Anonymous has left a new comment on your post ""WHY" L.A. traffic sucks #3: Bus'em and clog'em":
So are you finally ready to be taxed for a comprehensive subway system?
Note:
Transit ridership is much higher than people seem to think. At 1.3 million (bus and rail) daily riders that ends up being roughly 10% of the county.
Posted by Anonymous to L.A. traffic sucks: Let's fix it! at 6/01/2006 03:38:54 AM
italianesco replies:
I think this question should be put to L.A. Country voters along with a few other questions. Some of the answers can be gleaned from this article in the L.A. Weekly:
The Subway Mayor - How a bus-only politician — and a car-obsessed city — are learning to love the underground By ERIC BERKOWITZ - Thursday, August 18, 2005 - 12:00 am
Here are some highlights from the article. All emphasis mine:
"Villaraigosa talked of a 'subway to the sea' during the campaign and staked a big chunk of his political capital on a promise to expand the rail system. [...] Villaraigosa took the first step by assuming the helm of the MTA. Now, the question is whether he will have the clout to move the political mountains required to get Los Angeles the transit system it deserves."
HOW LONG will it take?
“'This isn’t going to happen in four years,' the mayor said. 'We’ve got to start building a consensus around a plan for the next 20 years.'"
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HOW MUCH will it cost?
"The Red Line’s extension to the Valley was completed in 2000. Jagged as a gerrymandered congressional district, and carrying a milelong spur from Vermont to Western, the $4.7 billion line is the most expensive 17 miles of subway ever built."
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WHO will pay for it?
"Riding the swell of frustration, Yaroslavsky sponsored an initiative in 1998 that barred the use of county sales-tax money for subway projects. He described it as the county’s 'last chance' to avoid 'a regional transportation nightmare.' With no opposition on the ballot, it passed. That same year, the MTA suspended all new rail projects." [...]
"Yaroslavsky stands by his 1998 prohibition against the use of county money for underground rail, and he still says subways are too costly. But he’s starting to sound like a cautious Red Line advocate." [...]
"Given that Sacramento has diverted more than $2 billion of local transit funding in the past two years to meet state budget shortfalls, and the Bush administration likely will continue to try to cut transportation funding, the subway will be a budget challenge even if Waxman and Yaroslavsky soften up." [...]
"Transit rider Harris, who has little money to spare, said he would “gladly accept a half-cent sales tax for the Red Line. I’d do it in a second.” That’s good, but it’s probably not representative of the electorate. People meekly give oil companies record profits by funding a 40 percent boost in gasoline prices, but they seize up when the word tax is involved. The voters will need to be convinced." [...]
"Villaraigosa can’t count on bundles of help from Washington or Sacramento. The region was reasonably successful in the recent federal transit bill [...], but money for a new subway project is a long shot even if Waxman comes around. Closer to home, our Hummer-driving governor won’t ever back such a project. The mayor will have to build local resolve to carry a substantial share of the load." [...]
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WILL it ever happen?
"Before one more foot of subway tunnel is in place, Villaraigosa and his new rail coalition must conquer the demons that have derailed L.A.’s most ambitious transit plans, even before the smattering of subway and light-rail lines were built." [...]
"Criollo is easily set off by talk of more subways. If Villaraigosa 'advocates for more rail, then we are willing to have open struggle with him in court, in the boardroom and in the streets. We’ll fight him every inch of the way.'”
"So far, the Red Line is nowhere to be found on the MTA’s schedule of priorities. After the Waxman and Yaroslavsky prohibitions, 'it’s not really on the radar screen,' said MTA spokesman Marc Littman. Villaraigosa said he intends to rectify this when the MTA prepares its new long-range plan in the coming months." [...]
"Villaraigosa’s challenge — and it’s a big one — is to communicate a vision that will inspire the city to endure the costs and disruptions of long-term transit projects."
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Not to sound pessimistic or to discourage anyone - I'm a believer in public transporation - but sounds to me like L.A. has waited a bit too long to tackle this immense problem. A comprehensive subway system for L.A. is a long, long, long-term project, and even if it were approved tomorrow, it'd be a long, long, long way from completion.
“'This isn’t going to happen in four years,' the mayor said. 'We’ve got to start building a consensus around a plan for the next 20 years.'"
