LOS ANGELES | Transportation News & Discussion

[SIGSEGV]

Originally Posted by BrownTown

Damn, 100,000 riders for just a handful of stations is really high numbers.

Do people actually trust those numbers? There's not much at either end of this line so it seems like most people are transferring at each endpoint.

A ton of people already commute on slow-as-hell "express" buses over Sepulveda to UCLA/Westwood, so I think they're pretty plausible.

[Quixote]

Goodbye LRT.

As I kind of predicted, this is one of those rare instances where Metro’s lack of creativity will actually end up being beneficial. The ESFV segment should not be a reason why we have to “dumb down” the rest of the line.

Thoughts:

1) Just scrap the monorail option already
2) HRT1 is clearly the best, and notice how they extended the alignment to include the Van Nuys Metrolink station
3) Why isn’t there a station on Santa Monica Blvd?
4) Other than that, I think Centinela does make more sense than Westwood/Overland for the southern extension

[Quixote]

Also, I wish they would consider making this an automated line running every 2 minutes peak, 5 minutes off-peak for like 23 hours of the day to maximize ridership and revenue. It makes the steep price of 100% grade-separation worth it.

[Car(e)-Free LA]

Can we cancel Van Nuys LRT and have option one but with subway stops at Magnolia, Oxnard, Haynes, Sherman, and the Metrolink station? Also, can the southern route stop at Wilshire/Westwood, Santa Monica/Westwood, and Westwood/Rancho Park, with future extensions along Overland, Jefferson, and Sepulveda to LAX. Definitely serves more important areas in Culver City than Sawtelle and Mar Vista.

[Quixote]

^ The potential for a station at Jefferson/Centinela is what does it for me. If they can manage to squeeze in a station at Santa Monica/Barrington, then it’s a grand slam. This is really the only chance of us ever seeing stations at such locations. Venice Blvd will likely get a rail line eventually (negating the loss of an Overland station), even more so with two existing stations (Culver City and Mar Vista). So the only real loss is Santa Monica/Westwood, which again, could be negated with a station farther west.

[Quixote]

Numble, NSMP, or anyone else, thoughts on making this a fully automated line? From an operations standpoint, I’d imagine it would be more efficient and perhaps cost-saving in the long run? Would the MRT option (which will no doubt be nixed seeing how it’s 8-11 minutes slower) be automated/driverless?

[numble]

Originally Posted by Quixote

Numble, NSMP, or anyone else, thoughts on making this a fully automated line? From an operations standpoint, I’d imagine it would be more efficient and perhaps cost-saving in the long run? Would the MRT option (which will no doubt be nixed seeing how it’s 8-11 minutes slower) be automated/driverless?

I always thought if it was a PPP the private partner could make it automated to try to save operating costs. If it is a PPP, the private partner would operate the line for 25-30 years in exchange for annual operations+maintenance payments. Their goal is to make their profits from operating the line more efficiently than Metro would. It’s very expensive for Metro to operate lines with drivers—they estimated $80-$90 million/year for the Crenshaw/Green lines, and those operate at lower frequencies than heavy rail: https://metro.legistar.com/View.ashx...D-C99DA2A0917B

The LAX automated people mover will be automated and run by a private partner for 25 years.

It seems that BYD has been pushing a monorail, which is why it keeps staying in the list of options: https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/...htmlstory.html

During his interview, Garcetti praised a new monorail system built in China by BYD Motors, a Chinese electric car and bus company.

The city provided $1.6 million in federal funding to help BYD open its North American headquarters in downtown Los Angeles. The company has sold several electric buses to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, the agency that will determine the transit future of the Sepulveda Pass.

According to Bloomberg, BYD has been pitching its monorails to gridlocked cities.

Garcetti said BYD’s new system is better than the monorails of the past because it is designed to withstand earthquakes, cheaper to build and can be accessed in an emergency, the mayor said.

According to their website, BYD’s monorails are automated and driverless:
http://en.byd.com/usa/skyrail/

BYD’s SkyRail is a fully integrated, driverless, state-of-the-art straddle type monorail system

[numble]

Some additional details in Laura Nelson’s LA Times article out today:
https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/...mpression=true

Without further analysis and engineering, a cost estimate for any of the alternatives would be “back-of-the-envelope math,” Zelmer said.

A Metro report in 2016 estimated that building two 8.8-mile rail tunnels would cost $7.4 billion to $9.2 billion and would take seven years. Metro typically builds a separate tunnel for each set of tracks, but is also considering one larger tunnel that would accommodate both directions of travel.

