Here’s a local issue that reflects a very common set of problems: the Los Angeles subway system. Such as it is. Namely, embarrassingly inadequate. Our aspirations to be considered a world-class city on the level of New York, Paris, Tokyo or London are severely restricted by the difficulties people face in getting around without a car. Or with a car, for that matter, given the traffic.
But there’s no reason it has to be like this. At any given moment, some concerned group of citizens will be agitating to improve the situation. Right now such a group is Get L.A. Moving. They’ve put together an amazing proposal for a serious subway network that would utterly transform the city, while respecting the natural contours of the existing urban environment. Click for bigger versions.
Looking at a map like this is a bittersweet experience — comparing what could be to what is. Of course it would be very expensive; they estimate about $35 billion, which doesn’t sound so crazy when spread over a number of years. Times are tough — but that’s exactly the reason why pie-in-the-sky plans like this should be taken seriously right now. There’s no better way to stimulate the economy than to pour massive amounts of money into legitimate infrastructure projects; you create jobs, but you also create value that lasts for many decades to come. Not to mention decreasing our reliance on fossil fuels, which hopefully doesn’t need to be justified.
Also — how cool would it be to have one of these babies crawling along underneath Sunset Boulevard?
In the back of my mind, the real obstacle to building a subway system in a mature city was that you couldn’t really imagine shutting down long stretches of busy streets for months or years at a time. But you don’t have to; modern tunnel-boring technology does it all underground.
Some will object that LA just isn’t dense enough to support a subway system; our attractions are spread out rather than localized to squares. That’s an utterly backwards attitude; build the subway, the density will come. With nice weather 340+ days a year, this is the perfect city in the world to have a mass transit system connecting a bunch of pedestrian-friendly outdoor plazas.
Of course, then everyone would want to come live here. So maybe it wouldn’t be ideal. But it would still be a good idea for the economy and the environment; so I’m willing to sacrifice.
Can’t argue that the giant subterranean boring machine isn’t impressive, but it would be cheaper and easier to install sleek pillars for monorail beams. Above ground and easier to rescue from, in times of shifting earth. And very futuristic, plus better to sightsee out of. Just start extending a certain line from Anaheim.
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> you create jobs
Yes, but you also destroy as many or more where you take the money/resources from to fund it.
http://www.econlib.org/library/Bastiat/basEss1.html
That’s not to say that subways aren’t great, but creating jobs is no argument for building them.
Tunnels are expensive, but earthquake-safe (or rather increased earthquake safety factor) tunnels are _really_ expensive.
I’m not from LA. But I think public metro rails are necessary in all large and mid size cities. It should be on the “to do” list for at least 50 cities in the US. That and more inter city rails.
I like monorail idea too, TB2. I think its more cheerful to be able to watch the world go buy. But I am surprised that its less expensive. I would think you would need more access/land/right away etc. Those things have to cause more legal and bureaucratic delays and costs. I don’t really know. Of course the cool tunnel borer is expensive…
I moved to SoCal from NY in 1995 and was appalled at the lack of public transportation. I miss it terribly and prefer it to driving unreservedly. But public transportation isn’t part of the fabric of society here. It’s all about the cars. Unless and until citizens can be persuaded or coerced (higher gasoline prices?) into using it, it doesn’t make sense to build it.
@ dB
I don’t think that referencing a 19th century economist is going to make your argument any more compelling. On top of creating temporary govt jobs to oversee the construction of the subway system, and on top of the money that will be poured into the PRIVATE sector to construct the subway, you’ll also permanently employ a large number of people to operate and maintain the subway.
Private industry is good for many things: public works ain’t one of them. Name one time that a private firm has improved mass transit for a whole city.
