Some significant transit news out of Washington D.C. today: The rules that govern which major transit projects receive federal funding have been eased so that theoretically more projects can qualify. Why does this matter to Los Angeles County? Metro is currently seeking federal funds for the Westside Subway Extension and [continue reading]
At the Glendale City Council meeting Jan 12, Metro Board Chair Ara Najarian, along with Mayor Villaraigosa and agency CEO Art Leahy, presented a ceremonial check to council members representing the first installment of Measure R sales tax money for use in improving transportation systems in Glendale. Glendale received $491,969 in [continue reading]
State officials are still announcing details of the proposed state budget to close a $19.9-billion deficit in the current and next year’s budget. Here’s what the L.A. Times is reporting about the budget’s impact on public transportation: One of the proposed budget’s biggest losers is public transit — and its [continue reading]
Several media outlets are already reporting that public transit funds will be slashed as part of the state budget that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger will announce later this morning. Here’s a link to a story posted online by the L.A. Times today. The story says mass transit will face cuts, but [continue reading]
As you probably know, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger delivered his State of the State address this morning in Sacramento. It’s a runup to his release of the state budget on Friday — a budget that Metro officials are closely watching to see what, if any, the impacts are on public transportation [continue reading]
I just posted yesterday about efforts to recover transit funds previously raided by the State Legislature — and an accompanying ballot initiative in the works to prevent more raids in the future. Well, it appears the future is now. Here’s the L.A. Times’ story on the latest proposal to balance [continue reading]
As you may have heard, the Legislature in the past few years has diverted hundreds of millions of dollars that were supposed to go to mass transit to other uses — namely balancing the state budget. On behalf of local transit agencies — many of whom had to cut service [continue reading]
Such is the ways of Washington D.C.: the defense spending bill that President Obama signed yesterday also includes money for transportation programs, including $50 million for the development of rail safety systems called positive train control to help prevent trains from colliding. Experts say such systems may have prevented the [continue reading]
Metro has released ridership numbers for November and there’s relatively little news to report. Rail ridership across the system increased slightly from Nov. 2008 — due to the opening of the Eastside Gold Line Extension — and bus ridership dipped from one year earlier. Metro officials believe the weak economy [continue reading]
Remember all those stories about soaring mass transit use in the summer of 2008, when gas prices soared? Well, here are the first two paragraphs of a story published by the New York Times: The Metropolitan Transportation Authority approved a punishing slate of service cuts on Wednesday that would amount [continue reading]
