My attempt to unravel the spaghetti mess that is LA Metro’s new K line and some surrounding developments.
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Music: Elevator 4 by Stevia Sphere https://steviasphere.bandcamp.com/track/elevator-4
Stadium parking photo by Ron Reiring: https://www.flickr.com/photos/84263554@N00/52372640610
BYD Skyshuttle monorail video by SF’s Rail Depot: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oh6kUSnKDD0
Future metro map by @nandert
source
One lane of a road carries more people and goods in one hour than this does all day long.
Getting out of LAX is such a baffling experience. How do I wank from the terminal to mass transit? Oh, it's easy. You take a shuttle. To a bus lot. To get a bus to a train line. That's half built. To take another bus.
Your flight to LA probably took less time than getting 5 miles away from LAX.
Also, those "aspirational" 70's sci fi Domes and Pyramids station designs are just bafflingly terrible. Why would anybody want to make a train stop so giant that there's nothing around it in convenient walking distance? NYC subway stops are mostly just nondescript stairs that go to the train, so the surface entrance is literally about 6 feet from the shop you wanted to get to.
Almost all Metrorail lines have opened in phases over years, so the K line is not extraordinary by this definition
It's wild to hear that a metro line comes every 10 minutes as an European. We're conditioned to think that anything over 5 minutes is already too much. 10 minutes is, like, fine, in a spur, on a weekend.
Kinda sucks how slow it takes for metro to build anything yet freeways get widened at the blink of an eye.
There are people who call the 1992 riots an "uprising"? That's a very odd and incorrect way of describing indiscriminate violence that only served to intensify racial animosity between blacks and asians in the city and reminded the entire country why opposing gun rights is an inherently fascistic position.
This is a lovely video! I consider myself to be a pretty big nerd when it comes to my hometown’s transit but you obviously dug much more deeper than I ever could! Keep up the amazing work and research!
Nobody rides the K line because it goes through the worst neighborhoods in all of LA.
the way the voice modulates to often momentarily mumbling and sounding like (panicked!) Beeker who blathers beneath his very own neck line…
Leave it to LA to mess up transit.
I know that this is a long ways away, but if the K line went all the way to the Red LIne via West Hollywood, I would go to places like The Grove a lot more often. My favorite alternative is Fairfax for that reason. I love the idea of a subway to Robertson and Santa Monica, but it is too circuitous compared to going up Fairfax. We basically need a big grid of rail lines across the West Side.
I’m one of the people who takes the game day shuttle and it saves on parking time so much. I just go to Hawthorne and ride from there and I don’t worry about the traffic until the freeway. But yeah also the D Line is going to the sea. I would love the Hawthorne extension so I can take the train with unlimited right of way.
That battery powered build your dreams monorail vehicle is sloo-ow. I hope the LACMTA picks another alternative for the sports megaplex people mover. Picking the Alstom means it could be connected with the airport people mover in the future.
They should have done a flying junction with the Expo line so you could have a one-seat ride into DTLA from the airport.
A perfect example of just how awful anything designed by committee can become.
Poor coordination between transportation planning and land-use policy. As long as LA remains low dense, unwalkable and spread out, the Metro is going to remain low in ridership.
Not just Metro, all the public transit did very poorly on having transit oriented development. In Hong Kong, Most stations have a lot of apartments and shopping centers above or near the stations(some are even owned by the transit company). And all rail stations will have couple bus lines near the exit so people can transfer to the passengers' destination. Metro doesn't have to worry about the ridership if they plan and develop the neighbor around the rail stations like that. Now in L.A., I can drive from my house to the closest station and park there. But what about my destinations?
Just to recap some of the original plans on this video. When it was planned:
Hawthorne Mall is extinct (closed in early 90's)
The K (purple) line will connect to the C (green) line. They will become one color.
The extention of the current green line (C). Only goes to faded aerospace companies that don't employ many people.
The Redondo Beach station is a empty parking lot in the middle of nowhere.
The current two stations planned to further extend to the Southbay. Lawndale station and Torrance station. Wouldn't even be at the core or busle of the Southbay or it's traffic congestions, to help eleviate. It would need two or three more stations. Hitting Del Amo Mall, hotels, business district, hospitals, and higher density residential.
If it would follow the original Santa Fe line to Lomita to be heavily used. It would have higher ridership and attractions to go to. Hawthorne Blvd So. In Torrance has a very wide medium divider in the road. Where two tracks could be built easily. Without affecting buying land.