Elevated tracks are cheaper to build and have “comparable benefits” to subways because they separate trains and automobiles, Zelmer said. But, he said, residents in the Valley have made it clear that they would “much prefer something underground.

A monorail system would also run above ground through the Valley, but its biggest cost savings would be in the Santa Monica Mountains, where the track could handle some inclines too steep for rail lines.

That would allow Metro to run elevated tracks between the Getty Center and Ventura Boulevard, avoiding several miles of tunnels and reducing the project’s cost.

Metro could realize additional savings by running an automated operating system on the monorail, which would eliminate the need for human drivers, Zelmer said.

The monorail option performed the worst of Metro’s four options in early assessments. The line would have the lowest estimated daily ridership — about 105,000 people — and, at 26 minutes, the slowest travel time between Van Nuys and West L.A.

The technology would also introduce a third system for Metro to operate and maintain, with different quirks and needs from light-rail and heavy-rail tracks and vehicles.
”

[bzcat]

Originally Posted by Quixote

^ The potential for a station at Jefferson/Centinela is what does it for me. If they can manage to squeeze in a station at Santa Monica/Barrington, then it’s a grand slam. This is really the only chance of us ever seeing stations at such locations. Venice Blvd will likely get a rail line eventually (negating the loss of an Overland station), even more so with two existing stations (Culver City and Mar Vista). So the only real loss is Santa Monica/Westwood, which again, could be negated with a station farther west.

The Playa Vista station is key. Also I think having the N-S trunk line west of 405 is psychologically better.

Westwood/Overland is also good but Metro doesn't seem to be swayed by it.

Let's just keep in mind that this is a preliminary study... so station locations are not fixed. I think in a full scope EIR, Santa Monica/Barrington will pencil out quite nicely.

Westside Stations (I traded Centinela/Washington for Santa Monica/Barrington):
UCLA Campus
Westwood (Wilshire/Westwood, transfer to Purple line)
Santa Monica/Barrington
West LA (Bundy/Olympic,transfer to Expo line)
Mar Vista (Centinela/Venice, transfer to future Venice line)
Play Vista (Centinela/Jefferson)
Westchester (Sepulveda/Manchester)
LAX Transit Center (Aviation/98th St, transfer to Crenshaw/Green line and LAX APM, and maybe future Lincoln BRT)

[bzcat]

Originally Posted by SIGSEGV

A ton of people already commute on slow-as-hell "express" buses over Sepulveda to UCLA/Westwood, so I think they're pretty plausible.

The speed advantage is significant over single occupant car so I think 100k ridership is probably under estimating the potential.

[Quixote]

Originally Posted by bzcat

The Playa Vista station is key. Also I think having the N-S trunk line west of 405 is psychologically better.

Westwood/Overland is also good but Metro doesn't seem to be swayed by it.

Let's just keep in mind that this is a preliminary study... so station locations are not fixed. I think in a full scope EIR, Santa Monica/Barrington will pencil out quite nicely.

Westside Stations (I traded Centinela/Washington for Santa Monica/Barrington):
UCLA Campus
Westwood (Wilshire/Westwood, transfer to Purple line)
Santa Monica/Barrington
West LA (Bundy/Olympic,transfer to Expo line)
Mar Vista (Centinela/Venice, transfer to future Venice line)
Play Vista (Centinela/Jefferson)
Westchester (Sepulveda/Manchester)
LAX Transit Center (Aviation/98th St, transfer to Crenshaw/Green line and LAX APM, and maybe future Lincoln BRT)

Agreed, although I’d put a station at Centinela/Culver as well. I’m curious why they show stations at Venice and Washington, only 0.4 miles apart. Is that an either/or?

[Quixote]

Originally Posted by numble

Some additional details in Laura Nelson’s LA Times article out today:
https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/...mpression=true

Single-bore tunnel should always be the way to go. It’s no wonder why these projects are so expensive. And, although I don’t expect this to happen, it’d be nice to bore a tunnel wide enough to accommodate 3-4 tracks for express service or future interlining. I don’t think Metro is possible of such ambition, but I’m just so ecstatic right now that LRT has been eliminated from further study.

[bzcat]

Originally Posted by Quixote

Agreed, although I’d put a station at Centinela/Culver as well. I’m curious why they show stations at Venice and Washington, only 0.4 miles apart. Is that an either/or?

