Dana Gabbard

Saturday, Governor Brown signed the two bills (SB 1225 and AB 1779) to facilitate local agencies assuming management of the Pacific Surfliner and San Joaquin intercity-rail routes. Streetsblog previously published an an in-depth piece exploring the history and challenges involved.

In my recent piece on the proposed local takeover of the Pacific Surfliner inter-city rail route the pivotal question I poised multiple times was which agency would take on the responsibility of managing the service.

In 2004 Los Angeles World Airports (LAWA) [the L.A. city department that operates LAX, Van Nuys and Ontario airports] as part of what is known as the LAX Master Plan Mitigation Monitoring and Reporting Program reached with opponents of LAX expansion agreed that by 2015 the FlyAway system will be expanded to nine routes. This is proving a challenging (and expensive) goal to work toward. Recently the Irvine route was discontinued due to low ridership (albeit a nonstop shuttle service is promised as an eventual replacement).

As I noted previously due to the terrible condition of Wilshire between Fairfax and Wilton repaving of the curb lanes along that portion is being undertaken in advance of the reconstruction of curb lanes to occur as part of the impending Wilshire bus lane project.

David Rutherford of Omnitrans is the guest speaker at the Sept. Southern california Transit Advocates meeting.

The Los Angeles-San Diego-San Luis Obispo Rail Corridor Agency (LOSSAN) is a joint powers consisting of various rail operating agencies and stakeholders who (as stated in their outreach material) seek to increase ridership, revenue, capacity, reliability, and safety on the coastal rail corridor from San Diego to Los Angeles to San Luis Obispo served by Amtrak's Pacific Surfliner along with the Coaster and Metrolink.

Souther Californoa Transit Advocates presents John Standiford of the Riverside County Transportation Commission on the extension of Metrolink to Perris Metrolink -- q&a session after the presentation.

Sometimes it is hard to keep up with the whirl of local activities and events relating to transit. For example the meeting L.A. City Council member Tom LaBonge held July 18th on the future of Wilshire totally escaped my attention.

Government Fleet Magazine has named Culver City the 3rd Best Government Fleet in North America for 2012 as part of its annual ranking of 100 best fleets.

This past Sunday I was out and about, riding Metro's line 20 westbound on Wilshire from the Westlake/MacArthur Park District and was startled as we approached Wilshire/Vermont that besides the usual verbal announcement for the stop a different deep bass voice interrupted to state "Connection to the Red and Purple Lines". Continuing on at Normandie and also Western the same voice announced "Connection to the Purple Line"