LOS ANGELES | Transportation News & Discussion

[202_Cyclist]

MTA board approves bus-only lanes on Wilshire Boulevard — with an exception

The $31.5-million rapid transit project will include 7.7 miles of bus lanes in the east- and westbound lanes from MacArthur Park to Santa Monica. But the lanes will disappear in a one-mile section in Westwood.

By Dan Weikel
Los Angeles Times
December 10, 2010

"Bus-only lanes that would operate during rush hour on busy Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles were approved Thursday, but a mile-long section of the proposed project was eliminated to ease the concerns of Westwood residents.

The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority board voted unanimously to build the $31.5-million bus rapid transit project, which includes 7.7 miles of bus lanes on both sides of the street between South Park View Street, which borders MacArthur Park near downtown, and Centinela Avenue on the Westside.

Supervisor and MTA board member Mark Ridley-Thomas was present but abstained.

Removed from the original plan were lanes between Comstock and Selby avenues in an area known as "condo canyon" because of its high-rise development. Residents say the project would cause huge backups of traffic, which now moves smoothly, and interfere with delivery people and motorists trying to get into or out of driveways or parking garages..."

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la...,7722931.story

[M II A II R II K]

A closer look at job centers and transit in Los Angeles County, including Century City


http://thesource.metro.net/2010/12/1...-century-city/

Many big job centers (illustrated by the darker shades of blue in the map above) are served by transit. These job centers include Warner Center in Woodland Hills (Orange Line BRT); Pasadena (Gold Line); Santa Clarita, Palmdale and Lancaster (Metrolink); Long Beach (Blue Line); and downtown Los Angeles.

Others are not at the moment. For example, the northwest San Fernando Valley is a darker shade of blue. It will soon have the Orange Line busway extension, scheduled to open in 2012 and a project funded by the Measure R sales tax increase approved by L.A. County voters in 2008.

The Crenshaw/LAX Line will travel along Aviation Boulevard through the job-rich area surrounding LAX. The South Bay area is also a darker shade of blue; an extension of the Green Line to Torrance is currently under study. And the Foothill Extension of the Gold Line coincides with the darker blue area along the 210 freeway in the San Gabriel Valley.

The second map, however, vividly shows what is rather obvious: these three big job centers are not currently served by local or commuter rail. Under Measure R, that area is slated to be accessible by the Westside Subway Extension and the second phase of the Expo Line.

[SD_Phil]

Really cool map! It should help boost the already considerable arguments in favor of expanding transit in those directions.

[JDRCRASH]

Wow, thanks Mark! We really need an LRT line on Brand to Downtown Glendale. It can then turn west to the Burbank Metrolink station, and, eventually, meet up with the Orange Line at Lankershim.

[Quixote]

FTA gives Metro the green light to study transit alternatives for Van Nuys corridor

By Dave Sotero
December 21, 2010

Metro announced today that it has been selected to receive $2 million in Federal Transit Administration funding to begin two new transportation projects: an alternatives analysis for a premium transit service on Van Nuys Boulevard and work to improve the agency’s transit forecasting model. See the FTA’s announcement.

And here are the project descriptions.

This latest funding notice from the FTA injects new momentum into the agency’s Measure R program and is a win for the San Fernando Valley.

The Van Nuys Corridor is a main element in the East San Fernando Valley North-South Rapidways Project, which seeks to provide better transit service on key corridors in the Valley.

For the Van Nuys Corridor project, the goal is to greatly improve mobility on Van Nuys Boulevard for about 10 miles between Ventura and Foothill Boulevards. Anyone who has ridden a bus down Van Nuys Boulevard in this area knows this street is primed for some sort of premium service.

The Van Nuys corridor consistently ranks as one of the top ten busiest bus corridors in Los Angeles County. In the Valley it is the busiest corridor. Total weekday boardings on Metro buses serving this boulevard even beat the Metro Orange Line and Ventura Metro Rapid in terms of daily ridership. (Metro has approximately 27,000 weekday boardings for buses running on Van Nuys compared to the Orange Line’s 23,500 and Ventura Rapid’s 5,500 boardings).

So what are the possible transit alternatives the Alternatives Analysis will study? Besides the obligatory No-Build and Transportation Systems Management alternatives, Metro will be looking at the following options:

Dedicated bus lanes
Light rail
Streetcars

...

http://thesource.metro.net/2010/12/2...nuys-corridor/

[pesto]

A couple of issues:

1. The commercial density in the SFV is far to the west, along Ventura and in Warner Center; nowhere near Van Nuys. The transit priority in the valley is for people coming from the Central Valley, Santa Clarita, the high desert and the valley itself into LA. LRT is too slow to help this; express buses are probably the best until a good HSR link is in place along the 405.

LRT may be good along Van Nuys, but not because it is a commercial hub. It will also get less opposition there because it runs mostly through struggling neighborhoods. But still, express bus is the obvious first step.

2. Glendale to DT is fine. The distance is short enough for LRT to make some sense (under 5 miles) although I would prefer subway. Connection between Glendale and either Burbank or Pasadena is a lot less obvious to me but I know others disargee.

3. Crenshaw runs right through some of the lowest density on the LA portion of the map. I don't think it hits any major employment areas without a connection or half-mile walk. In any event LRT is too long and too slow to serve as a major mover of commuters from the South Bay to mid-Wilshire.

[DJM19]

It should definitely be light rail. Its a busier transit corridor than the orange line and the Ventura line. Id rather just do it right the first time.

