Ramping up, July 14

Hailing a cab may get easier

A six-month pilot program to allow people to hail taxis in many parts of downtown L.A. and Hollywood goes before the City Council on Wednesday. At present, cabs are restricted from picking up people in many places -- bus lanes, red curbs, blue curbs, rainbow-colored curbs, etc. What's been the hang-up? The city's Department of Transportation tried to delicately say they're caught in a catch-22 in a May report. Here's how they say it: "Both the Mayor and the City Council have directed the Department to implement policy initiatives to provide traffic congestion relief. The anti-gridlock ordinance approved by the Council in 2007 calls for innovative and comprehensive measures on the part of the Department to deal with this pressing problem. There is a possibility that during peak hours, key lanes of traffic could be impeded by taxi operations generated by the pilot program." Here's how I say it: They're scared silly of anything that may slow down some bloke in a car.

LaBonge likes bikes

I took a call from L.A. City Councilman Tom LaBonge last week. He had just returned from one of his frequent overseas trips and said he was again impressed with some of the bike facilities in Germany and wanted to do more to help cyclists in L.A. Sounds great. And here's an insanely easy project to get started: Get some extra bike racks installed outside the North Hollywood Red Line station. I was there at 6:15 p.m. Friday and the existing racks were mostly filled. The Bottleneck Blog is even happy to offer frequent reminders of your progress.

Flights to Mammoth

After years and years and years of talking about restoring commercial air service to Mammoth, Horizon will be flying there this winter -- with round-trip fares from LAX at $198, The Times reports. For what it's worth, I can drive there and back in the Subaru for $100 to $110, although the flights are likely to offer a time savings. The ski resort has concurrently been trying to lure more skiers from the East Coast and Europe. The problem as I see it is that while the skiing is pretty great at Mammoth, the town is a wreck of mini-malls and getting around is a pain without a car -- unless you stay in the ski resort's very pricey lodging. Then there's the question of your CO₂ footprint: What's more likely to lead to global melting -- driving or flying? Grist has a good Q&A on the subject. Bottom line is: Driving is likely better.

Extra thrill from Amtrak riders

Thousands of people mooned trains Sunday as part of the annual let's moon-the-train event in Laguna Niguel, which started as a bar bet and grew to something worse, explains my colleague David Haldane in The Times. Speaking of trains and the O.C., weekend ridership on Metrolink is up 60% this summer, reports the O.C. Register. Explanation: Gas prices are 100% the reason, says Metrolink.

Pothole of the Week note

I forgot to hand out the weekly award last week. But as benevolent dictator of the Bottleneck Blog, I quickly pardoned myself. But get those nominees in! I've got of couple decent ones in the hopper, but there's nothing like a little competition to raise everyone's game. Also, a lot of the pothole nominees are from the city of Los Angeles. I will gladly accept nominations from the entire Southland. Don't they have potholes in San Dimas?

-- Steve Hymon

Photo: Julie Sheer / Los Angeles Times

Comments

[Dan W.]

Please, please, please allow taxis to pick up fares the NYC way in downtown, Hollywood, West Hollywood, Beverly Hills and Santa Monica.

[Spokker]

I ride the Orange County Line on weekends and like the first poster said, it was empty when I started riding it a year ago. Now it's pretty crowded. There are still empty seats here and there but it's not a ghost train like it was when weekend service first started.

[KateNonymous]

I wonder how much of a time savings there is with flights to Mammoth. By the time you get to the airport, check in, check any luggage, fly, pick up any luggage, and get to your lodging, is there really a significant time savings?

[Tony Fernandez]

Interesting that you mention my hometown. There's a nice pothole at the intersection of Arrow Hwy and San Dimas Ave that's been there for years, but it is absolutely nothing compared to these others that I've seen on this blog. San Dimas and most of the other Foothill communities are pretty good with fixing potholes.

[Damon]

I started taking Metrolink on the weekends occasionally when they began service over a year ago, and I can testify that although kindof empty at first they have become packed on the weekends.

Saturday I rode from Orange up to Union Station, and took the Gold line over to memorial park for a trip to the Norton Simon and a delicious burger at Jake's. (Btw, the Pasadena Apple store had a line about 2 blocks long for the new iPhone).