Los Angeles Measure R passes, allowing for massive transportation infrastructure upgrades
Articles — By forcechange on November 5, 2008 11:42 am
By a slim margin, Los Angeles County voters passed Measure R. A little over 67% of the voters approved the measure, which required a 2/3 super-majority. Steve Hymon at the LATimes notes:
Early work is likely to include an extension of the Expo Line from Culver City to Santa Monica, an extension of the Gold Line from Pasadena to Azusa and placement of a busway or light-rail line along Crenshaw Boulevard in South Los Angeles, planners say.
But approval of a half-cent sales tax delivered a more immediate victory to Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who came into office more than three years ago pledging to finally start the city’s so-called Subway to the Sea. Now, money to begin such a subterranean route — probably along the Wilshire corridor — is assured by the Measure R plan.
“The commuters of LA were fed up with traffic and gas prices, and they responded by making an historic investment that will change the face of transportation in the region forever,” Villaraigosa said.
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I am so glad that measure R passed. I have been a bus operator for MTA for the last 10 years. Every day I see the problems that face our great city, as far as public transportation is concerned.One day I picked up an administrater on his way to work at MTA. We talked a bit about transportation issues. I told him subways are the answer, not more and more buses on the street. One of these politicians needs to get brave and beg borrow or steal to get the funds for having not one, but many boring machines making new subways. They may curse that politician today, but in years to come they will make gold statues in his/her name.
I have just finished a trip in San Francisco and used their BART system. I have never been so impressed to see a massive transport system working so efficiently. Traveling from the airport to a destination thirty miles away only took less than twenty minutes. Transfers on the BART and Bus stops were less than five minutes. The air in San Francisco was clean and fresh because the convenience of their transit system discourages excess car driving. With the economy in a recession, building a transport system like BART would not only stimulate the economy, but also preserve our environment.
People need to get over the 1/2 a cent aspect. First of all that is chump change, and secondly it is about TIME for the public transportation system down here to be brought up to date.
If you’ve been to or lived in NY you will understand.
Agree. However, I wouldn’t use NY as a barometer. Tokyo has best transpo. in the world and should be the model to follow.
I don’t know much about Tokyo’s system, but I think the Bay Area’s public transit is a pretty good model for LA. They use a good mixture of heavy rail with BART and light rail with Muni. Although their traffic is still pretty bad, you can pretty much travel throughout most of the region pretty easily.
Better yet, consider the excellent metro system in Paris. Having lived there for nearly a year I never felt the need for a car. A hub-and-spoke arrangement with a few ‘wheel’ routes coupled with links to high speed rail stations and you’ve solved a lot of transportation problems.
LA is much more spread out, but we have to start tackling the problem. Next step would be ample “park-and-ride” spots at outlying metro stops with secure, monitored areas to leave cars while commuting to work..
So far, the metro is doing a great job in the areas that its in. If you go downtown, you’ll see packed trains and train stops…now they just need to get it going over on the Westside. I think any model is better than the nothingness we have now!