The Metro Board of Directors meets at 9:30 a.m. Thursday for its regular monthly meeting. The agenda is above or you can download the pdf here. A few items of general interest on the agenda:
•Metro staff are considering establishing a budget to add fare gates to four street-level stations for the Crenshaw/LAX Line and the 4th Street station in downtown Santa Monica for the second phase of the Expo Line. In a separate motion, the Board is considering to launch further engineering and cost analysis of adding fare gates to stations across the Metro Rail system.
•There are a couple of station renamings on the docket. The Board is considering a motion to rename the Blue Line’s Grand Station to Grand/L.A. Trade Tech and the Expo Line’s 23rd Street Station to 23rd St/L.A. Trade Tech. The Board is also consider a motion to rename the Exposition/La Brea station to the Exposition/La Brea Ethel Bradley Station.
•A motion asking Metro to implement an online database of previous Board of Director actions. At present, searching for motions and past actions is a crapshoot. The motion also asks for linking audio from Board meetings to reports — something that would, I suspect, be very useful to anyone who cares or is interested in actions taken by the Board.
•A motion to improve lighting and pedestrian access to/from the Universal City over-flow parking lot for the Red Line station.
Categories: Projects
Adding “LA Trade Tech” to the Grand and 23rd St station names is a good, commonsense idea, considering the close proximity of the line to the college. Like other commenters above, I have no concerns with a “passive renaming” (a.k.a. dedication) of the Expo/La Brea station to someone’s memory, as long as that dedication is limited to an onsite plaque or statue or something. Stations should never have their names altered to include non-geographic information, as it only serves to confuse riders. Interesting that some on the Board are proposing this after Metro has rightly begun to backtrack on previously named stations (Rosa Parks, Julian Dixon, etc.).
(What puzzles me further is that Metro inexplicably shortened the name of Lincoln Heights/Cypress Park Station to “Lincoln/Cypress Station”, as if those two words have some meaning. The old name was only two characters longer than Little Tokyo/Arts District Station and the upcoming Downtown Santa Monica, and several letters shorter than the proposed renaming of Expo/La Brea.)
I assume most of us here have to work during the Metro Board meeting and cannot attend. If only Metro Board members read some of these comments.
Wow, two stations with the L.A. Trade Tech name can be confusing to some. Several bus routes have terminus at the Grand / Trade Tech Station. Those riders might think that they just took the bus to the 23rd St. / Trade Tech Station. Those riders will get a big surprise when they got off the bus.
Naming stations to an institution generally is a good idea. Is Metro going to rename the Vermont Santa Monica Station to L.A. City College / Braille Institute Station? Rename Vermont / Sunset Station to Kaiser, Children’s Hospital and Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center Station?
Nice catch to those who pointed out the $1 maintenance fee for all. How sneaky of them! Did they think people would not find out?
Metro has so far collected about $40 from me since last April which is when I got my transponder since the maintenance fee waiver took effect. If any notion of a fee coming back whether it be one dollar or $3 or any amount, I will cancel my transponder.
They can either gain $40 in revenue a year from me without maintenance fees or gaining nothing by putting in a $1 monthly maintenance fee. Stop acting like the banks with sneaky hidden fees.
Agree with everyone.
No on the $1 maintenance fee for ExpressLanes. Politicians should stop making up new ways to steal more from taxpayers’ hard earned paychecks. You all know that these money won’t go to the where it’s needed; all it does it goes to enriching the politicians and the bureaucrats. If they want to bring in additional $2.3 million, why don’t these politicians and bureaucrats make some cuts out of their own salary and benefits? Funny you never hear that being mentioned.
Station name changes over and over again cost too much money. If you want to honor someone or something, use private donations and funds and place a plaque or statue. Why should taxpayers have to pay for something we don’t want?
There is nothing wrong with honoring someone with a plaque at a station without renaming the station. I hope some year to arrange for one honoring the late Pat Moser to be placed at the Highland Park Gold Line station.
What is it with the fascination of using our precious tax dollars to rename stations after dead people?
Are our politicians so power hungry that they want legacies kept in honor for eons?
Shall we start naming Metro Rail lines after dead people too? Will we see an Arnold Schwarzenegger Line in the near future when the Terminator is terminated?
When will Metro learn: you do NOT name stations after people! This does nothing to help transit riders at all, as it provides no information whatsoever about the station or its LOCATION within our giant metropolis. If anything is added to a station name, it should only be to help people find their way around (for example, naming a station after a major nearby/adjacent attraction, like Trade Tech College). Stop heading down this slippery slope of naming each and every station after someone – it only leads to unnecessary clutter on station maps and signage and does nothing at all to improve the transit rider’s experience. And once you start, EVERYONE is going to demand their station be renamed to honor someone.
I motion to 86 most of these motions. Renaming of a station is not cost efficient for one reason and do you think any of the riders will refer to the Exposition/La Brea station as the Exposition/La Brea Ethel Bradley station? How about taking a poll on how many people even know who Ethel Bradley is? It is an honor to have a station named after you, but these funds could be used elsewhere.
Nevermind the post I made. It seems like Molina again is pushing her own agenda to concoct ways to steal more from taxpayers by introducing a plan to get rid of the maintenance fee and replace it with a flat $1 monthly fee for all.
This is unacceptable. The maintenance fee should be ZERO. PERIOD.
Any talks about extending the Metro ExpressLanes maintenance fee waiver that is going to end at the end of this month? Or is the Metro Board taking a “wait and see” approach to see how many people cancel their transponders when they reinstate the stupid $3 fee again?
You missed Item 9 which is Supervisor Molina’s motion to slap a $1 fee per month on EVERYONE who uses the Express Lanes, whether or not they are a frequent user, they carpool, or they never use it at all. That should get more attention than it deserves.
I would certainly support adding “Trade Tech” to the names of the two stations serving the school. Just as I supported the idea of adding “Watts Towers” to the name of the 103rd St. Station (and if I’d known any channels through which to submit the idea, I would have been pushing for recognition of either the Towers, or Rodia, or both, long before it actually happened).