STRETCH OF 'BLOOD ALLEY' GETTING NEW RIGHT-TURN LANE.

Byline: Daily News

LLANO - Caltrans is widening Highway 138 at 165th Street East to make room for a right-turn lane.

The $151,000 project is expected to be completed in about two weeks, officials said. Meanwhile, traffic is backing up at the intersection as flagmen direct drivers around the work.

Caltrans and Los Angeles County also will split the cost of installing a traffic signal at the intersection, an area noted for crashes and close calls. The county last month approved its share of the $322,000 project. A timetable for installation was not announced.

Antelope Valley residents have dubbed the highway ``Blood Alley'' for its fatal traffic collisions. A state study concluded that over a five-year period the highway did have a higher-than-average number of fatal crashes, the result of the highway's rolling profile and lack of passing opportunities for motorists.

Seven people have died on Highway 138 already this year.

One was a woman run down in fog while walking along the shoulder with her boyfriend after their car broke down. The others included a mother and her three children who drowned when their truck ran off the highway and into the California Aqueduct.

A Palmdale man and a Riverside woman died last month in a head-on crash just east of the San Bernardino County line.

Antelope Valley civic leaders have been pushing for the widening of Highway 138, the region's main east-west corridor, for several years. Civic leaders cite the number of fatal crashes and collisions and projections of increased traffic volumes in the near future.