Photo courtesy Gökhan Esirgen.
As we posted the other day, Westwood Boulevard is closed to traffic this weekend between Ashby and Richland avenues to accommodate the laying of tracks for the second phase of the Expo Line. The road is scheduled to reopen by 6 a.m. Monday.
Above is a nice photo taken Saturday of the work thus far. Although the Exposition rail right-of-way has been there for decades, it has been many years since tracks actually crossed Westwood Boulevard. Gökhan Esirgen, a long-time proponent of the project, has also posted more photos and video of work over at the Transit Coalition’s website.
Next weekend it’s Overland Avenue’s turn; details here.
Here are some photos of track work in the vicinity of Westwood Boulevard in recent days:
The six-mile extension of the Expo Line from Culver City to downtown Santa Monica is funded by the Measure R half-cent sales tax increase approved by Los Angeles voters in 2008. The project is currently forecast to open in early 2016.
Categories: Projects
[…] that a contract to build the station will be awarded in April. Meanwhile, workers laid down the first piece of actual track on Phase II of the Expo […]
I live close by and although there were some impacts like the detour traffic and noise at night, I thought the workers did a very nice job with the project. They were very courteous and got the job done by Monday morning. Nice work!
Really, Early 2016. They’re laying tracks now and that’s over 26 months away! Are you sure that isn’t early 2015?
Hi Brendan;
The Expo Line Construction Authority says the project is a little more than half complete. If you go up and down the alignment, you can see there’s still considerable work to be done on some of the bridges and other infrastructure. Once complete, there is also considerable work to do to install electronics systems and test the line. So hang in there — work has progressed nicely and hopefully will continue to do so.
Steve Hymon
Editor, The Source