LOS ANGELES | Transportation News & Discussion

[craigs]

Originally Posted by homebucket

https://cal.streetsblog.org/2024/08/...ion-a-rebuttal

I'm all for electrifying those Metrolink lines--if riders don't have to bear the significant financial burden. I have only taken one round-trip on the Antelope Valley Line, and I liked the experience. The trains were clean, the conductor is always moving through the cars, and the other riders were sane and orderly. But Metrolink fares are already high, especially compared with Metro's trains, and I think large fare increases to pay for electrification would significantly depress the system's already-low ridership.

[homebucket]

Originally Posted by craigs

I'm all for electrifying those Metrolink lines--if riders don't have to bear the significant financial burden. I have only taken one round-trip on the Antelope Valley Line, and I liked the experience. The trains were clean, the conductor is always moving through the cars, and the other riders were sane and orderly. But Metrolink fares are already high, especially compared with Metro's trains, and I think large fare increases to pay for electrification would significantly depress the system's already-low ridership.

According to the article, it does say that Metrolink could utilize federal funding or state HSR money (what % of that of the full price tag is unclear), but it's off the table as long as the agency refuses to take it seriously. There is some cost savings built in since Governor Newsom may sign A.B. 2503 this month, which would exempt Metrolink from the frivolous CEQA lawsuits, and CSHRA has already funded environmental impact reports for electrification of the Burbank to Anaheim route, further reducing costs for Metrolink.

It also notes that it will take time to plan, secure funding, and build out the infrastructure for Metrolink, which is why the board needs to show some leadership and commit to electrification now.

[craigs]

Speaking of Metrolink, here's a fantastic map showing average weekday ridership by station from LA Redditor misken67:



That adds up to an average of 23,553 workday Metrolink riders.

[craigs]

LA County officials announced that a "14.5-mile segment of the 19-mile, $7.1 billion Metro Southeast Gateway Line is now eligible for federal funding." Utility work on the project is expected to begin by the end of this year.

[llamaorama]

That seems lower than what I was expecting for such a huge network in a giant city.

I wonder if the system would work better with shorter more frequent trains. Like 2-car stadler DMU's running every 30 minutes 7 days a week would easily handle those volumes and be more useful and attract more ridership.

[craigs]

Originally Posted by llamaorama

That seems lower than what I was expecting for such a huge network in a giant city.

I wonder if the system would work better with shorter more frequent trains. Like 2-car stadler DMU's running every 30 minutes 7 days a week would easily handle those volumes and be more useful and attract more ridership.

Yeah, Metrolink commuter rail ridership was never spectacular but it's way down since COVID. That's because the hub of the Metrolink system is Union Station in downtown LA and the model is to serve downtown commuters. As elsewhere, a lot of the downtown office jobs have gone to WFH some or all days.

[Quixote]

Metrolink’s utility, beyond faster and more frequent service, would benefit from thru-running. This is why I think it’s a good idea to convert Metrolink into a BART-like system, possibly compatible with our HRT, to serve urban LA County — no different than how the A Line functions. Suburban stations/riders could enjoy peak headways of 2-5 minutes. It would be an expensive, yet more cost-effective approach to expanding high-capacity rail because there is already some built-in ridership.

[Quixote]

Originally Posted by craigs

I'm all for electrifying those Metrolink lines--if riders don't have to bear the significant financial burden.

That’s where Props A/C and Measures M/R should come into play. There should be a plan to gradually decrease the apportionment of highway and local return funds, reallocating them to transit expansion and upgrades.

The resistance comes from the high capital costs vis-a-vis immediate ROI. The catch-22 has always been that to justify expenditure you need the ridership, but generating the ridership requires expenditure. Instead, we mostly get watered-down, politically satisfying projects that do nothing to move the needle.

[Quixote]

Originally Posted by craigs

LA County officials announced that a "14.5-mile segment of the 19-mile, $7.1 billion Metro Southeast Gateway Line is now eligible for federal funding." Utility work on the project is expected to begin by the end of this year.

For that $7.1 billion, we could finish the Subway to the Sea and possibly get the B Line down to the 105 because of the cost-effective nature of those routes.

[Busy Bee]

Originally Posted by Quixote

The resistance comes from the high capital costs vis-a-vis immediate ROI. The catch-22 has always been that to justify expenditure you need the ridership, but generating the ridership requires expenditure. Instead, we mostly get watered-down, politically satisfying projects that do nothing to move the needle.

