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Streetsblog LA
Good Transportation Planning: It’s Not Magic
Way back on April 14, LADOT General Manager Rita Robinson spoke in front of the City Council Transportation Committee on how the department is going to deal with the city's budget crunch. Robinson delivered her usual passionate defense of the "LADOT Family" in the midst of the cuts and also brought a basket fool of amazing analogies. She compared planning in the budget crisis to working with a bad comb over, ("you think you're covered but you're totally exposed") and compared her experiences with furloughs and layoffs to a parent having to decide which of her children to feed. Oddly, her comments about the City Council having "Reality Deficit Disorder" seemed to be left at home.
April 26, 2010
Will the Metro Board Overload “30 in 10” with Highway Projects
This Thursday, the Metro Board of Directors will debate and vote-on whether or not to formally support Mayor Villaraigosa's "30 in 10" program that would use federal loans to move the twelve largest transit projects contained in the 30 year Measure R sale tax program in the next decade. "30 in 10" has proven wildly popular with transit riders and is being touted as a national model for transit agencies, yet all of the advance debate on the program from the Board can be summarized as "how can we make sure to build more wasteful and expensive highway projects quicker?" You can read the full agenda for this Thursday's meeting, here.
April 20, 2010
Mayor’s Office Rescues 10% Set-Aside for Bicycling and Pedestrian Projects in Measure R Local Return
As someone who has been pushing hard for a "bicycling and pedestrian set aside" for Measure R funds from before it was called Measure R, I have mixed feelings about yesterday's City Council Joint Hearing with the Transportation and Budget & Finance Committees.
April 20, 2010
Could L.A.’s Transit Plan Become a Winning Campaign Issue for Boxer?
President Obama did triple duty last night for the re-election campaign of Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA), visiting three fundraisers to send a stark message about polls that show the environment committee chairman holding a single-digit lead against her GOP challengers despite a formidable cash advantage.
April 20, 2010
Final Obama Fuel-Efficiency Rule Gives Breaks to Electric, Luxury Cars
The Obama administration today released its final rule raising U.S.
auto fuel-efficiency standards to an average of 35.5 miles per gallon
(mpg) by 2016, winning plaudits from environmental groups while
offering extra benefits to makers of electric and luxury cars.
April 1, 2010
In New York, Robinson Packs the House, Leaves Em Speechless
LADOT General Manager Rita Robinson spoke to a standing room-only crowd at NYU's Rudin Center this morning, kicking off the New York City Street Summit. Robinson's speech, delivered just two weeks after NYCDOT Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan brought lessons from the Big Apple to her backyard, was both a spirited defense of LADOT's planning policies and a response to Sadik-Khan's vision of change.
April 1, 2010
Could Gas-Tax Bonds Pay For the Next Federal Transportation Bill?
House infrastructure committee chairman Jim Oberstar (D-MN), facing steep political odds
in his push to pass a new six-year federal transportation bill this
year, has begun to pitch an outside-the-box solution to the financing
shortfall that is still stalling congressional action: Treasury bonds.
March 31, 2010
As Minneapolis Joins NACTO, Oberstar Backs Shift on Transit Operating Aid
At an event in Minneapolis today, House transportation committee
chairman Jim Oberstar (D-MN) announced his support for giving urban
transit agencies more flexibility to spend federal transportation
formula money on operating -- a change in the current law that has already won the backing of Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood but has split the transit industry.
March 31, 2010
Bike Corrals for the City of Los Angeles
Due to Los Angeles City Council leadership and community advocacy,
bike corrals may soon be coming to Los Angeles. The April 14th meeting
of the city's Transportation Committee is scheduled to hear a council
motion on implementation of a pilot corral in Northeast Los Angeles.
Here's the backstory on how that came to pass.
March 29, 2010