Probably because Venice and Washington are both crosstown bus corridors. But that doesn't explain why Metro left out Pico which functions similarly vs Olympic (Expo line). Alternative explanation is Metro wanted a station located in Culver City, at least during this early stage so as to not piss off any stakeholders. Seems clear to me that Metro prefers Centinela Alignment over Sepulveda but as we have discussed before, Sepulveda alignment has as many as 3 potential Culver City or Culver City adjacent stations (Sepulveda/Venice, Sepulveda/Jefferson, Howard Hughes Center). Centinela alignment will skip Culver City station completely unless Washington is included.

I don't think Centinela/Culver will make the cut for a $1 billion underground station... ridership won't pencil out in a residential neighborhood primarily zoned for R1 and no prospect of new commercial development.

I'm ok with just Venice (Mar Vista) and Jefferson (Playa Vista) stations on this stretch... those locations make sense with combination of more dense residential, daytime employment, and crosstown bus ridership.

[Quixote]

If I’m not mistaken, station boxes are what make subway construction astronomically expensive. So wouldn’t single-bore tunneling make building more stations possible in addition to speeding up the project timeline? I’m really, really drawn to the idea of a large tunnel with a diameter wide enough for three platforms and three tracks. Any idea how big that TBM would have to be?

[numble]

Originally Posted by Quixote

If I’m not mistaken, station boxes are what make subway construction astronomically expensive. So wouldn’t single-bore tunneling make building more stations possible in addition to speeding up the project timeline? I’m really, really drawn to the idea of a large tunnel with a diameter wide enough for three platforms and three tracks. Any idea how big that TBM would have to be?

Metro did study a single bore tunnel for the Purple Line extension.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/4rib8d3qrz...al%29.pdf?dl=0

The estimated cost (page 77 of pdf) was $900 million more. It would be 70 days faster to tunnel (page 79), but users would be inconvenienced due to the station having to be very deep (page 78). I haven’t read the whole report.

BART is planning on using a single-bore tunnel for an extension and they concluded it would cost $70 million less, but cost 2.8% more to operate. They decided on single bore mostly because they did not want to tear up the streets for station excavation.

https://www.sanjoseinside.com/2018/0...ose-extension/

The double-bore design would feature parallel channels linked by a passenger platform. It would lie closer to the surface than a single-bore tunnel—about 35 feet below ground as opposed to 85 feet—and would require an estimated $70 million more to construct.

A single-bore tunnel, by contrast, would cost less to build because it would bypass major public utility infrastructure. But it would cost slightly more to operate over the long-term. The VTA puts the price of running a single-tunnel system about 2.8 percent higher over a 30-year period than the two-bore alternative.

Building a two-tunnel system would not only cause significantly more surface-level disruptions, it risks a political toll as well by potentially undermining public support for a project that’s already behind schedule and over budget.

[WrightCONCEPT]

Originally Posted by Quixote

Numble, NSMP, or anyone else, thoughts on making this a fully automated line? From an operations standpoint, I’d imagine it would be more efficient and perhaps cost-saving in the long run? Would the MRT option (which will no doubt be nixed seeing how it’s 8-11 minutes slower) be automated/driverless?

I think it makes perfect sense to make it automated through to squeeze more capacity out of the system. It is working well with Vancouver's skytrain system with lots of people moving capacity.

[Car(e)-Free LA]

Originally Posted by WrightCONCEPT

I think it makes perfect sense to make it automated through to squeeze more capacity out of the system. It is working well with Vancouver's skytrain system with lots of people moving capacity.

Agreed. Perhaps the red/purple/green lines can be automated as well. Also, this could mean PLATFORM SCREEN DOORS!!!!!

[Quixote]

Originally Posted by WrightCONCEPT

I think it makes perfect sense to make it automated through to squeeze more capacity out of the system. It is working well with Vancouver's skytrain system with lots of people moving capacity.

2-minute headways

Sydney is going automated with their new rapid transit system. It’s a no-brainer if you’re building a heavy rail line from scratch.

[bzcat]

Originally Posted by Car(e)-Free LA

Agreed. Perhaps the red/purple/green lines can be automated as well. Also, this could mean PLATFORM SCREEN DOORS!!!!!

That would be nice... and air condition too since the platform could be sealed from the platform.

[numble]

More details on Sepulveda Transit Corridor were displayed in community meeting presentation boards, including construction constraints, travel time info and evaluation against certain criteria. HRT1 & HRT2 seem to satisfy more evaluation criteria.
https://media.metro.net/projects_stu...TB_2019-01.pdf