Yep, pretty much

[Quixote]

Finally, a departure from stainless steel!

Sepulveda Transit Corridor Partners Selects Stadler Rail Cars and Siemens Mobility Rail Signaling Technology for Proposed Fast, Green Line Connecting Los Angeles’ San Fernando Valley & Westside



LOS ANGELES - Sepulveda Transit Corridor Partners (STCP) has announced that it has selected two key partners to provide essential infrastructure components for its transit development options to ease congestion through the I-405/Sepulveda corridor between Los Angeles’ San Fernando Valley and Westside. Stadler, a world-class passenger rail vehicle manufacturer, has been selected to design and build the state-of-the-art rail cars in STCP’s proposal. Siemens Mobility, a worldwide expert in intelligent transportation solutions, has been selected by STCP as the signaling partner for the driverless Metro systems that are a key element of the consortium’s sustainable and reliable transit proposal.

https://www.sepulvedatransit.com/sep...alley-westside

[jmecklenborg]

Originally Posted by Quixote

The resistance comes from the high capital costs vis-a-vis immediate ROI. The catch-22 has always been that to justify expenditure you need the ridership, but generating the ridership requires expenditure. Instead, we mostly get watered-down, politically satisfying projects that do nothing to move the needle.

LA is a crazy set of contrasts in which the heavy rail metro system will be 100% underground and every single station location will be successful (i.e. zero crap suburban park-and-rides in the middle of the expressway like Washington, DC). Meanwhile, only a handful of the many surface light rail and commuter rail stations are in locations that equal the least-successful heavy rail locations.

Piggy-backing the expense of grade separation and electrification for commuter rail with HSR makes a lot of sense, however. But the political strategy in LA and across the United States is to create new mediocre services rather than upgrade existing services to something resembling heavy rail performance. The new downtown light rail subway is an exception to this, but a rare exception.

[Quixote]

Originally Posted by jmecklenborg

LA is a crazy set of contrasts in which the heavy rail metro system will be 100% underground and every single station location will be successful (i.e. zero crap suburban park-and-rides in the middle of the expressway like Washington, DC). Meanwhile, only a handful of the many surface light rail and commuter rail stations are in locations that equal the least-successful heavy rail locations.

Piggy-backing the expense of grade separation and electrification for commuter rail with HSR makes a lot of sense, however. But the political strategy in LA and across the United States is to create new mediocre services rather than upgrade existing services to something resembling heavy rail performance. The new downtown light rail subway is an exception to this, but a rare exception.

It's still puzzling to me that there are some who still genuinely believe that LRT will suffice, given its many competitive disadvantages:

1) Lower capacity
2) Less frequency
3) Slower speeds
4) Risk of delays from collisions
5) Lack of signal priority

At-grade, street-running segments along any portion automatically affect the entire line and its car-competitiveness, which therefore reduces its overall utility.

This is before even mentioning perceived public safety issues, which along with the pandemic, have really quashed a lot of the momentum built after the passage of Measures R and M. As a result, the D Line extension will probably not generate the level of ridership as initially anticipated, which in turn could reinforce the notion that such a large capital investment isn't worth the ROI and that Metro doesn't need to operate trains at higher frequencies.

At this point, I think our best hopes moving forward are:

1) The D Line extension to the VA opens in 2027, prompting questions and enthusiastic conversations about extending it all the way to Santa Monica
2) Bechtel's bid for the Sepulveda corridor wins, and its innovative approach provides a useful template for HRT expansion moving forward (e.g., shorter, more frequent trains, 21-hour automated operations, smaller station boxes) and sets an important precedent for elevated heavy rail in LA
3) The novelty of the Brightline West ignites talk of mainline ROW upgrades (e.g., double, triple, quadruple trackage) and Metrolink electrification

[Quixote]

I wish Metro would at least explore the idea of constructing new subway lines with limited stops at only the most strategic locations, and then add infill stations at a later date. So for, say, a B Line extension down Vermont, stations could be built at Pico, Expo, 105 freeway, and either Slauson or Manchester.

