Not the gold standard

The Times' Steve Hymon raises a really smart point today about the new Gold Line extension from East L.A. to downtown. Or as Steve points out, kinda near downtown:

The new rail line, in a way, is cruel. Imagine boarding the train in Boyle Heights and then rolling down 1st Street directly toward the heart of downtown. "Toward" is the operative word there. Just when the train hits the outskirts of the business district, it turns north on Alameda Street toward Union Station. If the heart of downtown is your destination, you must switch to the subway at Union Station and go back to where you were heading in the first place. What's the big deal about that? If you believe that mass transit should take you where you want to go -- not kind of near where you want to go, then it's dumb. It also violates the first rule of commuting in Los Angeles: Always head toward your destination.

Comments

[Anthony Fernandez]

Donald, that negative portrayal still exists today. I ask you to look for an article that praises our system or says even one good thing about it. I bet you that you can't find a single one.

[Donald Stanwood]

The summary by Richard H about the untimely demise of the Red Line Eastside Extension is especially welcome in a city that often seems populated by amnesiacs. Barring some dreadful snafu, I'll be supportive of the new section of the Gold Line when it opens in 2009. But it's definitely Plan B. Light rail will never have the passenger capacity of a heavy rail metro. While we're in the business of pointing fingers, the "Los Angeles Times" deserves to take some blame for the misfortune of Metrorail. Its relentlessly negative coverage of the MTA in the mid-90s helped generate a climate of defeatism that led directly to Yaroslavky's dismal "reforms".

[Lisa]

RIchard H wrote, "Or not bother with the train and take the 68 or 368 bus on Cesar Chavez or 30, 31, or 330 bus on First Street which takes transit users from the eastside to the destination the overwelming majority of people going to downtown L.A. from the eastside go, BROADWAY (No street, avenue or boulevard on any map) in a seamless journey."

Hah! Once the eastside gold line extension is completed, you can bet that those efficient bus routes will be eliminated in order to encourage people to take the gold line. That's exactly what happened in Pasadena when the gold line was completed. There used to be a bus with a park and ride next to it at the beginning of the 110 freeway that went directly downtown (civic center/Broadway). Then, the bus line and the park and ride were eliminated, presumably to encourage ridership on the gold line. Now, instead of taking the bus directly to civic center/Broadway, I have to take the gold line into union station, and then either take the red line or a bus to near civic center and then walk a few blocks to my job. Shouldn't be that way, but thanks to poor transportation planners, public transportation in L.A. is sometimes just as stressful (or more) as driving and takes just as long (or more) to reach my destination.

[jl]

Almost all our population increase over the last 10 years comes from immigrants and their children. Why do we continue to damage our environment by having these immigration policies.

[Dan W.]

"There wouldn't be a problem if the downtown connector was there."

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It is essential for this project to be in the Long Range Transportation Plan for the MTA, and I believe it will be, but we need to keep lobbying for it.

[Andre]

so typical of LA mismanagement and poor planning... and we wonder WHY we're mired in a quagmire of roads and congestion? It's not like we couldn't have made the Gold line actually transfer IN the city like normal Metro's -- probably a "cost cutting" measure that in the end, will end up costing Angelino's more..

[Anthony Fernandez]

There wouldn't be a problem if the downtown connector was there.

[Richard H]

"If the heart of downtown is your destination, you must switch to the subway at Union Station and go back to where you were heading in the first place."

Or not bother with the train and take the 68 or 368 bus on Cesar Chavez or 30, 31, or 330 bus on First Street which takes transit users from the eastside to the destination the overwelming majority of people going to downtown L.A. from the eastside go, BROADWAY (No street, avenue or boulevard on any map) in a seamless journey.

One must point out that in an earlier configuration of Metrorail, the Red Line subway was supposed to be extended to the eastside with stations on First and Boyle, Cesar Chavez and Soto, and Lorena and First and then to points beyond on Whittier Blvd that would provided a seamless journey from the eastside to downtown L.A. and points beyond. At least $50 million, perhaps as much as $100 million had already been spent on tunnel engineering, station design and land acquisition. Studies were done with regards to things like historic buildings and houses, and potential gas problems for the tunnels in the Boyle Heights oil field (Henry Waxman, where were you?). The Eastside would be next after the tunnels through the Hollywood Hills were done. This was in 1997. Ten years ago.

What happened after the tunnels through the Hollywood Hills were done, connecting Universal City through Hollywood Blvd. to Downtown L.A.?
Zev Yaroslovsky, L.A. County Supervisor, and Richard Riordan, Mayor of Los Angeles, both on the LACMTA board, turned against the Eastside Redline extension. All rail construction was halted by the MTA board in January, 1998 and for added measure, Zev sponsored the sucessful ballot initative preventing any Prop A or Prop C funds from being used for future subway construction. The eastside red line extension would have been 80 to 90 percent funded from federal or state sources. Zev killed it by denying the last 10% to 20% from the local sales tax. If the Waxman prohibition on tunneling under Wilshire Blvd. was Act I, the Yaroslovsky County Sales tax prohibition was Act II.

As an alternative, or consolation priize, the Eastside got a Gold Line extension. A long, slow, seamless journey to Pasadena instead of Downtown L.A. Evidently, the LACMTA needs to do something to boost the anemic ridership on the Gold Line so extending it through an area which already heavily transit dependent fit the bill. The trouble is that it doesn't take too many eastside transit users where they need to go, which is where the jobs are, without a detour into Union Station, and walking a quarter mile and a hundred stairs from the Gold Line stop to the Red Line Station and a long wait for the next train. One should also assume that big bus service cutbacks will be made on the eastside after Gold line service starts to insure that transit dependent people will ride the Gold line instead of a bus.

Anyway, the eastside problem is taken care of so subway construction through the "better" parts of town can be resumed.