LOS ANGELES | Transportation News & Discussion

[bzcat]

Originally Posted by blackcat23

http://urbanize.la/post/plans-lax-rail-link-move-ahead

Metro releases the DEIR for Aviation/96th Street Station, which will link to the future LAX automated people mover

First time Metro is planning to build a retail component inside its station.

[SoCalKid]

Originally Posted by bzcat

The new P3010 trains are experiencing a lot of problems on Expo line. Mainly with slow speeds and jerky brakes. For example, the P2000 travels at 50 mph between Farmdale and La Cienega station (the fastest part of Expo with no speed restriction and fully elevated/gated) but the P3010 will barely hit 30mph. The slow speed is causing the P3010s to miss red lights at other parts of Expo line and causing bunching problems, forcing the faster P2000 and P865 to slow down and wait at stations.

Any idea why they are having these speed issues? I wonder if they're solvable or if these are permanently defective trains.

[DenseCityPlease]

^This is horrendous decision making. If maintenance is so pressing they ought to be completely suspending rail service between midnight and 5am (as is done even in the transit paradise of Tokyo) in order to preserve at all costs the 10 minute headways during all hours of operation.

Our 105 mile rail network, which cost some $15 billion of taxpayer money to build, is now effectively unusable after 8pm. I would rather forfeit the entire Expo 2 and Foothill 2 extensions and go back to how things were a year ago than have this....

[Muji]

Unsurprisingly, Metro's evening service cuts have not been well-publicized. The only discussion I've found of it has been a post on Streetsblog yesterday (which keeps a surprisingly neutral tone): http://la.streetsblog.org/2016/06/22...-night-trains/

It's insane to me that they've decided to do this a few months before the new sales tax ballot measure. Crazy as it is, the service cuts are giving me doubts on voting yes in November. As much as the region deserves a massive transit expansion, I hardly think that an agency that so severely mismanages its service deserves to manage it.

[SoCalKid]

Originally Posted by Muji

Unsurprisingly, Metro's evening service cuts have not been well-publicized. The only discussion I've found of it has been a post on Streetsblog yesterday (which keeps a surprisingly neutral tone): http://la.streetsblog.org/2016/06/22...-night-trains/

It's insane to me that they've decided to do this a few months before the new sales tax ballot measure. Crazy as it is, the service cuts are giving me doubts on voting yes in November. As much as the region deserves a massive transit expansion, I hardly think that an agency that so severely mismanages its service deserves to manage it.

I encourage everyone to contact their County Supervisor (all of them sit on the Metro Board), and if your City Councilman sits on the board, them also. Let them know how disappointed you are with service cuts, and say you won't vote for the transit tax unless Metro shapes up (I wrote that, although I'll vote for it no matter what). Also a good time to make any other complaints or recommendations. For example, I complained about the Expo line making stops at the maintenance yard for driver changes.

[caligrad]

Originally Posted by electricron

Gain yes, but at the same rate?
Population of California:
1940 6.95 million
1950 10.68 million; a 53% increase with a gain of 3.73 million
1960 15.87 million; a 48% increase with a gain of 5.19 million
1970 19.97 million; a 25% increase with a gain of 4.07 million
1980 23.67 million; a 18% increase with a gain of 3.7 million
1990 29.96 million; a 26% increase with a gain of 6.26 million
2000 33.99 million; a 13% increase with a gain of 4.03 million
2010 37.35 million; a 3% increase with a gain of 3.36 million

The rate of increase of population is much lower now with higher taxes than it was earlier. I'm not sure even more taxes in California is sustainable.

LOL but at the same time, do we really need more people here? No housing, No water, Crowded streets/freeways, Crowded beaches. I wouldn't mind a population decrease of about 5 or 10 million HAHA. But at the end of the day, We're still seeing a population increase, whether its people born here or people moving in. Taxes and Earthquakes seem to not be scaring people away.

[ChargerCarl]

Originally Posted by caligrad

LOL but at the same time, do we really need more people here?

