Web Advanced Corporation Approved for Website Design, Development and Management Services

At their joint meeting on May 10, the Foothill/Eastern Transportation Corridor Agency (F/ETCA) and San Joaquin Hills Transportation Corridor Agency (SJHTCA) Boards of Directors approved a three-year contract with two one-year options for website design, development and management services with Web Advanced Corp. The Transportation Corridor Agencies’ (TCA) website, thetollroads.com, has more than 25,000 daily visitors who primarily use the site for account maintenance, account sign up and online One-Time-Toll payments. It also houses general Agency information including Board meeting agendas, finance and investor information, capital projects and environmental programs.  Web Advanced, located in Irvine, will provide the Agencies with planning and design services to enhance the user experience, ongoing maintenance and to ensure the website is functioning properly 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Patrol Service to Begin at Saddle Club Mitigation Property and Continue at Upper Chiquita Canyon

The F/ETCA Board of Directors authorized a contract amendment with a private security company, High Level Security Solutions, to patrol the newly acquired Saddle Club property, a 33-acre site located in Trabuco Canyon near the main entrance to O’Neill Regional Park. Additionally, a one-year extension with the Orange County Sheriff’s Mounted Enforcement Unit was also approved to continue patrolling the Upper Chiquita Canyon Conservation Area. The Agency began contracting with private patrol companies to reduce trespassing in the conservation area in 2002. In 2015, TCA introduced a hybrid approach including both private patrol and the Orange County Sheriff’s Mounted Enforcement Unit, because sheriffs have authority to issue citations. Since the hybrid approach was put into place, trespassing has been reduced by 89 percent. The Upper Chiquita Canyon Conservation Area is 1,158 acres and has a conservation easement requiring the Agency to perform specific management activities to maintain and enhance the property’s habitat and wildlife uses, including restricting public access. The Saddle Club property, acquired in December 2017, includes 14 acres of oak and riparian woodland and 13 acres of coastal sage scrub. Saddle Club will be the first of TCA’s mitigation properties to include public access, but until a site use plan is developed and officially opened to the public for recreational use, patrol services are necessary.

Plein Air Artists Capture the Beauty of Upper Chiquita Canyon

On April 20, 2018, Plein Air artists from the Southern California Plein Air Painters Association were invited to the Upper Chiquita Canyon Conservation Area to paint the natural habitat of rolling hills, grasslands and coastal sage scrub of TCA’s largest mitigation site. In French, plein air means open air or outside, and it allows the artists to better represent the true colors, natural light, form of shapes and feel of a scene. At Thursday’s meeting, Lisa Telles, chief communications officer, shared a few photos of the event (Opens in a new window) and artwork (Opens in a new window) , as well as a short video (Opens in a new window) highlighting the event. For more than 25 years, TCA has been committed to balancing construction and operation of Orange County’s Toll Roads, (State Routes 73, 133, 241 and 261), with the preservation of more than 2,100 acres of open space and wildlife habitat in Orange County. For more information about TCA’s environmental initiatives, visit thetollroads.com/environment.

April 2018 Traffic and Revenue Report

Compared to April 2017, transactions increased in April 2018 for F/ETCA and slightly decreased for SJHTCA. For the 73 Toll Road, transactions decreased by 0.1 percent and revenue increased by 3.7 percent. On the 133, 241 and 261 Toll Roads, transactions increased by 2.9 percent and revenue increased by 6.7 percent.