Category: Transportation

In today’s LA TIMES:

House votes to repeal law blocking subway construction on L.A.’s Westside

Rep. Henry Waxman persuades lawmakers that a ban on federal funding for tunneling, which he pushed in 1985, should now be lifted. The move eliminates an obstacle to extending the line.

By Richard Simon, Times Staff Writer
February 8, 2007

WASHINGTON — Two decades ago, Rep. Henry A. Waxman wrote into law a ban on the use of federal funds to build a subway tunnel in the Fairfax district of Los Angeles, worried that construction could trigger an underground gas explosion.

On Wednesday, the Los Angeles Democrat — now convinced that new technology could make drilling safe — persuaded the House to repeal his 1985 law, removing a major political obstacle to extending the line to the Westside.

The one-page bill passed on a voice vote.

The Senate is likely to follow suit soon, and President Bush is expected to sign the repeal into law.

Roger Snoble, chief executive officer of Los Angeles County’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority, said the measure “opens the possibility of securing federal money to extend our subway westward to help alleviate the area’s crushing traffic congestion.”

A subway extension from its western terminus at Wilshire Boulevard and Western Avenue to the ocean about 13 miles away would cost at least $4.8 billion and require years of planning, design and construction. Securing federal funds at a time of massive budget deficits and fierce competition for dollars will also be no easy task.

“There is still much work to do before the subway can be extended,” Rep. Diane Watson (D-Los Angeles) said in a statement after the vote.

Waxman sought the tunneling ban after more than 20 people were injured in a methane gas explosion at a West 3rd Street clothing store.

But with traffic congestion growing worse, local officials led by Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa asked him to reconsider the ban.

“Very few issues affect the quality of life in Los Angeles more than traffic gridlock,” Villaraigosa said in a statement. “Getting stuck in traffic is more than just an inconvenience — it keeps us away from our families, it pollutes our environment and it costs our economy. Building a subway to the sea will get Los Angeles moving again.”

Villaraigosa noted that Los Angeles ranks first in the country in the amount of time that drivers spend in traffic jams — about 93 hours a year.

Waxman said he agreed to repeal his earlier bill after an independent panel of experts “indicated that technologies have been developed that could make tunneling in the area safe.”

A similar repeal measure was approved by the House last year, but died in the Senate in the waning days of Congress.

California Sens. Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein, both Democrats, this week introduced legislation to repeal the 1985 tunneling ban.

“It’s time to make this project a reality,” Feinstein said of the extension.

richard.simon@latimes.com

There was a story in the LA Daily News yesterday about how developers plan to build along the Orange Line in the San Fernando Valley.

I thought of a town near where my parents live called Ridgewood, NJ. It has a train station where one can ride into New York City in about 45 minutes, and a historic downtown filled with restaurants, shops and pedestrians.

As the inevitable LA “homeowners” backlash begins, in which various NIMBY’s sound the alarm about transit development and its “horrors”, (while they conveniently ignore auto oriented auto pollution and traffic), I will think of Ridgewood, NJ as a model of how to integrate public transportation and everyday living.

You’re sitting on the spanking new gorgeous Orange Line bus, the one that travels along the beautifully landscaped, fully dedicated Busway. It’s a sunny day, the bus is uncrowded, you decide to open the LA Times and catch up with the news on your way to North Hollywood.

As the bus gains speed, you suddenly are aware of an annoying intrusion of robotic sounding voices. It is called Transit TV and it broadcasts loudly into every Orange Line bus. There are advertisements for trade schools, banal weather and sports casters whose voice is automatically designed to increase in volume as the bus goes faster. You can no longer read your newspaper in peace or enjoy this brief moment of aloneness. You are a captive of TransitTV.

There is something insidious, rude and completely disrespectful in allowing a private company to install televisions in a bus. It is the polar opposite of an ipod because you cannot escape the drivel, you must endure it. It would be like Metro installing open bags of foul smelling dog doo in every bus. You would try and hold your nose, but the smell would get worse until the bus ride ended and then you would jump out and thank the Lord.

That is what Transit TV is: an assault on the senses.

Streets Without Signs

Kevin Roderick’s LA Observed has an excerpt from a recent article in Der Spiegel which discusses how some European traffic planners are REMOVING signs and lines to force drivers to self-regulate and therefore be more obedient and courteous to each other.

“European traffic planners are dreaming of streets free of rules and directives. They want drivers and pedestrians to interact in a free and humane way, as brethren — by means of friendly gestures, nods of the head and eye contact, without the harassment of prohibitions, restrictions and warning signs….”

It seems that most of the signs are ignored anyway. When was the last time you saw a car drive on the freeway under 65 mph? If California eliminated the double yellow line in the middle of the road, would the self-absorbed SUV driver slow down and pay attention?

It’s an interesting idea, getting rid of regulations and signs and allowing the driver to navigate a road more carefully, a road that has no directions other than common sense and courtesy.

Republicans would probably like the reduction in rules and government regulation and increase in individual responsibility.