Hmmm… as rich as the map is, it does highlight the low density of the lines. Pasadena just has a single spine going along Colorado, with a long way between stops. To make this really work there has to be a serious supporting network of local trolleys, park&rides, etc. to feed into it…
In my previous life, before I was a space blogger, I worked at an environmental consulting firm here in L.A. that specialized in writing the environmental documentation required for public transit projects. There’s a lot of debate about whether these things should be surface rail or subways. Usually cities do subways despite their increased cost because they require less private property to be condemned and because it is safer for pedestrians. But the California Department of Transportation already owns lots of disused freight rail right of ways (like the Exposition line in west L.A.), which means they don’t need to eat into expensive property. And the sediments in the L.A. basin have lots of hydrocarbons, which means whenever you dig a tunnel it tends to accumulate nasty stuff like hydrogen sulfide gas. So then you have to vent that gas, and wherever the vent pops out at the surface creates a potential negative health impact. For these reasons Caltrans tends to want to do things as surface rail, but then you get tons of NIMBY opposition. It’s a real mess.
Thanks Sean. Living in LA and loving every aspect of the city other than the Haze and poor infastructure, I wish I had more to add but being someone who strongly believes robust public transit as an essential pillar to any metro or large city’s infrastructure. It is good to know others feel the same way and are advocating their beliefs makes me feel good that this city might actually grow out of the Smog Ages and help be the catalyst to spark the same across the US, especially after Chinas recently announced and extremely enviable rail system.
Dream on Sean. Ain’t going to happen in LA.
Technologically, it would be a fantastic challenge, but which is entirely doable. The money will be so huge, even money printer Greenspan will have trouble. But the show stopper is – culture. Add politics and you have an impossible dream.
“Of course, then everyone would want to come live here.”
Guffaw! That’s even funnier than the line about LA’s “attractions”.
*What* attractions?!
Money spent on infrastructure improvements like a serious subway system for LA wouldn’t reduce investment in other productive uses because such funds would otherwise be used to fuel speculative financial deals–at present, American business is not interested in building things or providing services if it can help it for the obvious reason that the returns to capital are vastly greater in finance. The goals of businessmen and the goals of rational public policy just aren’t the same. It makes sense for the dominant business interests to act to increase their share of wealth even if the best route to this goal requires that the total wealth of the nation be reduced, which is exactly what is happening. If the object of the game were really to increase the productive capacity of the whole society, we would obviously be spending on capital improvements.
What are those people doing with one of the LHC detectors? Oh wait…
There is a lot of money and lobbying power OPPOSED to any expansion of subways in LA. And that’s why it is not going to happen in a capitalist-friendly country like the United States.
Green line is a perfect example. It is a bizarre subway line that essentially runs from nowhere to nowhere. If it were extended 2 miles west, it would reach LAX. If it were extended 2 miles east, it would connect with Metrolink railway lines. It would be possible to arrive to LAX, take the subway, transfer to the train, and be in Disneyland within 1 hour after arrival or in San Diego within 2 hours.
So why is it built in such a peculiar way? The answer is that long-term parking businesses at LAX, fearful of losing money because no one would use them if the subway line were properly designed, lobbied and bribed till the plans for the last section were axed.
It sounds like an urban legend, but wasn’t the LA public-transportation system bought by a tyre company 60 or 70 years ago and then shut down?
Aahhh, the wonder of search engines. Here’s the straight dope:
http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/551/did-general-motors-destroy-the-la-mass-transit-system
Jobs created by the public sector are like virtual particles: very temporary and not
substantial. And creating jobs in the public sector takes jobs from
the private sector. As Bastiat warned about public spending, the visible benefits
are easy to see. The invisible costs are …. well … invisible.
Larry Wasserman
@Matt T
Yes, no one denies that a lot of jobs are created. But a lot of other jobs are ALSO destroyed elsewhere. Look at the analogous situation on a desert island with Alice anb Bob shipwrecked and trying to survive. Alice has a knife and uses it to carve up coconuts. Bob, having no knife, idly looks on. Not good. So I take the knife from Alice, give it to Bob and tell him to carve me a limestone sculpture. Hooray, one job created!
