Work crews on Friday night are set to begin making repairs to the rail junction at Washington and Flower in downtown Los Angeles. The work will require all trains to be replaced with shuttle buses for Expo Line and Blue Line riders traveling between 7th/Metro Center, Pico, 23rd Street and Grand Stations over the entire weekend (the service alert is posted after the jump). Normal train service on both lines in this area is scheduled to resume at the opening of service on Monday morning, Feb. 18.
Exposition Construction Authority crews will be adjusting the track gauge to improve the movement of Blue Line trains turning from Flower to Washington. When completed, the work is expected to correct excessive wear on some train parts and improve the overall maintainability of the track components at this location.
Up to this point, the condition has required frequent monitoring and inspections until a permanent solution could be designed and implemented. At no time has safety been compromised. Likewise, after the work this weekend, monitoring will continue and trains will continue to travel through the junction at reduced speeds until Metro, the California Public Utilities Commission and the Expo Line Construction Authority are certain the track adjustments have corrected the problem.
SERVICE ALERT–METRO BLUE LINE AND EXPO LINE
Due to railway track work in Downtown Los Angeles, Metro Blue Line and Expo Line train service will be impacted the weekend of February 15-17, 2013.
Track repair work will begin Friday night, Feb. 15 at 8:30 p.m. and last until close of business Sunday, Feb. 17. Metro Blue and Expo Lines will cease to operate at the following locations only:
Metro Blue Line: No train service between 7th/Metro Center and Grand Station.
Metro Expo Line: No train service between 7th/Metro Center and 23rd Street Station.
Patrons will be provided with replacement shuttle bus service during this time. Shuttle buses will travel to and from all impacted stations: 7th/Metro Center, Pico, Grand and 23rd Street Stations.
Metro will provide signage directing transit riders to nearby on-street shuttle bus locations. Metro personnel will also be available at stations to assist patrons. Service alert information is now on display on station electronic message boards.
Metro apologizes for any inconvenience this service impact has to its transit customers.
Categories: Projects, Service Alerts
Meanwhile, the Red Line just keeps on running! Sure tunneling is more expensive but so are better clothes, vehicles, jewelry, first class flight accomodations…..etc.
The whole business with having to redesign a piece of trackwork that wasn’t working as originally designed just goes to show you:
Theory and practice may be the same in theory, but not necessarily in practice.
I’m tired of folks complaining. The Expo line has been a wonderful gift for all of us in Mid-City LA. I’m glad that Metro was able to fix this issue.
Actually, people will forget the inconvenience in 3-4 DAYS.
It has been explained but I do not have a link to offer.
I’m so tired of the complaining, Metro is doing the best with the resources that they have. It wasn’t Metro that built the Junction it was the Expo Authority. Some of you want viaducts? So do I but it takes money, taxpayer money that I bet most of you would complain about. It is a inconvenience, but for a major part of the new system that needs to be fixed in a permanent way. We wanted Expo open quickly but it still had quirks. We won’t even have remembered this service interruption 5-10 years from now. As for all of you wanting better service, you need to get out and campaign to pay for it, someone has to pay and I’ll certainly vote for it, but many weren’t keen on heavy rail for the city because of costs so we have the system we campaigned for, let’s make it the best we can and continue to lobby for a better one down the road.
Has Metro explained how this mistake was created in the first place? Crossings were perfected on railroads more than 100 years ago.
What a huge inconvenience for Metro riders and the public!! The Expo train to downtown 7th St Metro center won’t even be going to downtown!! Safety is a priority, but to cause delays for passengers is a shame… Why can’t they do track work at night in between 12AM and 5AM when trains are out of service?? Thanks a lot Metro, I won’t be riding the train this weekend due to the delays I understand that maintenance and safety are very important
I think that trains run on Flower St. is a big mistake. The tracks on Flower should be built in an aerial viaduct because right now, there’s too much cross traffic on Flower’s intersections to deal with. I can image what an operational nightmare would be when both the Regional Connector and the Farmers’ Field projects are completed.
If this is the typical Metro work crew with 5 guys standing around watching 1 guy work, it will be this time next year before the work is finished.