Yes? Why not? Why are so many NIMBYs misanthropes? More people = more trade, more potential friends, more potential partners, more potential entrepreneurs, more employees, etc

More people also means better transit projects start penciling out.

[SoCalKid]

I recently sent a message to LADOT urging them to adopt signal preemption for the Expo and Blue lines. This is the response I got (deleting name of the Engineering Associate as he sent this email privately):

It is an interesting point you bring up, about providing preemption for LRT services. However, it is something that I'd rather discuss with you on the phone, as getting into the details will take a significant amount of time via email. The programming was designed specifically to accommodate LRT in a semi-preemption manner (for lack of a better term), and will not likely be changed anytime soon. Anyhow, feel free to call me, or provide your number and I can call you. I will be on vacation all of next week. So we can discuss upon my return.

[LosAngelesSportsFan]

Originally Posted by SoCalKid

I recently sent a message to LADOT urging them to adopt signal preemption for the Expo and Blue lines. This is the response I got (deleting name of the Engineering Associate as he sent this email privately):

It is an interesting point you bring up, about providing preemption for LRT services. However, it is something that I'd rather discuss with you on the phone, as getting into the details will take a significant amount of time via email. The programming was designed specifically to accommodate LRT in a semi-preemption manner (for lack of a better term), and will not likely be changed anytime soon. Anyhow, feel free to call me, or provide your number and I can call you. I will be on vacation all of next week. So we can discuss upon my return.

Please call him and call him out on his bullshit.

[caligrad]

Originally Posted by ChargerCarl

Yes? Why not? Why are so many NIMBYs misanthropes? More people = more trade, more potential friends, more potential partners, more potential entrepreneurs, more employees, etc

More people also means better transit projects start penciling out.

LOL its Friday. In a good mood for the weekend. I was being a little sarcastic. Thought that was kinda obvious. Thanks for fishing though

[SoCalKid]

Originally Posted by LosAngelesSportsFan

Please call him and call him out on his bullshit.

I was thinking about it, but when it comes down to it, this guy won't be the one making any decisions. If we really want a change, we need to put pressure on Garcetti. He has publicly stated that he is not opposed to preemption, but it didn't sound like a priority for him. People who care about this should be emailing and calling his office once a week. That type of thing makes a surprising difference.

[ChargerCarl]

Originally Posted by caligrad

LOL its Friday. In a good mood for the weekend. I was being a little sarcastic. Thought that was kinda obvious. Thanks for fishing though

That wasn't really against you, I figured you were, but more agains NIMBYs in general.

[Eightball]

http://thesource.metro.net/2016/07/1...st-full-month/

We’ve been getting a lot of requests for Expo Line ridership numbers since the extension from Culver City to Santa Monica opened on May 20. The gist of it: average weekday boardings increased from 29,047 in April to 45,876 in June, the first full month of service between downtown Los Angeles and Santa Monica. See the above chart.
...

[202_Cyclist]

Originally Posted by Eightball

http://thesource.metro.net/2016/07/1...st-full-month/

Remember this: http://la.streetsblog.org/2013/09/12...ng-about-expo/?

Hahahahahahahaha! What a bunch of hacks.

[Quixote]

^ Speaking of hacks, who the hell is responsible for coming up with these lowball ridership projections? In fact, it seems that this has been going on for as long as Metro Rail has been in existence. I think the Green Line is the only one that has underperformed ridership-wise, but it's derided as a line that "goes from nowhere to nowhere."

Between this lack of foresight, reduction of evening rail service, and the constant delays/breakdowns/maintenance issues, Metro's logistical incompetence is on full display. It's always one step foward, two steps backward.

[bzcat]

Originally Posted by Quixote

^ Speaking of hacks, who the hell is responsible for coming up with these lowball ridership projections? In fact, it seems that this has been going on for as long as Metro Rail has been in existence. I think the Green Line is the only one that has underperformed ridership-wise, but it's derided as a line that "goes from nowhere to nowhere."

