PRESS RELEASE

A creative group of transit activists staged theatrical performance on the Palms overpass of the 405 freeway for a captive audience of drivers stuck in traffic last Friday, March 13, 2009. As passengers stuck in the usual gridlock looked on, a giant 100 foot banner was hung from the overpass, urging motorists to advocate for more public transit, and less freeways. The sign read “If we had trains, you’d be home by now!”

West LA for Change, a new grassroots organization in the area, planned the event in order to draw attention to the need for a more comprehensive public transit system in the City of Los Angeles. The group stated that this is the opening salvo of many actions planned for the near future.

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What a great idea!

Awesome! So sorry I couldn't be there. Thank you guys for all your follow-through.

I know weekly actions are a huge commitment (recently, I've been doing 3-4 of them a week), but I'd find a way to take this on, especially if it was near my community.

I think monorails are the ideal solution, but they're too efficient to build, which the construction companies don't like. (They REALLY don't like it.) It would probably take a revolution to get those built in this country for city use--especially in L.A.

Back in the 70s, three cities, Washington, DC, San Francisco, and Los Angeles, faced breakdown from increased traffic.

Washington decided to build its Metro system, a multi line system following natural routes and serving most of the area and providing both regional and local service.

San Francisco did not follow Washington's plan of a complete system but a simple Y system that covered a wide area but not intensively with only limited local area service.

Los Angeles, influenced by the anti-rail Los Angeles Times and conservative Republican County Supervisors, rejected rail and did nothing. Later after some of those people died off, the County developed the minimalist Blue and Green lines and the subway to Western Avenue, all too little and too late.

Thanks to its good public transportation system, Washington residents enjoy one of the highest quality of living standards in the country.

In the Bay Area, people living or working in areas served by BART enjoy benefit of the system. Unfortunately, that's a small portion of the area population.

In Los Angeles, traffic and limited area public transportation leave some people with four hour commutes, excessive pollution, and one of the lowest qualities of life in the country.

It is time to do what we should have done forty years ago and build a complete area wide rail system.

I was in the Bay Area 10 years ago, and the BART system was as you described. However, the bus system, which I also used, is (was?) vastly better than the one here in L.A. I was able to get from the Oakland Airport to Berkeley--and back--for under $5. And I reached my destination 45 minutes early.

I didn't know the area, but I had no trouble catching the different buses.

I've been on the subway in DC, too, and was very impressed by it. It went all over.

Our focus for L.A. probably should be trains above ground (but I still think monorails are the best solution: they're much cheaper, can be built very quickly--above grade, are more environmentally sound, and even have a history of making a profit. No wonder there's so much opposition to them, especially here in ass-backwards, corrupt L.A.)

Local transit improvements are needed to improve L.A.'s air quality and spend less time in traffic..

Getting to L.A. from S.F. by train isn't easy either. Last year's ballot measure for high speed rail linking the two cities is past due..

Another recent proposal is for a rail line to link Las Vegas to the L.A. region via Orange County. This would save a great deal of traffic and prevent Vegas from being isolated from public transit..

As recently as the 1990's Amtrak had passenger rail starting in Salt Lake City to Cedar City, UT to Caliente, NV to Las Vegas, then connecting to the L.A. line at Barstow, CA..

Long distance rail lines are components to regional and local light rail, all are needed for cleaner air quality, lowered CO2 emissions and other side effects of auto dependency..

http://www.unitedrail.org/

http://www.railserve.com/Passenger/North_America/

Monorail is very sexy, but can someone please explain how building a monorail is cheaper than just designating one lane of freeway (like the useless HOV) in each direction as "rail," putting track on it, and fencing it off? Offhand, the later option seems way cheaper, since almost no construction is needed at all, except for the stations.

I'm agnostic towards which sort of rail to add, but I'd like to know the arguments for each.

Curious,
Dan

Here's a site dedicated to improving and expanding passenger rail service across the U.S. with potential rail links to Canada and Mexico..


The NARP Grow Trains Campaign

Welcome to the web home of the National Association of Railroad Passengers’ 40-year vision for rail in the United States. We aim to shift discussions over intercity passenger rail to emphasize connectivity and capacity expansion for both freight and passenger rail. Visit the links below for more information.

Please do not hesistate to contact NARP if you want further information or to give us your feedback. We are particularly interested in your observations about specific proposed routes on our map, since you live closer to—and may know more about the potential—for many of this routes. You can also read our news release about our vision.




National Association of Railroad Passengers (NARP);
http://www.narprail.org/

Dan wrote:

"Monorail is very sexy, but can someone please explain how building a monorail is cheaper than just designating one lane of freeway (like the useless HOV) in each direction as "rail," putting track on it, and fencing it off? Offhand, the later option seems way cheaper, since almost no construction is needed at all, except for the stations.