On top of that, you can be sure that the traffic would be horrendous with the disruption caused by all the construction. Anybody pinning their hopes on a complete subway system for relief from the traffic problem is dreaming. I'd say that the city needs to do whatever it takes NOW - NOT tomorrow, NOT four years from now, NOT 20 years from now - to find simple, affordable and politically viable relief, immediate relief, to the traffic problem. Some of my ideas might be a good place to start... ;-) [See WESTSIDE SOLUTION AT A GLANCE]
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Read the complete article in the L.A. Weekly: The Subway Mayor - How a bus-only politician — and a car-obsessed city — are learning to love the underground By ERIC BERKOWITZ - Thursday, August 18, 2005. It's mostly a history of the roadblocks to the subway.
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Thursday, June 01, 2006
Open Discussion: Subway: "...ready to be taxed for a comprehensive subway system?"
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3 comments:
You wrote:
On top of that, you can be sure that the traffic would be horrendous with the disruption caused by all the construction.
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I moved into the Koreatown during the middle of construction. I remembered it well. The biggest impact is having big, ugly piers over where the stations are going to be.
Part of the high-cost of building the subway was the deep-bore construction. This means that streets were relatively untouched where the tunnels are, but the station boxes was where you had those piers. Cut-and-cover is a much cheaper building method, but this is actually slower and all of Wilshire Boulevard would have to be ripped up to be done.
As for horrendous traffic; there won't be any. That's because Wilshire will periodically have to be closed. This is usually done on weekends only, and lasts about 1-2 years. This is how long it took on Wilshire going to Western. (This is also in progress along First Street in East L.A., where the Gold Line extension had to be built as a subway.)
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Anybody pinning their hopes on a complete subway system for relief from the traffic problem is dreaming.
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Antonio Villaraigosa (and passage of the bonds in November) may make it a reality.
Zev's law bans the two local sales taxes from being used to build the subway; the bonds passage would free up money for subway construction while local and federal money can go elsewhere. Zev's law did not ban subways.
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I'd say that the city needs to do whatever it takes NOW - NOT tomorrow, NOT four years from now, NOT 20 years from now - to find simple, affordable and politically viable relief, immediate relief, to the traffic problem. Some of my ideas might be a good place to start... ;-)
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Cool your jets there, buddy. :> When you mean now, the soonest you can see any plan of yours become reality is a year or two. That's as close to now as you can get.
The local traffic bureaucracies are set up this way. Even installing a left-turn signal is quite a cumbersome process.
Don't go blaming the bureaucracy for this; it's not done just to keep progress from happening. It's to make sure everything gets done right in the first place.
Here's the typical process:
1. A traffic engineer typically does surveys as to what management solutions need to go where. Once that is done, city planners then assess which of these projects have priority.
2. Planners then identify a funding source and project outline for the city council to adopt.
3. City council adopts the proposal and a request for proposals is floated.
4. A contractor is selected to complete the program.
5. The solution is then tested.
6. The improvement has been made.
It's agonizing, I know, but skip these steps and strange things start to happen.
If you really want to be a traffic management advocate, take the next step and go to city council meetings and make friends with the transportation departments. The engineers and planners are not stand-offish, and you could bounce these ideas off their heads and get feedback.
I used to be very involved with transit advocacy, and I could tell you from first-hand experience what a glacial and frustrating process it is. You have to be very patient. For instance, do you see the articulated buses on the Orange Line and on Vermont and Western avenues? I got the ball rolling on those almost 8 years ago. Yes, it can take that long, but stick with it and you'll get an appreciation of how things get done and you may even see traffic get less aggravating.
1.3 million riders? I have to assume most of them use going the other way to so that makes it 650,000 riders and 5% of the population. So I guess it's not so great.
The traffic problem has many factors...
-Old streets that were never meant for buses (let alone the mega buses, that are stretched twice as long. Say on Vermont in Koreatown. Just completely insane to run these huge buses all day on these old dilapidated streets.
Say Vermont and Washington. It creates chaos on the right lane.
-The freeways are from the 50's. Hopeless. The pasadena freeway, lol. Its a joke in 2008.
-Overzealous builders.
-Lack of leadership.
-Huge gap in the rich and the poor. Terrible schools. If 30 or 40% of highschool kids drop out, that must keep adding pressure on the bus system.
And lots of other factors.
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