Between this lack of foresight, reduction of evening rail service, and the constant delays/breakdowns/maintenance issues, Metro's logistical incompetence is on full display. It's always one step foward, two steps backward.

Ridership estimates is one of those things best described as "no good deeds goes unpunished". There is no incentive for a transit agency to over estimate ridership during EIR process. They estimate just enough riders to get to where they need to be for Federal funding. If the line gets full Federal matching funds with 30,000 daily riders, there is no upside to guess you will have 50,000 daily riders and then it gets 40,000 daily riders after a few years.

[caligrad]

Interesting how bus rider ship is down. But rail ridership is up. But bus ridership drags overall numbers down.

I'm not sure how anyone else feels but I rather ride rail over buses any day. In my opinion, just like street cars, if there is traffic in the streets then that lowers the dependability on the bus system where as rail isn't tied down to share the street with cars and can keep on flowing. Maybe that's why bus ridership is down ? Every time gas prices go down, LA sees a big increase in traffic. Throw buses into that equation, might as well hop on rail or drive your own car.

[Quixote]

Originally Posted by bzcat

Ridership estimates is one of those things best described as "no good deeds goes unpunished". There is no incentive for a transit agency to over estimate ridership during EIR process. They estimate just enough riders to get to where they need to be for Federal funding. If the line gets full Federal matching funds with 30,000 daily riders, there is no upside to guess you will have 50,000 daily riders and then it gets 40,000 daily riders after a few years.

If anything, it would serve their best interest to be more liberal with their estimates so that the projects could be more competitive for federal funding.

Metro should be jumping for joy that new transit lines have more often than not met/exceeded their initial ridership predictions sooner than expected, because it means that people are buying what they're selling. What do they do in response? They continue to make the customer experience harder than it should be, alienating them in the process and forcing them to question whether or not transit is a better alternative to driving. Metro is okay with cutting evening rail service in half because they know that they can probably get away with it. But for the marginal cost savings of a few million dollars, they lose so much more in terms of good will.

Expo is already averaging 46,000 daily riders... that's been with crowded (2-car) trains and 12-minute headways. The growth rate will definitely slow down once the novelty wears off, but it's totally conceivable that this line could be at capacity in 20 years.

[Swede]

Originally Posted by Quixote

Expo is already averaging 46,000 daily riders... that's been with crowded (2-car) trains and 12-minute headways. The growth rate will definitely slow down once the novelty wears off, but it's totally conceivable that this line could be at capacity in 20 years.

At capacity? Since the stations can handle 3-car trains and the line should be able to handle 5-minute headways capacity should be a bit over 3 times higher peak loads than today. Or am I counting that wrong?

46 000 is just the beginning. Stockholm's LRT ring-line (does a half-circle just outside the inner city) built from 32k in 2005 to 44k in 2007 to 57.7k in 2012 (no expasions opened during that time). I'd be surprised if the Expo line didn't also build over time like that.
So... yeah, if trains are crowded now there service sure needs to improve to handle the growth.

[Quixote]

^ It's generally been said that the Blue Line is at or near capacity, peaking at roughly 93,000 daily riders back in 2012. So I can't imagine Expo being able to accommodate any more than that.

I firmly expect ridership to grow at a steady rate, since service will in fact improve. Once all the Kinkisharyo cars are delivered, you'll see 3-car trains and hopefully 6-minute headways during peak hours. But this will also be a challenge given the aforementioned issues with signal prioritization, street-running segments along the alignment, and power/maintenance. Then factor in the Regional Connector and Crenshaw Line connection, the destinations along the line itself, and the expansion of the system as a whole over the next few decades. How long before we run into problems?

Notice how the Red/Purple Lines aren't really saddled with any of those problems? I'm so grateful that we have a proper HRT system (as small as it may currently be) here and that it has a lot of room to grow. Building one completely from scratch today is next to impossible in this country.