Here is a look at some of the transportation headlines gathered by us and the Metro Library. The full list of headlines is posted on the Library’s Headlines blog, which you can also access via email subscription or RSS feed.

For the MTA, the buck stops at Leimert Park (LAObserved)

Supervisor and Metro Board Member Mark Ridley-Thomas guest blogs, arguing that Metro must build a Leimert Park station for the Crenshaw/LAX Line whether or not it can be done within the project's current budget. Excerpt:

A decision on the station has languished, despite it being one of those rare causes seemingly everyone says they support. The station would connect Los Angeles to the city's African American cultural center, much like the current stations in Chinatown, Little Tokyo, Culver City and Mariachi Plaza have enhanced the appeal of those destinations.

But when the station came up for a Metro board vote in 2011, Metro's own staff was divided: some said the agency could afford the station, others said it was impossible. The Mayor — who effectively controls four of the board's 13 votes — insisted no additional money be put up for a station and persuaded a majority of the board to go along with him.

The Metro board must soon stop the hedging and make the right decision. In the first week of May, the leading bidder for the Crenshaw/LAX rail line will be made public, to then be approved by the board at the end of the month.

If the bid does not include the station, or if it says construction costs are beyond what had been expected, the Metro board must decide whether it can find additional resources for a station.

If Metro does not come up with a way to build the station, Leimert Park supporters, after being held waiting for two years, will be finally spurned.

We'll see what happens when the bid results are released in early May. Until then, this post offers a very interesting — and rare — view into Metro Board politics.

405 project stuck in the slow lane (L.A. Times)

The Times catches up with the news that the Sepulveda Pass Improvements Project is running behind schedule and has gone over budget. Supervisor and Metro Board Member Zev Yaroslavsky isn't pleased with the way the project has been run while Metro officials say that some parts of the project have already opened (the Sunset Boulevard bridge, for example) and others will continue to open throughout 2013.

Meanwhile, in a blog post written off the 405 news, LAObserved's Mark Lacter says the 405 project should serve as a cautionary tale about the time and expense involved in extending the subway to Westwood.

Mayoral candidate survey: Eric Garcetti (L.A. Streetsblog)

Streetsblog throws some fresh transportation questions at the candidates for mayor of Los Angeles. Among the inquiries: who would they put on the Metro Board, what do they think of LADOT's leadership, what transportation project do they want to pursue in their first year of office, where will funds come from for pedestrian improvements, etc. Good questions. Eric Garcetti gets first crack at answering.

Here is a look at some of the transportation headlines gathered by us and the Metro Library. The full list of headlines is posted on the Library’s Headlines blog, which you can also access via email subscription or RSS feed.

Of broomsticks and bikes (ZevWeb) 

As part of the county’s approval of the expansion of the Universal Studios theme park and back lot, NBCUniversal has agreed to spend $13.5 million to extend the Los Angeles River bike path from Studio City to Griffith Park. With some future linkages in downtown L.A., it could be possible to take the bike path one day from the San Fernando Valley to Long Beach.

Goodbye Blockbuster, Hello subway stop (Buzzfeed)

The last hours of the Blockbuster at Wilshire and La Brea are chronicled; the store closed Sunday to make way for construction of the Purple Line Extension station there. Copies of “24″ were going for 99 cents and the reporter counted 27 copies of “Greenberg,” the ultra-terrible Ben Stiller flick.

Central subway tunnel machines expected to arrive in S.F. this week (San Francisco Examiner)

The massive boring machines will be used to dig the north-south Central Subway project, which will extend light rail into the congested North Beach area. Digging is expected to begin in June. Meanwhile, the low bidder to build three stations for the project came in at $840 million, higher than Muni’s projections. Tunnel boring machines will also be used to dig tunnels for three Metro projects: the Regional Connector, the Crenshaw/LAX Line and the aforementioned Purple Line Extension.

Why aren’t young Americans driving anymore? (Washington Post)

The headline is a little misleading, given the Post cites data showing that between 2001 and 2009, driving by motorists age 16 to 34 declined by 23 percent; 2009 was four years ago, right? That said, the post cites stats showing that driving by all Americans has dropped by more than eight percent since 2005, which is the biggest decline in recent times.

What’s going on? For one, the baby boomers are driving less as they get older, which makes sense — many are presumably retired or hopefully doing something more fun than getting up early each day and putting on uncomfortable clothes (i.e. anything that’s not shorts, t-shirt and sandals) in order to sit in a tiny cubicle in some anonymous big building and answer/send needless email all day while fighting off the urge to drop into a permanent slumber.

As for the younger folk, here are the list of reasons the Post says they’re not pushing pedal to metal with the zeal of, say, my semi-fossilized generation: the recent recession, it’s harder to get a license, the cost of driving has gone up (gas, insurance, the car itself), more young people live near transit and are willing to use it and technology such as Facebook may have replaced some commute trips (yes, girls online have somehow become more interesting than girls in person; triple yikes!). In tech’s defense, some apps may make it easier to commute or give the kiddies something to do while on transit that’s more fun than sitting in rush hour traffic.

On that note, if anyone knows how to get three stars on this level, please leave a comment.

Finally, here’s a mighty interesting paper written by a team of researchers at UCLA that informed the federal research in turn used by the Washington Post.

Bullet train: the insanity escalates (San Diego Union-Tribune)

This harsh editorial takes the California High-Speed Rail Authority to task for changing the bidding rules for construction of the first 29-mile section of track between Madera and Fresno. In particular, the UT says that bidding rules shouldn’t have been altered without public notification in order to rank low cost ahead of technical merit. The low bidder for the project also ranked last in technical merit. The editorial was based on this article that appeared in the L.A. Times last week.