The goal of this approach is to:

1) Cut down initial costs by 40-60%
2) Create an appetite/incentive for further accessibility (e.g., infill stations, extensions)
3) Increase network-wide ridership that makes future capital expenditures that much more cost-effective

[electricron]

Originally Posted by Quixote

I wish Metro would at least explore the idea of constructing new subway lines with limited stops at only the most strategic locations, and then add infill stations at a later date. So for, say, a B Line extension down Vermont, stations could be built at Pico, Expo, 105 freeway, and either Slauson or Manchester.

The goal of this approach is to:

1) Cut down initial costs by 40-60%
2) Create an appetite/incentive for further accessibility (e.g., infill stations, extensions)
3) Increase network-wide ridership that makes future capital expenditures that much more cost-effective

To decrease costs of building underground stations is to dig them out with cut and cover techniques. Drilling them out with moving drills may be cheaper for the corridor in general, but much more expensive at station locations.
Either way you build it, the stations must be dug out before the corridor is built, because doing it afterwards requires shutting the corridor down. To keep the corridor up, dig out all the station locations first. Whether you actually build the stations now or later does not matter. Never-the-less, the digging costs for in fill stations is not cheap.

[LA21st]

Originally Posted by craigs

Speaking of Metrolink, here's a fantastic map showing average weekday ridership by station from LA Redditor misken67:



That adds up to an average of 23,553 workday Metrolink riders.

I wonder what the weekend numbers are. Cause the line to San Clemente on the weekends is busy like you'd see back in Chicago or east coast.

[LA21st]

Originally Posted by Busy Bee

Yep, pretty much

God, that east LA exentsion is such a dumb, boring line. And nobody rides it.
Couldve easily done something in West Hollywood instead.

[Nouvellecosse]

A city like LA would do well with a large, Melbourne-style, suburban rail network. It has high average density making it difficult to keep up with road capacity, but fairly low peak density for its size meaning that a rail network focused on underground heavy-rail metro isn't as useful. LA's network should be less core focused than Melbourne's but given that the Green line is fully grade separated and acts as a cross town connection, just expanding the current Metrolink network by electrifying it and adding tracks to allow greater frequency would work wonders.

Although I'm not sure how close the existing mainline rail tracks get to major destinations. That can be a problem with converting or upgrading a mainline rail network for public transport use. If the rail network was originally for passenger use then it works well since the stops tend to be convenient for passengers such as in suburban downtowns that used to be separate towns and cities. But for a mainly freight network, the routes often go thru very industrialized areas.

[jmecklenborg]

Originally Posted by Quixote

It's still puzzling to me that there are some who still genuinely believe that LRT will suffice, given its many competitive disadvantages:

1) Lower capacity
2) Less frequency
3) Slower speeds
4) Risk of delays from collisions
5) Lack of signal priority

Well the green line is completely grade separated and very fast, but its station locations are crap.

Rebuilding the at-grade expo and blue line approaches to the downtown connector ought to be a very high priority but I don't believe that it's in the cue.

[Quixote]

Originally Posted by Nouvellecosse

A city like LA would do well with a large, Melbourne-style, suburban rail network. It has high average density making it difficult to keep up with road capacity, but fairly low peak density for its size meaning that a rail network focused on underground heavy-rail metro isn't as useful. LA's network should be less core focused than Melbourne's but given that the Green line is fully grade separated and acts as a cross town connection, just expanding the current Metrolink network by electrifying it and adding tracks to allow greater frequency would work wonders.

Although I'm not sure how close the existing mainline rail tracks get to major destinations. That can be a problem with converting or upgrading a mainline rail network for public transport use. If the rail network was originally for passenger use then it works well since the stops tend to be convenient for passengers such as in suburban downtowns that used to be separate towns and cities. But for a mainly freight network, the routes often go thru very industrialized areas.

LA's urban core doesn't really have mainline ROWs traversing through it. Instead it has vestiges of the old Pacific Electric streetcar network, typically in the form of wide roads with landscaped medians (i.e., Santa Monica, San Vicente, Vermont, Burton Way).

For what LA doesn't have (at least not yet) in the way of population density, it makes up for by sheer total population. We need a system that can move millions of people efficiently. LRT just doesn't have the capacity or psychological cachet that HRT does.

I agree that underground metro isn't necessary, especially the way we're constructing heavy rail whereby routes closely parallel major arteries and freeways. The best stretch of subway is the D Line extension between Century City and Westwood, in which no car can compete with.