For that matter, Sepulveda has a huge median. It should get something there as well. Though it is very close to van nuys. Still something must be done with that street.

Canoga, Reseda, Sepulveda, Van Nuys, Lankershim. I think they should all have a transit upgrade of some kind. And then get working on the east-west corridors.

[miketoronto]

Why are they putting bus lanes on Wilshire? Is the subway extension not going to go under Wilshire all the way to Santa Monica?

[DJM19]

Originally Posted by miketoronto

Why are they putting bus lanes on Wilshire? Is the subway extension not going to go under Wilshire all the way to Santa Monica?

Its going to go under Wilshire, but only to westwood for now, until more money is realized. But that line will take several years. The bus lane is a quick solution to help right now.

[Sodha]

Originally Posted by DJM19

Its going to go under Wilshire, but only to westwood for now, until more money is realized. But that line will take several years. The bus lane is a quick solution to help right now.

Wilshire is one of the nation's busiest corridors. It has a near 100,000 boardings on the 20 and 720 alone. Not even Chicago or New York has a congested single street like Wilshire that is 15 miles of length of multi-story buildings. Wilshire deserves both a bus-only lane and a heavy rail transit mode. This is the same mentality in London and Paris where bus only lanes run in the same areas with heavy rail. We're not substituting buses for rails and vice versa. We need both to serve a very dense corridor and one that will get more dense with the Purple Line extension.

[Kingofthehill]

After Wilshire, Vermont needs HRT. ASAP. It is ridiculous that a street with consistent high-levels of density and 50,000+ bus riders, daily, is rarely mentioned - if ever - during transit discussions. (and even more ridiculous is that streets like Crenshaw, with its paltry ridershio, are on-track for "premium" transit before Vermont).

[blade_bltz]

Originally Posted by Sodha

Not even Chicago or New York has a congested single street like Wilshire that is 15 miles of length of multi-story buildings.

Come on now...

[pesto]

KOTH: Agreed! Vermont is everything that Crenshaw isn't: actual traffic and density, connects to Coliseum, USC, Expo Park (and Ktown, Westlake, Red Line and DT, either directly or with a short connection depending on route).

blade blitz: I think the comparison is to length of street, not to traffic density. But it should be noted that about 90 percent of the highrises in LA are within 1 mile of Wilshire.

[northbay]

having more than one transit mode on a dense street is not unusual or mutually exclusive. i imagine the subway will be for longer distance travel and the brt will have more stops closer together.

makes me think of market street in sf, it has bart subway, muni subway AND surface streetcars (and buses of course). different 'levels' of transit for different needs.

[JDRCRASH]

Originally Posted by DJM19

It should definitely be light rail. Its a busier transit corridor than the orange line and the Ventura line. Id rather just do it right the first time.

For that matter, Sepulveda has a huge median. It should get something there as well. Though it is very close to van nuys. Still something must be done with that street.

Canoga, Reseda, Sepulveda, Van Nuys, Lankershim. I think they should all have a transit upgrade of some kind. And then get working on the east-west corridors.

Sepulveda has a large median, but only past Parthenia. That's because an old PE ROW once ran down Van Nuys, turned on Parthenia, and then turned on Sepulveda.

I think this ROW should be reused when this corridor is designed.

[DJM19]

Yes it is a good idea to turn on parthenia. The only problem is how to bring the train back east after going north on sepulveda? I do think it should end further east, such as at the sylmar metrolink.

[XtremeDave]

Originally Posted by DJM19

Yes it is a good idea to turn on parthenia. The only problem is how to bring the train back east after going north on sepulveda? I do think it should end further east, such as at the sylmar metrolink.

The PE ROW continues onto Brand which takes it east to San Fernando Road. From there the line could either run on an aerial/tunnel or on San Fernando/Truman St up 1 mile to the Metrolink (and possible HSR) station.

[JDRCRASH]

^ Oh yeah, I forgot that the CHSR is supposed to stop at Sylmar.

[Quixote]

Welcome to 2011! It should be a busy and exciting year for Metro Rail. On the horizon:

1) Opening of Expo I to at least La Cienega
2) Beginning of construction of Expo II to Santa Monica
3) Beginning of construction of Gold Line Foothill Extension to Azusa
4) Beginning of construction of Crenshaw Corridor

The FEIS/FEIR and preliminary engineering for the Westside Subway Extension should be completed by the end of the year.

Also, an LPA for the West Santa Ana Branch Corridor is expected to be chosen sometime late this year. So, it looks like that project does in fact have a shot at getting built within the 10-year timeframe.

[OhioGuy]

Originally Posted by Westsidelife

Also, an LPA for the West Santa Ana Branch Corridor is expected to be chosen sometime late this year. So, it looks like that project does in fact have a shot at getting built within the 10-year timeframe.

I just checked it out on Google maps and that's a pretty sweet corridor! Other than street crossings, the fact a future rail line would be able to avoid running on potential traffic clogged streets should help avoid overly slow travel times between Santa Ana & LA. It's great the corridor has been preserved all these years despite the end of rail service 50 years ago.

I would assume a potential future line would run from the end of the ROW through downtown Santa Ana to the transit center to connect with CHSR? Would it connect to the green line further west and run along that corridor? Or would they build a connector between the green & blue lines so that it could turn north toward downtown LA? (though running it on the blue line tracks could face problems further north with coordinating between Expo trains & blue line trains)