Refined Alignment for Regional Connector
Metro has made some new refinements to the proposed alignment for the Regional Connector project through Little Tokyo. The aim is to bring down costs and lessen construction impacts in the area.
The proposed change would essentially eliminate the sharp curves the light rail alignment was going to use to meet up with the Metro Gold Line at 1st and Alameda. Metro staff will brief the Little Tokyo Business Improvement District on Thursday. On Wednesday, Metro presented the changes to the Little Tokyo Community Council Transit Committee in order to receive feedback.
Metro’s project team says the refined route would avoid a storm drain on 2nd Street, avoid the Office Depot property and most of the businesses businesses facing Central Avenue. The refinements would also mean the elimination of having cut and cover construction along 2nd Street within the Little Tokyo community. These were key concerns raised by the Little Tokyo stakeholders during the draft environmental study process.
So far, Little Tokyo stakeholders have given the proposed changes a warm reception. The agency will still have to do cut and cover around the station box, but that work will be confined to the north side of the Office Depot block, adjacent to 1st Street and Central Avenue.
Metro project planners say the refinement would bring down the project cost. During this phase of the project, the team is looking to “value engineer” the project (i.e., evaluate engineering methods that lower construction costs) as much as possible to keep the project within budget.
The project team plans to follow up these meetings with a station design workshop where planners will start designing key Little Tokyo station elements, including station entrances and design features.
The next community update meetings are planned in late February/early March, when Metro will show additional progress on engineering.
This looks like a fine plan but is it the best possible station arrangement?
Would not the best station be one that would allow trains coming from Union Station towards Little Tokyo to go all directions? I think that the ideal Little Tokyo station would allow trains to continue along the current gold line towards East LA, pass through the new regional connector tracks towards Long Beach, or even pass through the new regional connector tracks towards Culver City.
Trains from all directions should be able to turn in all directions to increase the system’s overall accessibility. Lines do not need to go only east-west or north-south. Doing this would reduce the amount of transfers that passengers need to make, cutting valuable time off of trips.
Like it or not, Little Tokyo has to understand that they are in an urban area that badly needs this project. This specific project is going to be a game changer in Los Angeles. It isn’t just going to benefit downtown, but will have ripple effects throughout the Metro system.
This and the subway extension are the most important transportation projects in Los Angeles County, and perhaps the state.
Building on Dylan’s point: I agree about having more than just a N/S & E/W routes… Utilizing this proposed track alignment, to me, you could have four routes total:
1) LB-SGV
2) LB-ELA
3) Westside-SGV
4) Westside-ELA
A single transfer would be required to go:
5) LB-Westside
6) SGV-ELA
If these routes mirror commuting patterns from Metro’s survey data, this new alignment then makes sense.
However, with your “all directions” approach at Little Tokyo and Washington/Flower, two more “direct” lines could be created (#5+6) That eliminates the need for a transfer on those two trains bypassing the regional connector’s downtown tracks…
Once the alignment is built though, without service from SGV to ELA, I am not sure it ever will be changed due to the underground portals. Washington and Flower, can be more easily changed on the surface, I would think.
Therefore our options seem to be two lines requiring transfers, or up to six lines requiring none. If the stations along the DT Connector have center platforms for easy transfers, two lines may work.
Too many sharp turns, too many at-grade crossings, too little insight on future development.
It is comforting to see that Little Tokyo’s Y-configuration will be buried underground–as opposed to the situation at Washington/Flower which would dangerously interfere with automobile traffic!
@Ken
I don’t know if your are referring to this project or our rail system as a whole. If its the latter than I certainly agree. But this project is actually well planned because it is fully grade separated for once and is very unlike the soon-to-be fiasco at Washington and flower. Its completely ludicrous that it is at-grade with the peak headways and amount of car traffic. It way too tight of an interface between cars and trains. That is not going to work out well and will be even worse if trains actually have to wait for lights. A very similar example is the intersection of fourth and king streets in San Francisco.
This is truly wonderful news. The Connector is going to make large changes in attracting more rail riders and support. Now if only the 30/10 initiative would come together!
We are all in Little Tokyo’s debt for the badly needed changes that help keep the Connector off 2nd St., then refused to let Metro destroy the intersection at First and Alameda Sts., and finally for this newest development, rotating the underground Little Tokyo station into a far better alignment while making the least possible disruption there. The Los Angeles Downtown News link is only good for a week or two but here’s a snippet that might help.
http://www.ladowntownnews.com/articles/2011/01/18/news/doc4d2e494270d75128271837.txt
Previously, Metro planned to use the Office Depot property primarily as a construction staging area; it would have served as temporary storage for the hulking tunnel boring machine that will work under Second Street. The agency is now negotiating to move staging to the city-owned “Mangrove” property on the northeast corner of First and Alameda streets. A proposed mixed-use development for that site has long been stalled.
The changes reflect preliminary solutions to a host of concerns lodged by Little Tokyo stakeholders in response to the draft environmental impact report that Metro released on the project last year, said Metro spokeswoman Ann Kerman.