From the Dept. of That’s a Relief:
https://twitter.com/THRMattBelloni/status/676638529389113345?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Art of Transit:
More from my exciting new Travel Town expose. Photo by Steve Hymon
The Paris agreement would be a great first step if this was 1995 (Five Thirty Eight)
Excerpt:
As ambitious as this sounds, the agreement contains no binding rules on how to meet this (or any) temperature goal.1 All greenhouse gas emission targets are voluntary and left to individual countries to determine. This choose-your-own-emissions strategy skirts the political problems that disarmed the Kyoto Protocol, but it may have also rendered the Paris agreement too weak to prevent widespread climate catastrophe. The pledges submitted thus far leave a scary gap between what’s needed and what countries aspire to do.
The article includes a chart from the World Resources Institute that alleges that even if nations hit their targets for reducing greenhouse gases, average worldwide temperatures will still rise three degrees Celsius or more — far past the two degree limit needed to avoid serious impacts, such as rising seas.
Metro extends Silver Line, boosts rapids, quietly reduces local bus service (Streetsblog LA)
Axel Hellman does a nice job parsing some of the bus service changes taking effect this week, noting the particulars of how some lines are running less often (the 45) so that others can run more often (the 745). Excerpt:
There’s more than meets the eye to these changes. If you look through the new schedules, there are several unannounced cuts – and improvements – on various bus lines. These details were not included in the official announcement, brochures, or social media posts. Some riders who don’t closely study the timetables will see an unexpectedly long wait for their bus. Riders on other lines will find a pleasant surprise in the new service changes, giving them a faster bus ride or shorter waiting times.
Here’s our post on the service changes and here’s our post on one significant change, the extension of the Silver Line to San Pedro.
New Foothill Transit express bus from Azusa to DTLA (Foothill Transit)
Service begins January 4 with free rides in January. The line will leave from the Azusa Transit Center — adjacent to the future Downtown Azusa Gold Line station — and head into the heart of DTLA with very limited stops in West Covina. The schedule (hit the link above) indicates the ride will take about 50 minutes.
The Gold Line opens to Azusa on March 5. The Gold Line runs to Pasadena and then Union Station, where passengers can transfer to the Red/Purple Line subway. Gold Line to Union Station from Azusa is expected to be about 50 minutes. Seems to me it’s good for folks in Azusa to have different choices for getting to DTLA.
Here’s the map:
One-third of the nation’s worst traffic bottlenecks are in L.A. County (LAT)
Ten of the 30 bottlenecks are local but here’s the exciting part of the new study: none of our local clog-ations are #1: that honor is reserved for a stretch of the busy Kennedy Expressway in transit-heavy Chicago. As for local traffic-constipators, there are no huge surprises on the list and the 405 is very well represented.
One slight head-scratcher: the only stretch of the 5 on the list is the oft-clogged stretch between DTLA and the OC line. Hmm.
One HUGE head-scratcher: the portion of the 10 freeway between SaMo and Crenshaw Boulevard didn’t make the top 30.
Driverless cars won’t save Los Angeles (Aljazeera)
In this op-ed, Jordan Fraade writes the problem with self-driving cars is that, well, they’re still cars and not the most efficient way of moving people around a dense urban area. The question, I suppose, is whether cars driven by computers can eke out some extra capacity on our already crowded roads.
Dec. 14: how will the Paris climate deal change our everyday lives in L.A. County?
Dec. 11: will we ever have a truly car-free city?
Dec. 10: hey, so when is the Expo Line to SaMo opening?
Dec. 9: Uber’s latest biggish idea, health clinics at transit stops?
Dec. 8: L.A. Weekly’s Purple Line Extension skepticism, smog discounts in Bejiing.
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Categories: Transportation Headlines
Foothill Line 496 from Azusa to Downtown brings back memories of the old Line 496 that traveled between Downtown L.A. to San Bernadino via Riverside, West Glen Haven, Country Village, Fontana, Onterio Airport, Monc;lain Plaza, Pamona Park & Ride, El Monte Station. Now there was a Bus Line that served many communities and often had standing loads only to be cancelled for an unknown reason prior to the creation of Metro Link using high seat interurban type buses with luggage racks inside and in a compartment outside of the interior of the bus much like Greyhound.
@The Real Transit Rider. Probably time to buy a car.
I’m surprised the interchange from the 10 East to the 405 isn’t included. There’s an onramp immediately before it, requiring entering drivers to quickly merge left two lanes while contending with traffic merging to the right for the 405. Merging vehicles can reduce visibility of traffic backed up for the 405 South, and accidents are known to happen there.
Schedule changes, greeat!
My bus just didn’t show up yesterday, at a transfer point. I saw 3 go in the opposite direction, and I was late to work. I Missed a meeting that I couldn’t re-schedule until early 2016. I hate that sometimes I truly depend on metro in a professional capacity, but I’m only kidding myself if I do this.
Whats worse is that when I get into my office, even my boss’s mindset is based around a stigma that Metro is unreliable, therefore so am I? So now they’ve cut service.
“As far as the Metro “quiet” service cuts, I would say reducing service on the branches of Line 180-181 by almost half (from 35 minutes to 60) is pretty drastic.” Its just rude. It would make more sense if Metro had good on time performance, but what happens when that 180 runs early, or has a malfunction, or even worse; what if happens to arrive full one day?
Rough business Metro, makin that last mile kinda suck a little bit longer.
The 10 isn’t really a “bottleneck” because it’s not like lanes are being reduced in that segment. There are two lanes in each direction coming out of the McClure Tunnel in Santa Monica and the freeway gradually gets wider until there are seven lanes in each direction around Western Avenue (where the freeway goes into its local/express configuration). It’s just that the Santa Monica Freeway was supposed to be complemented by the Beverly Hills Freeway along Santa Monica Boulevard and the Slauson Freeway near Slauson, neither of which were built.
The situation is similar to the San Gabriel Valley which got three east-west freeways compared to the San Fernando Valley which only got two. Although rush hour traffic in both areas is pretty bad, the midday and weekend traffic in the San Gabriel Valley is much, much better than that in the San Fernando Valley.
As far as the Metro “quiet” service cuts, I would say reducing service on the branches of Line 180-181 by almost half (from 35 minutes to 60) is pretty drastic. Moving the needle from 10 to 12 or from 12 to 15 is less important to highlight, but to go from 20 to 30 or 30 to 40 (or vice versa) is important to let people know to change their travel patterns. I think that a rapid bus running every 20 minutes is obviously better than one running every 30, but people can’t shift their travel patterns if they don’t know what is going on.