If they weren''t going to connect it to the purple line-then they probabbly should have sent it to either Santa Monica or Downtown. along the Expo line. Unless you live on the K route itself taking it to the airport requires at least 3 rail connections-and thats a lot. I realize the k line and expo station aren't at grade but you could do that(i will say the connection between the expo and K line is also not grade especially coming from the West)
While its ridership is going to no doubt get better-the small number is probabbly always going to keep it such that improving it with more stations or better connections will never ever quite make sense)
I am sorry but this line is so awful…I take the bus on Slauson and Crenshaw and you see the bus stop across the street always empty with a few police standing there but I am glad it exists even if not that many people use it
Guess who was on the Metro Board (including Chairman, for part of the time) during the time many of these major decisions were made? None other than James Butts Jr, mayor of Inglewood.
It’s strange that this video doesn’t mention this important fact. He preceded Garcetti as Chairman. One might expect that since the same person is (a) lobbying for SoFi Stadium in Inglewood; (b) making key decisions on the K Line route and connections, some sort of coordination could’ve happened between the projects? No, quite the opposite!
Wait till it connects LAX.
excellent analysis. I love the irony that no EIR was needed for SoFI yet metro expansion is forever bogged down in EIA requests from neighborhoods who don't want it (I'm looking at you Beverly HIlls)
As someone who is from NYC, I think that Option 3 for the K and C line would be the best option imo. They share some stations and then split off into their own branches. This allows for a 1 seat ride and just 1 transfer if you need to go from thr K to the C without too much trouble.
Nah. Not Nobody. Not “Nobody.” /
The LAX connection will not substantially increase ridership. LA Metro is only forecasting 2,200 riders/ day and there's good reason for that. SFO BART station gets only 5,200 riders/day and that is with an airport station much closer to the terminals and far better regional service and access in an urban area already favorable to using transit. JFK gets 14,200/day (still far less than many European and Asian airport stations) and again that with a system far more expansive than anything LA is even planning for.
Additionally, LA's LAX station is not in the terminals but will require a transfer. People underestimate the ridership decline that happens w each successive transfer. Being that most airport passengers will require at least 1 if not 2 transfers just to get to the LAX station, before transferring one more time to the People Mover, the inconvenience w luggage is pretty likely to be too much for all but those are transit dependent. The airport stations w the highest ridership numbers are the ones w rail stations inside the terminals, including stations for each terminal (most European and Asian systems w airport ridership of 30,000 to 60,000/day).
I'm not saying we shouldn't have an LAX rail station. I'm saying it isn't going to explode ridership. The Sepulveda line would do more for ridership than the Crenshaw line. Also, once the South Bay line, the Crenshaw Line to Hollywood, and the Century Frwy Lines (especially if it ever connects to the OC Metrolink line in Norwalk), and the Sepulveda Line all converge at LAX, then real options are available for airport passengers.
Btw, anyone else see a problem w the LAX light rail elevated station costing half of what the entire Crenshaw Line so far cost? or 2/3 the cost of the entire Regional Connector? or half the cost of the entire San Francisco Central Subway? A 101 story skyscraper, the St Regis, in Chicago's Loop was built for $1 billion, the same as this single platform, 2 rail, light rail station, on land Metro already owns, will cost.
The real ridership increase for the Crenshaw Line is going to be from the connections to the Red and Purple lines. That is where the majority of the current everyday bus corridor ridership is heading and that is the corridor this line was meant to service. People are connecting to jobs in Hollywood and Mid-Wilshire. That's also the main reason that current ridership is lacking until the line is finished. Why get on a bus, then transfer to a train, only to transfer to a bus again to finish your trip when you can just stay on the bus in the first place? It's faster to just stay on the bus.
Also, the detour to West Hollywood would cost $1.8 billion more for 1.5 add'l miles and practically the same projected ridership as the straight line up La Brea to Hollywood (from 87,500/day to 88,700/day). I understand the desire of WeHo to get rail access but what is the justification for much higher costs for essentially the same ridership? This really should be an additional line between Hollywood and Beverly Hills through WeHo and WeHo should demand that. It probably would only cost 2 LAX stations!
The extension to the South Bay will also miss the busy Del Amo business area by choosing to stay on that old RR ROW that veers off into an oil field. This is why Metro is only projecting an add'l 5,000 riders/day on that extension. For context, that's about the same ridership as the Hollywood & Vine station by itself pre-Covid.
Wait til it connects to LAX
Goes nowhere. No direct access to airport or SoFi stadium or to a job hub
Should have gone north on Lincoln Blvd to Santa Monica