Today’s Headlines

  • Union Pressure Scraps Kinkisharyo Planned Palmdale Metro Rail Car Plant (SFV Business Journal)
  • Editorial: Unhappy About Aps Auctioning Underpriced On-Street Parking (LAT)
    Editorial Cartoon: Glendale Unhappy With People Saving Parking Spots (GNP)
  • Arts District Residents Unhappy About New Metro Maintenance Yard Along River (KCET)
  • Editorial: Unhappy About LAPD False Patrol Reporting (LAT)
  • Editorial: Unhappy About Boneheaded Decision to Name Metro Station for Molina (Downtown News)
  • Gas Prices To Decline Through December, Then Increase with Cap-and-Trade in Jan (DN)
  • L.A. McMansionization Restrictions Not Working (Architects Newspaper)
  • Ebola Scare, Thought To Be Hoax, Onboard Metro Bus (LAT)
  • Glendale Seeks Input on “Green Streets” Bike/Ped/Rainwater-Friendly Makeover (GNP)
  • Culver City Seeks Input on Modifying Bus Service (CC Observer)
  • Great New Haight Street Contraflow Transit Lane Prioritizes Bus Speeds (SB SF)
  • New ‘Transport Oakland’ Group Presses For Livability, Endorses Candidates (SB SF)
  • Seattle’s Got Bike Share (Seattle PI)
  • Implementing Vision Zero Means Culture Change for NYC (SB NYC)

Get National Headlines at Streetsblog USA

  • Dennis_Hindman

    The first listing does not have the correct link to the SFV Business Journal

  • Christopher Kidd

    The Oakland group is called “Transport Oakland”….

  • Joe Linton

    Thanks! Fixed!

  • Joe Linton

    oops – that was a totally unrelated link. Fixed.

  • P.

    Comments for the Culver CityBus Proposals closed on October 8th. The city council meeting on the 27th where the plan is presented should be interesting if the Playa Vista folks decide to oppose the changes to the #4.

  • All the stations on the Gold Line East L.A. (Ed Roybal) extension should be named for Zev since it was he who prevented it from being a Heavy Rail Subway line (eastward extension of the Red/Purple Line)

  • The KinkiSharyo decision should be a wake-up call for local politicians.

  • Dennis_Hindman

    Heavy rail subway construction costs are about $500 million a mile in Los Angeles. Light rail is no more than $227 million a mile (Expo phase II). The more a rail line cost, the less miles of rail that can be installed for a fixed amount of money. If the Gold Line East LA extension was installed as a heavy rail subway, instead of light-rail, then there would have to be project cuts somewhere else.

    So the question is: should the Expo Line Phase 1 (or another project) not have been built in order to have had enough money to build a heavy rail line to East LA?

    Metro doesn’t print billion dollar bills in a back room. They are working with a fixed amount of money.

    The East LA Gold Line extension should have been a subway according to Supervisor Molina. Some have complained the Crenshaw Line should be built completely as a tunnel and the East San Fernando Valley Transit Corridor project needs to be a train, according to many. The problem is that fulfilling each of those requests would make these projects way over budget (the Crenshaw Line is already way over budget and not yet built). Some other projects would have to be cut to stay within the overall fixed budget. Since the Sepulveda Pass corridor project is last on the list for Measure R projects, then that would likely have to be eliminated to fulfill these extra cost demands.

  • Alex Brideau III

    I don’t doubt that Kinkisharyo will “look outside California” to locate their final assembly facility, but I think their contract with Metro requires them to keep all final assembly jobs within the county. If that’s the case, my money says they’ll abandon Palmdale but stay within the county borders. Lancaster, perhaps?

  • Joe Linton

    Today, Art Leahy responded to questions on this – said rail cars won’t be delivered late – but cars could be manufactured “out of state.”

  • Alex Brideau III

    I wonder how they can do this, if KS is indeed contractually obligated to build in state? Odd.

  • How can a railcar that is being partially funded by Federal dollars be limited to assembly in one state?

  • “Heavy Rail/Subway” was going to be paid for by the Feds at a ration of 80/20. That was the era in which Waxman/Zev said no. And thanks to Waxman/Zev, that chance is gone.

    Oh well, better to send all that capital to the Saudis for oil and the Germans for cars…

  • Alex Brideau III

    Beats me. I think we’d need to dig up the actual contract to get more details.