A fight over the Expo line

I had the chance to meet with Damien Goodmon yesterday outside Dorsey High School. Goodmon is leading a community group, the Citizens’ Campaign to Fix Expo, that is trying to force the under-construction Expo Line light rail to go underground for a four-mile stretch between Figueroa on the east and La Brea to the west.

This will be a long post –- but bear with me. Light rail lines don’t get built every day in the Southland, and things happening today could affect what’s up and running a decade from now.

Goodmon’s basic argument: Building the train at street level, as the MTA is doing, is unsafe and it should be built underground instead. It’s particularly unsafe, he says, outside a pair of schools along Exposition Boulevard in South Los Angeles –- the Foshay Learning Center and Dorsey High School. Goodmon has focused much of his efforts on Dorsey, which sits next to Farmdale (pictured above), a street that crosses the tracks adjacent to the school grounds.

The Expo line project is already budgeted at $863 million and will run eight miles from 7th and Figueroa in downtown L.A. to Culver City. The state Public Utilities Commission has approved 36 of 38 street crossings on the line and is scheduled in November to decide how the two remaining crossings should be built. If the PUC rules in the MTA’s favor, Goodmon says, his group will probably file an environmental justice lawsuit alleging that South L.A. is getting an unsafe train, whereas there are some grade-separated crossings near USC and to the west in Culver City.

If that happens, it’s unclear what happens next. Construction may proceed, but it could potentially be suspended. Or perhaps Goodmon gets what he wants -– the train to be put in an underground trench -- but the MTA has to put the project on hold while finding the money to do so.

A few highlights from my interview:

* I asked Goodmon why he thinks high school students –- many presumably pretty smart kids –- will get hit by the train at Farmdale when there will be crossing gates. After all, there haven’t been problems with students at Blair High School getting in the way of the Gold Line light rail in Pasadena –- and the train passes just two blocks from their school.

“Will people -– in this case high-school-age teenagers -- abide by them [the gates]?” he asked. “It’s a gamble.”

He rejected the comparison to Blair -– saying many more students will cross tracks at Dorsey. He also rejected my assertion that his own argument over environmental justice and racism has a sour tinge -- that perhaps he's suggesting that Dorsey students, many of whom are minorities, aren’t smart enough to stay off active railroad tracks. “This isn’t about intelligence. Accidents happen to smart people,” Goodmon said, adding: “What happens when you have two conflicting gang members and they start to fight?” alongside the tracks.

* I asked him if he worries that by succeeding he may ultimately delay or perhaps stop a rail project that could give South Los Angeles residents a better transit option than riding the bus. Goodmon said that he’s pro-rail and that he wants the line to be built –- he just wants it built the right way. “They’re not going to take a penny away from South L.A. because we have the audacity to ask for the same thing as Culver City,” he said.

* Goodmon said that he believes it would cost about $300 million to build the line underground in South L.A. He says he thinks the MTA could find the money if the agency tried harder and that the project would be better –- and faster -– as a result and therefore attract more riders. In his view, the train line is a project that will last decades, so why not build it the right way the first time around, rather than wait until problems develop and traffic gets tied up at South L.A. street crossings (see above rendering). “They always want to build 10 miles of bad rail rather than five miles of good rail,” Goodmon said. “It makes no sense."

The Dorsey High crossing is not the only dispute. Just to the east, the other crossing still not approved by the state is outside Foshay Learning Center. Both Goodmon’s group and Neighbors for Smart Rail -– a group largely based on the Westside in the Cheviot Hills area -– say that at-grade street crossings at Western Avenue and a smaller street called Harvard are dangerous and that a pedestrian undercrossing at Harvard is inadequate. The folks at Cheviot Hills are involved, in part, because the proposed second phase of the project could pass an elementary school on Overland.

The Board of the LAUSD has passed a resolution against the at-grade crossings in South L.A. Goodmon, who is just 26, said that he’s devoting all his time to the fight and that he’s only doing odd jobs on the side. Most elected officials have been quiet on the issue and while the MTA says Goodmon is wrong, he has clearly gotten their attention.

More on that tomorrow and more soon on the Cheviot Hills part of the story....

-- Steve Hymon

Got a take on traffic or transportation? E-mail your tips to steve.hymon@latimes.com.

Top photo: Steve Hymon / Los Angeles Times

Bottom drawing: Expo Line Construction Authority

Comments

[dane bramage]

Damien's "faster" claim is a rather weak argument in favor of his proposal, since any type of grade separation over that distance, whether above or below ground, would gain you maybe several seconds at best. Hardly worth the "$300 million" Mr. Goodman would want taxpayers to pay. Stick to your safety angle, Damien, and don't dangle a weak "speed" argument out there...

[KateNonymous]

Wouldn't a fence solve this problem?

[ry]

Did Mr. Goodmon elaborate as to why he is insisting that the ONLY solution to this "problem crossing" is trenching the right-of-way below grade? The notion that this is the only option is ludicrous! What are the deal-killers that prevent him from considering elevating the line over the crossing, grade separating the pedestrian over or below the rail, etc. Why this fixation on the SINGLE MOST EXPENSIVE "alternative" instead of critically examining and promoting ALL approaches to solving the problem?

[lsm]

Hats off to Mr. Goodmon for his timely warning. Until he asked, "What happens when you have two conflicting gang members and they start to fight?" alongside the tracks, I neglected the danger at-grade tracks posed. Although he neglected to warn us of this danger during the planning phase of this project, we must now heed his belated warning--even if it kills the project in mid-construction. We must keep the area around our schools free of at-grade tracks so gang fighting near these schools poses no threat of accidental light-rail train injuries to pedestrians. But why stop there? These gang fights pose risk of injury from all at-grade traffic. We must stop all vehicular traffic near these schools until we can find the funds to move all nearby streets, avenues and boulevards underground. If we can not find funds to move all these streets, avenues and boulevards underground, let us get by with only the few we can move underground. To paraphrase Mr. Goodmon, I want five miles of good roads rather than ten miles of bad roads.