Man dies who was struck by Blue Line train

The Blue Line light rail between Los Angeles and Long Beach has claimed its 91st victim since the train opened in 1990. The 54-year-old man who was hit by a train Saturday has died of his injuries, according to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. Officials think the death may have been a suicide.

In case you missed it, here's the story that ran in the paper Sunday:

By Jia-Rui Chong, Chong is a Times staff writer.

A 54-year-old man was hit Saturday evening by a Blue Line Metro train in the same area of downtown Los Angeles where another Blue Line train hit a vehicle earlier in the day.

Witnesses said they saw the man step in front of the southbound train about 5 p.m., near where the train goes beneath the Santa Monica Freeway, said Los Angeles Fire Department spokesman Brian Humphrey. Nothing was known about the man's possible motivation.

The man was taken to California Hospital Medical Center in critical condition with multiple fractures and contusions, Humphrey said. No other people were injured.

The collision with the car occurred about 2:30 p.m., just south of the station at Pico Boulevard and Flower Street, where the light rail runs at street level, said Metro spokesman Rick Jager. The vehicle got in front of the train and sustained minor damage, but there were no injuries, he said.

Jager said that part of the track has not been problematic in the past and the two accidents on Saturday were coincidental.

"It's an unfortunate situation. But our trains are safe," he said. "The trains have the right of way. People have to pay attention out there."

--Steve Hymon

Comments

[Damien Goodmon]

Damon,

If the accident and fatality rates of cars were as high as they are for the Blue Line, there would be an accident at every major intersection practically every day and a death at every major intersection once a month.

Last year was a good year for the Blue Line (only 29 accidents and 3 deaths) and still the accident and fatality rates were astronomically higher than cars:

CA Freeways: 1.09 accidents per million miles driven
Blue Line: 17.1 accidents per million miles operated

CA Roads: 0.0018 deaths per million miles driven
Blue Line: 1.77 deaths per million miles operated

Understand that to obtain the same fatality rate with roads you have to take the number of auto-related deaths last year and multiply it by 983!

I say this seriously, if autos were as accident prone and fatal as the Blue Line, we would all be dead!

Finally, grade separating a 22 mile long line with a 26 foot right of way is quite different from grade separating thousands of miles of road and thousands of intersections. We make that investment with hi-speed roads (we call them freeways) and we should make the same investment for high-speed transit.

[Damon Tordini]

We have thousands of miles of roads criss-crossing the landscape, yet nobody claims we need grade separation or pedestrian footbridges every time somebody gets hit by a car. Isn't this more a problem of people not being mindful of trains?

[Damien Goodmon]

It's been well-documented. Just go to FixExpo.org

In particular, the Flower St portion of the Blue Line is the most accident-prone section of light rail in the country. And the irony of course is that this is the slowest running section of the Blue Line. Metro is legally able to operate up to 35 mph, but operators rarely go over 25.

The average in the Flower St section is 9 accidents a year over just 0.6 miles. If all of the Blue Line was as accident prone as that section, the Blue Line would be in an accident almost every day.

It's a testament to Metro's genuine concern for rail safety and reliable operations that they're going to double the number of trains in this section with the Expo Line sharing the tracks. They're expecting 48 trains per hour during peak hours.

And as someone on another blog said about Jager's comments, Metro sounds like the railroad mafia. Of course, the nature of the problem is that "safe" is a relative term. Metros using a definition very different from most rational people. We would never allow a private corporation to operate the deadliest product in the country, by two-fold and call it "safe."

We keep the deceased and his family in our prayers.

[alex]

Steve, you left out the most important part of the story. Hours earlier, another Blue Line engine hit a car in the same area. Is there something particularly dangerous about this section of track or was it just a coincidence?