Parking isn't much easier...

Steve's column about the disabled person who got a parking ticket when getting out for a doctor's appointment is just the beginning, it seems.

Times reporter Roger Vincent reports that parking around Los Angeles is getting more expensive and harder to find. Consider:

Cheap, convenient parking — as Southern Californians have long known and expected it — is getting harder to find, particularly in high-density places such as Hollywood, Santa Monica and downtown Los Angeles. Two hours in an office building garage in Century City can set you back $28, more than twice what it cost in the early 1990s. Club hopping in Hollywood? It could cost $60 before you even you tip the valet. Commuters who paid as little as $80 a month in downtown Los Angeles in the early 1990s are being hit up for as much as $300 for unreserved spaces. Prefer a prime slot with your name on it? Be prepared to write a check for more than $500 a month. Basic economics — rising demand and declining supply — explain the parking price surge.

And that's not all. In his Monday City Hall column, The Times Steve Hymon found that 10% of the city's 42,000 parking meters are broken at any one time.

Parking getting as bad as the traffic? Comment below.

The Color Purple

Amid the debate about more rail lines as a way of reducing traffic, transit officials have quietly changed the color palette. MTA officials didn't run out of red ink when they printed the new subway maps. They've changed the name of a portion of the Red Line. Passengers traveling west between Union Station and Wilshire Boulevard at Western Avenue will now board the Purple Line. That's also the line that Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa wants to take to the sea. How will the new color resonate on the Westside? And why is the MTA having some much trouble picking color (the Expo Line still doesn't have an color designation because of politics squabbling)? Comment below.

-Jean Guccione (Jean covers the MTA for The Times)

Steve's back on the Westside

In his column, Steve reports from Century City: "It's hard to imagine why a traffic officer would find himself incapable of allowing a disabled person two minutes to get out of the car."

Learning more about the Expo Line

Do all these passionate comments about Cheviot Hills and the Expo Line leave you wanting more? The Exposition Metro Line Construction Authority's website has detailed rendering, station information and general plans. It includes details about public meetings at UCLA set for Feb. 7 to provide updates on the project.

(Expo Line Image from EMLCA)

Traffic debate echos

The lively debate on the Bottleneck Blog is echoing elsewhere on the web. Here's some sample linkage:

Metroblogging Los Angeles weighs in ("Make Pico and Olympic one-way streets during peak hours").

Blogger Ken Reich praises Steve's work, while MetroRider LA seems more dubious.

Blogger SaigonBob has a bone to pick with one L.A. politico and his response to traffic problems.

Chasing Clean Air offers one solution, while Patterico believes one issue -- illegal immigration and traffic -- has gone largely undiscussed.

Not surprisingly, Autoblog Green takes issue with Jaime de la Vega's Hummer.

More on de la Vega's Hummer

Steve's column on L.A. city transit chief Jaime de la Vega and his Hummer produced a lively discussion on the Letters to the Editor page:

Steve's Cheviot Hills Column...

Steve Lopez examines in Sunday's paper about why an abandoned stretch of rail track on the Westside isn't part of the solution to the region's traffic problems. Here's the link:

http://www.latimes.com/news/columnists/la-me-lopez28jan28,1,4372719.column?coll=la-news-columns

The Evidence

Here it is, the Hummer driven by Jaime de la Vega, L.A.'s deputy mayor for transportation. To readers who have defended him on the basis of this being a smallish Hummer model, the H3, are you kidding?

The Hummer is a symbol of consumptive excess, whether it's the mid-size SUV model or not. The H3 is rated at 16 mpg in the city, and the idea of a transit chief behind the wheel, or, say, a governor, is somewhere between irresponsible and obscene. Is it any worse than driving any other mid-size SUV? Not much, but yes. The Hummer, originally designed for military use, makes a statement. It is not the statement a transit chief ought to be making, especially when global warming is a growing concern and lives are being sacrificed at war, in part to protect our right to burn as much fossil fuel as we please -- Steve Lopez.

Share Your Pain

Regarding the Hummer:

Many have asked if Jaime de la Vega's choice of wheels is being financed by taxpayers. The word from Matt Szabo, press secretary to Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, is no. Szabo says de la Vega has never requested or received reimbursement for car expenses.

Regardless, it's hard to believe he's still got it, and even harder to believe the mayor hasn't called him aside and told him to wake up. De la Vega might be able to get away all this if he were some kind of transit genius. But the guy was pro-bus under Mayor Dick Riordan, he's pro-train under Villaraigosa, and we can only hope the next mayor doesn't like the horse and buggy.

Have you finally had it?

The MTA is about to begin studying two route options for Phase 2 of the Expo Line. For more details check out Steve Lopez's Sunday column and join the debate here.

Should the MTA use the Southernn Pacific right-of-way it already owns, which runs west from Robertson past Cheviot Hills and all the way to Santa Monica?

Or should it respect the wishes of homeowners in Cheviot and nearby communities who would prefer a southerly route along Venice Boulevard, north on Sepulveda and then west along the existing right of way?

To add your two cents, click on comments.