New hope for L.A. subway?

Who says it's too expensive to build a subway? Ground was broken today on an extension of the famously star-crossed Second Avenue tunnel in New York. The NYT says the project has been in the works for decades -- but work was abruptly halted in the early 1970s when money ran out. At $3.8 billion, it's not that much more expensive than the Subway to the Sea proposal, where estimates run about $5 billion. What's unclear is whether Second Avenue is a Wilshire subway competitor for funds -- or a sign of what is possible:

The first leg of the subway line has a budget of $3.8 billion. Officials are waiting for the federal government to formally commit to financing a third of that amount. The authority expects to borrow the majority of the money needed for construction through the sale of bonds. The first section of the new subway will have stations along Second Avenue at 96th Street, 86th Street and 72nd Street and at 63rd Street and Lexington Avenue. It will operate as an extension of the Q line and is scheduled to open in 2013. (Photo from MTA NY)

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Comments

[greg kay]

Has anyone computed in 2007 dollars what, say BART or the Sixth Avenue subway cost when they were built? Just curious....

[Shaun]

I was just reading an article about how NYC produces 1% of the nation's greenhouse gases and found this interesting:

"The city has 2.7 percent of the country's population — 8.2 million of 300 million — and the average New York City resident contributes less than a third of the emissions generated by a typical American. This is largely due to the popularity of the city's mass transit system, which cuts down on car emissions, officials said."

Granted we will never have a mass transit system like NY but anything to get people out of their cars would be good for a region notorious for it's air pollution.

[Richard H]

According to Wikipedia, the Second Avenue Subway was intended to replace already existing elevated lines on Second and Third Avenues long, long ago. These elevated lines were demolished during the 1940’s and 1950’s. However for one reason or another the Second Avenue Subway was never built. The line has always been needed to relieve another subway line running at well overcapacity. The case for building it is overwhelming.

LACMTA wishes it had this kind of problem. Maybe if the existing Metrorail system were running anywhere near to capacity, funding for additional lines could be more easily justified and obtained.

If Wilshire Subway is pitted against Second Avenue Subway for Federal funding, it would be a slam dunk for Second Avenue Subway.

[Shaun]

We need this subway so just get it done already. Start the planning, start the EIR's, start looking for funding, and just start something please. The longer we wait the more expensive it gets. Buy materials now at today's prices and just get it done. Stop giving us a cheap, half a*s transit system and give the nation's 2nd largest city a transit system a world class city deserves.

[Scott Mercer]

Let's see. They've been talking about building the Second Avenue Subway since 1929.

We've been talking about building the "Subway to the Sea" since 2004. Okay, I'll be fair. The 1968 RTD proposal had a subway line going down Wilshire Blvd. as far as Westwood.

So, New York's been talking about this line at least 40 years longer than we've been talking about ours. I think we'll have to wait a while longer.

Let's hope we get the 2016 Olympics, because that would surely bump us to the front of the line for more federal money.

[Richard H]

Four groundbreaking ceremonies!

So that’s how they do it in New York.

Keep holding groundbreaking ceremonies until the subway gets finished. One mile per groundbreaking ceremony. At $350 million a mile, a bunch of celebrities and politicians should hold a groundbreaking ceremony every few hundred feet or so.

Yeah, I think L.A. can manage that trick.

[michael l]

The longer we wait the more expensive it will get. When people talk about the price tag of a subway they fail to realize that this investment is about so much more than money. It is about the quality of life in Los Angeles. Imagine an LA where people can't complain about traffic or pollution. That is what I want for my favorite city because those two things are some of the more glaring issues that we deal with day to day here in LA. And don't tell me it wont work in LA because that attitude is what got us in this mess. Please more action, less talk.

Side note to Ben Brown:

What does RF microwave attacks have to do with the subway? Are you trying to shred all credibility from your comments?

[Benjamin Brown]

Of course the money is quite reasonable...an investment for the future. However, how are you going to deal with all the neck bio-chip unwittinG People who don't swig pepto-bismal or wear diapers masses when a subliminal RF microwave attack ensues?