TORRANCE TRIBUNE May 19, 2016 Page 3 Construction Snarls LAX Traffic Ahead of Summer Peak By Rob McCarthy A major cause of traffic congestion at the upper entrance to Los Angeles International Airport is due to be removed next month in time for the summer rush. Still, the nation’s third-busiest airport is asking visitors to pardon the dust. Traffic backups at Southwest Terminal 1 should improve after a construction barricade is removed sometime in June, said airport spokesman Charles Pannunzio. The barricade on the west end of the terminal is blocking access to the curb for passenger drop-offs, and creating a bottleneck for drivers entering the upper level. “There’ll be more space between terminals 1 and 2 when they take that out, probably The new Terminal 1 check-in lobby opened in February, and now work has shifted to the east side. Photo credit: LAWA. See LAX, page 6 near the end of June,” the spokesman said. Crews have finished remodeling the west end of the terminal, which Southwest took over from US Airways. Phase two of Southwest Airlines’ $500-million renovation project in Terminal 1 has moved to the eastern side of the terminal. Construction crews won’t complete the remodeling of the check-in and ticketing areas before late 2017. A pedestrian bridge from parking structure 1 is closed. The east curb area outside the Southwest terminal is blocked by a barricade. Southwest’s terminal is one of several construction projects under way in the airport. Traffic delays are expected because of work to: Parking structures 3 and 4 across from the Bradley International Terminal: The left lane is blocked and expected to last through June, according to an LAX construction update posted on its web site. Alternate route: East Way. Elevator and stairwell upgrades on the south side of parking structure 4: Lane 1 adjacent to parking structure 4 on the lower/ arrivals level is closed, and will continue through August. Alternate route: East Way as a shortcut to United Terminal 7 or Center Way to exit the airport and avoid the Bradley Terminal. “They finished a couple of elevators, but there is still going to be a left lane closed there,” Pannunzio said. United Airlines’ renovation of Terminals 7 and 8: Work is taking place behind barricades in front of the two terminals. Redevelopment of Terminal 7 has closed a 135-foot section of the passenger drop-off area on the upperlevel for departures Level, which will remain in place through September. The elevated walkway to parking structure 7 is closed, with access to the parking garbage limited to the street level. The waiting area at Gate 71A is closed during the next several months. United’s baggage service office and baggage carousel 3 are closed and will be replaced. A few other notable projects, which drivers and travelers out of LAX may encounter, are: Engineering Company Pays it Forward for North High Senior By Cristian Vasquez Ruben Hakobyan stood in front of the Torrance School Board Members with a smile on his face during Monday night’s board meeting. The North High senior is this year’s Balfour Beatty Scholarship recipient and was accompanied by his parents. Also at the meeting were Balfour Beatty Senior Program Manager Tom Schlegel and Sharefest Executive Director Chad Mayer with a $1,000 check for the young scholar. “I have always wanted to pursue engineering and it is a goal of mine to study engineering at UCI [University of California, Irvine],” Hakobyan said. “College is pretty expensive and you take what you can get and I am very grateful for this scholarship.” The $1,000 scholarship was provided through a partnership between Balfour Beatty and Sharefest Community Development, both of which have been working together since 2010. Through their partnership, Balfour Beatty and Sharefest have been able to carryout a wide range of community projects, including awarding scholarships to high school seniors seeking careers in engineering. “Balfour Beatty was looking for someone who had engineering as their goal,” North High Principal Ronald Richardson said. “When I went to UCLA as an undergraduate, the cost of school was $76 per quarter. Today it is more than $10,000 [per year]; add on to that the living costs and food and it becomes expensive for a family, so to give him $1,000 is a big advantage for Ruben and an honor that will help him in future endeavors.” Balfour Beatty, a well-known construction firm that acquired the school bonds in the TUSD, has been working and completing a variety of projects throughout the district. Sharefest is a nonprofit dedicated to leveraging a community’s assets through creating working coalitions, raising local leaders, helping interested youth and building volunteerism by using already established community organizations. This year the two partners worked on six project locations where they were able to complete an estimated 50 projects, including the volunteer efforts that took place during this year’s Annual Sharefest Workday, which took place in April. “The big one where we partnered was at Walteria Elementary School where we completed about $45,000 worth of work to the school at no cost,” Mayer said. “We got muralist and Balfour-Beatty reached out to its vendors and contractors to ask if they were willing to give back to some of these schools.” In the past three years Balfour Beatty has donated more than $19,000 in scholarships, ranging from $1,000 to $2,500 each. In addition to demonstrating an interest in engineering, construction management or related fields, recipients of the scholarship must live in the communities where Balfour Beatty is involved. “We ended up starting a golf tournament four years ago as a means of having fun while doing what we do to raise the money with our contractors in order to provide Sharefest an opportunity increase what it is that they do for the communities,” Schlegel said. “Working with Balfour-Beatty and being introduced to Chad [Mayer], his wife and to hear what his vision is all about, it was a hand-in-glove type of collaboration; it was an opportunity for us as a company to not only work in the district but to dig deeper into the community and be able to relate with people.” With a 4.2 GPA and his vision set on civil engineering, Hakobyan met the requirements to receive the scholarship, but only found out about the opportunity when his counselor Jessica Quevedo pointed him in the right direction. After four years on the soccer team and lending his friend Hamun Hodjati a hand in running the school’s Blue Crew student section, Hakobyan is ready to begin his college career in the fall. “I am looking to work in the field and am interested in building,” Hakobyan said. “I would like to influence the infrastructure of the city.” Hakobyan, who was selected for the scholarship by his school, was as appreciative of the scholarship as he is mindful of the work and effort by Balfour Beatty and Sharefest to give back to the community by providing scholarships to local students. “It is important for the company, since they are showing support to students such as myself who want to pursue careers in this field,” said the North High senior. “It shows how important this company is and how important engineering is to the world.” Schlegel said that was the intent of creating this scholarship: to pick students that were going to be working in our field, whether it be construction management or trades, or potential civil engineering or architectures. •
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