Two visions of L.A.'s traffic future

The weeklong debate at The Times opinion section about the future of L.A. traffic ends with the wish lists from the Transit Coalition's Bart Reed and the Reason Foundation's Ted Balaker. Reed backs more mass transit, Balaker favors other solutions like toll roads, buses and smarter growth. A summary:

Reed: The Subway-to-the Sea; a rail line between the Valley and Westside; Green Line to LAX and to Santa Fe Springs; Gold Line to Montclair; Metrolink service further into L.A. and making it electric; add rail to the Orange Line and expand it to Glendale; the regionwide high-speed rail network; Expo Line to the sea. (BB lost track of costs, but seems like more than $100 billion).

Balaker: Reduce bus fares 40%; force transit officials to actually take mass transit; build more tunnels to reduce bottlenecks (like 710 missing link); more high-density living near job centers; covert some carpool lanes into HOT lanes (where solo motorists pay tolls to use them); buy nicer buses and give them congestion-free lanes around the region.

Now who is right? Hit the COMMENT button and join the debate about our traffic future!

Comments

[Shaun]

I’m sorry but Balaker is just so shortsighted with his views. I’ve been reading all the crap he throws out there and his solutions will make little difference in what we have today and will only maintain our status quo of congestion and an over reliance on automobiles. He talks against rail b/c of the costs then suggests building more freeways in tunnels!! Which is the most expensive way you could build a freeway.

How is reducing bus fares, already some of the lowest in the country, going to reduce congestion. Most of the people that take the bus do it b/c they have no other option. Do you really think that someone who drives to work is going to take the bus b/c it’s a quarter cheaper but takes them twice as long to get to work? Nobody in their right mind would sacrifice 20 or 30 extra minutes to save 25 cents. Buses don’t attract people out of cars in nearly the quantity that QUALITY HEAVY RAIL can.

Then he goes on to advocate high density housing near employment centers, which for the most part is a good idea. But you cannot take on more density w/o providing the proper infrastructure to support it, which means for ALTERNATIVE modes of transportation. SoCal is out of room for low density single family homes and most new construction near the coast will be dense, multi-family development like condos and town homes. The SD Union Tribune had an article Sunday talking about how that’s pretty much the shift SD and most of SoCal will see from hear on out; higher density development. Since we WILL become denser, we need to provide inter city rail service for people. We cannot build denser and rely on only cars b/c the space cars take up. You need more and wider roads and you need tons of land for parking. How the hell does Balaker expect high density housing to work w/o GOOD public transit? Not everyone that lives near a job center will be able to walk, not everyone that lives in high density housing near a job center will actually work in that job center; people change jobs and addresses all the time. And what happens when you want to leave your dense, urban neighborhood; unless you have rail connecting different parts of the region people will continue to drive and add to congestion. Smart growth, infill development, and density are a much better way to grow in urban LA and a much better use of land. BUT you can’t have that type of density w/o good public transit or else congestion just will get worse. It’s amazing Balaker argues for greater density but argues against more rail transit. Is he looking to make LA an even more congested place to live?

Then he wants to convert HOV to HOT lanes? Has he not notices how crowded many of the HOV lanes already are? Many HOV lanes would become just as congested and slow as the main purpose lanes if that were to happen.

Buy nicer buses? The metro rapid already has nice new buses but it still does NOT COMPARE to rail at all. No matter how “train-like” you make a bus it will always be a bus. Nicer buses are not going to do anything towards relieving congestion. Giving them congestion free lanes is one of the few good ideas he actually throws out there but I don’t see how that is possible w/o increasing congestion b/c you are taking away a lane of traffic.

