The reason for not reconstructing stations to provide new through-branches is that every time you branch a line, you force a halving of service levels on each branch. This already happens at Wilshire/Vermont, where half the trains operate the Red Line branch to North Hollywood and half the trains operate the Purple Line branch to Wilshire/Western. It was pointed out that if you branched the Santa Monica line off at Hollywood/Highland, you would result in only 25% of all service going to North Hollywood and 25% of all service going to West Hollywood. Neither of those are acceptable, so -- in order to maintain decent service levels -- the Santa Monica line will need to be a separate line, with a cross-platform transfer at Hollywood/Highland.

But the same logic applies if you branch at Wilshire/La Cienega, because you then have the same unacceptable 25% service level through West Hollywood, and (even worse) a 25% service level on Wilshire between La Cienega and Vermont.

By that logic, it makes more sense to have the Santa Monica-La Cienega route be an entirely separate line, with a cross-platform transfer at Wilshire/La Cienega ... and the potential to continue that line south to connect with the Expo and Crenshaw lines, and make a Hollywood-to-LAX connection possible.

WestsideExtension@metro.net

I've told Dan this.

The best thing to do now is to build the Santa Monica leg last, and build West Hollywood after the Wilshire extension.

Santa Monica will have a downtown connection into downtown with the Expo Line. With the subway, that will be two services designed to do the same thing.

Santa Monica will have two rail lines while West Hollywood will have none.

The West Hollywood extension has better network effects. You will have more riders overall by adding WeHo to the existing subway grid.

As for Wilshire, the advantages for the subway begin to diminish west of the 405. The crush loads are east of Westwood Boulevard. West of the 405, the Expo Line veers north past Pico and Olympic, and the farther west it goes the closer it gets to Wilshire. At Bundy, Wilshire is only a 5 minute bus ride. Within Santa Monica city limits, Wilshire is close to a 10 minute walk. Near the ocean, Wilshire is about four blocks.

The length of the subway between Century City and Santa Monica is about the same as a Red Line extension through West Hollywood. The difference, though, is that West Hollywood will produce higher overall ridership than Wilshire from Century City to Santa Monica.

I'm surprised Metro dropped the idea of a station in the West LA area. Granted, they have a dot on Bundy there, but it's the area around Sawtelle, Barrington, and Federal Avenues and Wilshire and Santa Monica Boulevards that has incredibly high commercial and residential density, and the adjacent Veterans' Administration and Hospital are major destinations. Four Blue Bus lines (1, 2, 3, 4) and four Metro bus lines (4, 20, 704, 720) currently serve this neighborhood, and the place is still ridiculously congested. West LA really needs a subway station!

From an engineering perspective, it might be tricky and require the Vermont station to be bypassed.

However, that's not a reason not to build the Pink Line under Alternatives #11 or #16.

All we would need is to build a connection at the Wilshire/Vermont station, so that eastbound trains could make a left turn and go up Vermont, or westbound trains could make a right turn and go down Wilshire.

Building this connection would be much cheaper than building a subway under Santa Monica Blvd and would only add a few minutes to a potential all-subway commute from, say, North Hollywood to Santa Monica.

We could assign this routing another color, the Brown Line, or whatever.

Also see Metro's images of monorail above Wilshire at Fairfax at
http://transittalk.proboards37.com/index.cgi?board=general&action=display&thread=521&page=2#4787 .

Also see Metro's images of monorail above Wilshire at Fairfax here.

That the Westside is increasingly a job center is well known and reported again today in the Los Angeles Times. The movement to limit commercial development hasn't even started, and existing capacity hasn't even been met yet. The beauty of the Purple Line is that there are many people traveling westbound from the east, not just eastbound from the west.

With the new move to limit commercial development on the Westside, and the growth of other areas such as Downtown, they may not even be working there either. Maybe Westsiders will be commuting to the Eastside and the Valley on the subway ?

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True in the short term, but over time, with two million more people scheduled to migrate to Los Angeles County over the next two decades, those per boarding costs will decline with the inevitably increased density.

Next we need to work to pass the extra 1/2% sales tax for this and other big projects (AB 2321)

http://www.socata.net/gm/archives/00000073.shtml

So pick the Wilshire alignment of your choice and let the MTA know you want the Santa Monica Blvd. line included in the final proposal!

The one downside of these finalists is that this means there will not be a one-seat ride from the Valley to the Westside via Santa Monica Blvd. I really hope there has been sufficient support shown for a Sepulveda LRT going to/from LAX to/from Metrolink in the Valley to make it into the Long Range Transportation Plan. Countless people who are snaking through passes and canyons every day deserve a quality public transit alternative.

But ask your friends to show their support for the Wilshire and Santa Monica Blvd. proposals by attending one of the MTA forums or sending the MTA a message today!

I actually like a mixture of options 3 and 4.

I'd take the Santa Monica Blvd. line that loops from Santa Monica/San Vicente down to Wilshire, and then the Wilshire based alignment.