TOPANGA CANYON—Construction on the Underground Utility Project on Topanga Canyon Boulevard is expected to begin on Monday, July 20.

Ongoing work is scheduled to last between 12 and 18 months Monday through Friday, starting at 9 a.m. and ending at 3 p.m. During these hours there will be single lane closures allowing north and southbound traffic to still pass through. All lanes will re-open after 3 p.m. each weekday. No construction will take place on the weekends, along with holidays (the period between Thanksgiving and January 2) and Red Flag Days.

According to the Topanga Town Council’s website, “the Topanga UUD [Underground Utility Division] project will remove the potential ‘fire’ hazards caused by downed power-lines and improve the area aesthetics by undergrounding the overhead utility lines.”

An image of Topanga Canyon Boulevard lined with utility poles.
An image of Topanga Canyon Boulevard facing southbound lined with utility poles.

The work area of the project will begin just north of a Verizon store on Topanga Canyon Boulevard and will continue through Cuesta Cala, where the placement of a vault is expected to begin on Thursday, July 23.

All traffic will be able to get to and from local businesses and schools, but power-outages are still to be expected. The blackouts are bounded to the “cut over” section of the project, which will be coordinated in the hopes of afflicting minimal impact on businesses. The outage time could last about 4 hours.

Topanga Canyon is also familiar with the information that many Native American artifacts have been discovered during recent projects and has prepared by putting into place a document by the County of Los Angeles Board of Supervisors. If artifacts do surface on the construction site, the city will take adequate measures to ensure the safety of the relics.

The project manager on the upcoming construction is Steve Dunn.