Given LA’s size and density congestion will always occur, no city in the world similar in size to LA has ever found a “solution” to congestion. But most have ALTERNATIVES to congestion which LA really lacks. LA needs more heavy and light rail and we need it as soon as possible. Or public transit primarily serves those w/o cars and we need it to serve those with cars too. Just b/c we can afford a car doesn’t mean we always want to be stuck in one. The LA Times should be pushing for more rail; just think about how much 500,000 additional subway riders would increase your circulation. I read somewhere that the NY Times owes a lot of its circulation to subway riders that read the paper on the way to work. People who drive are the ones who contribute the most to our economy and contribute the most to our tax base, therefore they deserve a first class rail system. We pay to subsidize the system for those unable to drive and that is fine by me. But we also deserve something back in return. Something more than sitting in traffic for two hours a day and losing two weeks a year to congestion. We pay to subsidize a system that is mainly geared towards those who have no other transportation options. But we also don’t give those people who pay the most for the system any other options besides driving and sitting in traffic. Give Angeleno’s, both rich and poor, the first class rail system we deserve and have been waiting for. Why can’t our leaders learn from past mistakes? We’ve shot down rail proposals before and opted for more roads and look where we ended up. The same people who stopped expansion of the Red Line are now clamoring for it to be expanded!!! That alone should be an indicator of how we need to learn from past mistakes. If LA wants a different result than what it ended up with today then we need to start doing things differently. Stop focusing on roads, buses, and freeways b/c that’s exactly what got us to where we are today. Bit the god damn bullet and spend all those billions on something new; a first class rail system. It will cost a ton of money and I know that but we all should be willing to pay for it as long as it gives us something new and different that will provide alternatives to congestion. If Orange County and San Diego County can vote to increase taxes for transportation projects, surely LA County can do the same. We can find the money to pay for a first class subway system; it won’t be cheap but it will forever enhance the quality of life here.

[Richard]

The Mayor of Los Angeles actually has taken public transit from time to time.

As for a world class rail system for a world class city. That's going to need a world class tax increase. Somebody's got to pay for it all. It isn't going to paid for out of fare increases...

[movielocke]

you forgot one of Balaker's key initives to spend public money: finance long European vacations for LA's transit elite and others that could easily afford them anyway.

probably a more realistic look at costs.

Subway to the sea - 10 billion - opening each new stop along the way so people start getting emerging benefits within two year.

westside railline 20 billiion: (elevated, twin steel or monorail probably elevated over sepulveda ala chicago's El trains)
from metrolink to orange line along sepulveda/vannuys corridor 3 billion
tunnel on westside rail line from the orange to under sepulveda pass from Ventura blvd to the Getty Center - 3 billion
Getty Center to LAX - 3 billion
LAX deep into orange county (as far as we can get it along the 405 corridor, at least long beach airport, hopefully to the 5) - 6 billion
Build all four stages simultaneously and connect them to each other. so it's done in six years = 5 billion in additional cost overruns

Expo line to the sea + cost overruns - 1 billion (starting construction before the current expo line is finished) naturally it is only so cheap by using the Right of Way.

La Cienega line - 6 billion total
from the Green line to Beverly Hills (Santa Monica Blvd) - 3 billion -
subway section from Santa Monica blvd to Hollywood Highland - 3 billion

Vermont Rail line: - 11 billion total
From Wilshire/Vermont to the 105 - 5 billion
from the 105 to ken malloy park 5 billion
on Gaffey from the harbor/coast to ken malloy - 1 billion

Goldline foothill extension - 4 billion

Orangeline extension to connect to the Gold line - 6 billion

Orangeline extension through Chatsworth to Metrolink - 2 billion

western Goldline extension to Simi Valley - 5 billion

Slauson Rail line - 6 billion
From Marina del Rey to the 710

underestimating the above (and I was trying to overestimate in some places) - 14 billion

20 billion for various rail projects on the Eastside and in OC, but since I don't know anything about them, I don't really have ideas for specifics. or use the money to put more buses on the road in greater capacity. Or use it to create park and ride complexes. OR use it to convert HOV lanes into HOTlines to be operated by a transit authority (not a private company) that funnels the hotlane money towards a continuing transit network of rail, buses, and rich people hotlanes. Why should we grant the money printing factory of HOTlanes to a private company when they're going to be public carpool lanes that are converted, why should the public give up an asset to enrich a small coterie of investors?

the answer lies in a diversity of rail, buses, hotlanes and reasonable fares, there's no single answer, but if we lock into one type of rail, or one type of solution (hot lines, freeway lane expansions, car pool lanes) rather than employing a diverse and complex functional system of transit (emphasis on the system, these will feed and support each other, rather than competing) but focusing on any single element as a solution and working only on that element will just result in endless frustration and a failure to create a working solution. But expect the latter to happen.

[Derek]

Reed is spot-on. A world-class city requires a world-class rail system.

[TrafficBulldog.org]

Yes, force MTA officials to actually take mass transit.

At least that is something new to this conversation.