million Will Rogers Beach refurbishment in December 2005 as a way of modernizing and redesigning the beach’s aging infrastructure. With May 2007 as the goal, the county planned to offer summer beachgoers Spanish-style concession stands, refurbished bathrooms, repaved parking lots and a reconstructed main entry at Temescal Canyon Road. But meeting that pre-summer goal has been a challenge. A county planning error caused a four-month delay in construction. While installing a natural gas line in the parking lot’s eastern parking lot, crews working for county contractor Gonzales Construction Inc. encountered a city-owned sewer main early this past summer. After four months of negotiation between the two overlapping bureaucracies and three days of construction to fortify the sewer, regular construction resumed in late September. To overcome that delay and open Will Rogers to summer beachgoers, county officials have said that they have accelerated construction. The contractor has hired more workers and began working on multiple projects simultaneously, said Gil Garcia, the project manager for the county’s Department of Public Works. Workers are constructing new restrooms, concession stands and the lifeguard headquarters concurrently with parking lot repaving. Crews demolished the decades-old concession stands early this month. They also completed laying a natural-gas line in the beach’s eastern parking lot, but the line to the county’s maintenance yard in the lot’s western end is not yet complete. In its transition toward all-natural-gas vehicles, the county is building a natural-gas pumping station at its maintenance yard. In its original plans for a pumping station, the county also said that it would offer a filling station for the public, but the details plan have not yet surfaced. According to Garcia, construction is currently within the allocated budget. When county supervisors first approved the project in 1999, they set aside $4.9 million for construction. But when they finally awarded the contract to Gonzalez Construction, they agreed to pay $8.3 million. Late plans to add a natural gas line and the sewer-main planning error are expected to cost approximately less than $600,000. There have been no major delays since September, said Garcia. Rain caused some delays in November and December. Although rain dries quickly, it has delayed work on the parking lot when it has formed in pools, he said. If the headquarters is completed by the end of the month, it is unknown when the building will begin to house lifeguard operations again. For more than a year, lifeguards have worked out of temporary trailers in a parking lot adjacent to the lifeguard headquarters. Reporting by Staff Writer Max Taves. To contact, e-mail: reporter@palipost.com
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