Bastiat’s What Is Seen and What Is Not Seen may be the most clear and insightful writing on the subject ever. What does it matter that he was an economist or from the 19th century?
Although I’m also personally a fan of public transportation, it needs lots of tax dollars to survive. There aren’t a lot of those around in California these days.
“…build the subway, the density will come.”
Except that then LA would have to be able to accomodate that density in other ways. I’m particularly concerned about the water supply, which I understand to be only just barely sufficient now. A huge influx of people into the area would mean coming up with new water sources to match. Not so simple.
Sean: “Times are tough — but that’s exactly the reason why pie-in-the-sky plans like this should be taken seriously right now. There’s no better way to stimulate the economy than to pour massive amounts of money into legitimate infrastructure projects; you create jobs…”
And where do you plan to take those massive amounts of money from?
Also creating taxpayer funded jobs is banal, the only problem is again, who’s taxes do you plan to rise?
If you really think this subway project is such a great idea why not start/join a fund rising initiative, if you can convince every single of the 4.5 million LA citizens to donate $7800 you will have your $35 billion and the work can commence.
Spending money on useful public works simply does not reduce private investment when the private sector is not doing any damned investing. One of the obvious reasons we’ve suffered through a series of speculative bubbles is because the people with surplus money haven’t found any better thing to do with their wealth than to bet it on currencies, hedge funds, and derivatives. Which is one of the best reasons to redistribute wealth to people who will actually do something useful with it.
The Chamber-of-Commerce riff against public spending–“Yes, no one denies that a lot of jobs are created. But a lot of other jobs are ALSO destroyed elsewhere.”–is simply and demonstrably wrong.
I think the argument that Los Angelinos love their cars too much to embrace public transit is a bunch of BS. I grew up here and yes, I do love my car and I do love driving…but I most definitely don’t love traffic, smog, looking for parking, or the amount of miles and maintenance I have to put into my car due to all the driving. For the longest time, didn’t even know that we had viable public transit options.
I spent the past five years in Tokyo…and was amazed that such a densely populated city could function so well, and that it was founded on the basis that public transit was the norm…efficient, clean, reliable, and cheaper than driving and parking.
After I came back, I wanted to see if things had improved here…and yes, we do have Public Transportation! I actually take public transit quite a bit here in LA now (Metro Buses, Metro Rail, and MetroLink) aside from lack of frequency and lack of early or late hour availability; I think it’s quite good (as long as you plan early).
Working on access points and time availability will greatly improve Los Angelinos interest in mass transit…though as Sean points out…maybe we don’t want too many people crowding our awesome city!
@Jim Harrison
Bets on currencies, hedge funds and derivatives _are_ investments. Meaning that in the end resources get put to use in attempts to increase future production. Bets on speculative bubbles are investments, but bad investments that don’t lead to increased future production. Then the investors lose their money. This tends to discourage bad investments. Unless, of course, someone takes money from sensible investors to bail out the reckless ones.
I grew up in LaLa land back before GM, ARCO, Getty, and Firestone conspired to destroy the public transit trolley system. Yes, there were less people, but the ability to ride from the beach in Playa del Rey to downtown Hollywood (the doctors and dentist), made life feel vibrant and adventurous. Then came the cars, and it took more than an hour to drive from the beach to the other end of the valley along Sepulveda, and nearly two hours to make the transit to the new opened Disneyland along Century and Whittier. Next they built the Interstates, and are still building the Interstates, and you could make the trips in half the time. But that encouraged more and more people, which resulted in it taking the same amount of time as the original roads.
Emily’s ideas are the most reasonable approach. Trains used to run all over the Greater LA area/region, particularly to assist with the development of the aerospace industry and NASA’s space program. Beginning to reconnect the tracks with commuter trains would be much more reasonable than delving into the substrate of LA, filled as it is with faults, fissures, tars, gases, etc.