"I'm agnostic towards which sort of rail to add, but I'd like to know the arguments for each.

Curious,
Dan"

I have a DVD which explains all of this, and which I've been seeking a venue for a public showing. And I know a person willing to talk about this subject.

But in answer to your question, monorails are simpler to build, so much less traffic has to be diverted during construction and for a shorter duration. Typically, one lane of a road has to be closed, whereas adding train tracks necessitates closing multiple lanes. This also means that businesses tend to not be hurt by construction.

Once monorails are running, they're cheaper to operate, partly because the tires are made of rubber and don't need to be replaced as often the metal wheels of trains. Also, they require less people to operate.

Another advantage, monorail tracks and stations take up less physical space, so there's more flexibility in where they can be built. In Japan, a monorail route--and a station--was installed on the shoulder of an existing freeway.

The fact that monorails are above grade adds to their flexibility, and makes them much safer for pedestrians, and they don't impede ground traffic.

If you see monorails discredited on a website, consider the source. Oftentimes the site is there to promote light rail or subway, which entails significantly more construction--and money for certain people. Trains and subways tend to operate in the red and are heavily subsidized by the government.

In the early '60s, Alweg, the Germany-based company which helped make the early monorails at Disneyland, offered to install monorails in L.A. free of charge on the condition that they'd get to keep the revenue. They were practically thrown out of city hall. Ray Bradbury was there (he has long been an advocate for monorails) and wrote about this a few years ago for the L.A. Times.

There's info. about monorail systems around the world--even Moscow has one--at Monorails.org.

Monorails have a significant limitation in a system convering a wide area.

The problem is switching a monorail from one track to another. With ordinary track, a switch is a simple piece of rail that when moved allows a train to switch from one track to another. It is the ultimate in relative mechanical simplicity. They are rugged and relatively inexpensive to build, maintain, and operate and take a lot of abuse before failing. They work in rain, snow, freezing weather and ice.

A system should have at least two switches at each station. When a train breaks down, the system must have a way of allowing other trains to get around them. To do that trains must be able to switch tracks.

Switches exist for monorails but relatively speaking they are kludges. They require moving in sync and very precisely two large beams. More can go wrong with them than a rail switch. High speed switches are even bigger kludges.

At Disneyland and Disney World this is no big deal. Likewise in most of the world's mono rail systems, the systems are not that long and don't require that many switches. However, in a 20, 30, 40, mile or longer systems with stops every mile or two and needing 40, 50, or 100 switches, the greater initial, operating, and maintenance expenses of monorail switches over regular rail makes a big difference and makes conventional rail more economical.

To anyone who wants a heads up on the next event:

1. Go to westlaforchange.org.
2. Click on "sign up for email" link.
3. Fill out form.

Would love to see more discussion of steel rail vs mono, specifically with respect to using the existing 405 right of way. There are a lot of questions for both modalities, including the grade on the Sepulveda pass (can steel rail do this?), dealing with existing multiple overlapping overpasses (can mono go this high?), cost, station placement, etc.

It should integrate well with the Expo and Green lines.

Most importantly, I think, this has to be a very high volume system. It should be able to handle the current throughput of the 405 itself, since the resulting ease of transport and creation of a transit corridor will generate more far more trips. This should be easy to do; the system in Manila transports 40,000 people per hour, which is worth about 20 optimally loaded freeway lanes.

The DVD documentary that I mentioned ("Monorail: An Intelligent Alternative" put out by the Monorail Society) has footage of monorail tracks switching, and the narrator claims that switching tracks isn't a problem, that it's fast, and that the switching systems have lasted for years. Also, even the largest of the monorail track switching systems are smaller than that of a light rail, according to the documentary.

For further info. on this subject, one can join the Monorail Society for free (monorails.org) and pose any questions in their Yahoo discussion group.

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Betterled wrote:

Monorails have a significant limitation in a system convering a wide area.

The problem is switching a monorail from one track to another. With ordinary track, a switch is a simple piece of rail that when moved allows a train to switch from one track to another. It is the ultimate in relative mechanical simplicity. They are rugged and relatively inexpensive to build, maintain, and operate and take a lot of abuse before failing. They work in rain, snow, freezing weather and ice.

A system should have at least two switches at each station. When a train breaks down, the system must have a way of allowing other trains to get around them. To do that trains must be able to switch tracks.

Switches exist for monorails but relatively speaking they are kludges. They require moving in sync and very precisely two large beams. More can go wrong with them than a rail switch. High speed switches are even bigger kludges.

At Disneyland and Disney World this is no big deal. Likewise in most of the world's mono rail systems, the systems are not that long and don't require that many switches. However, in a 20, 30, 40, mile or longer systems with stops every mile or two and needing 40, 50, or 100 switches, the greater initial, operating, and maintenance expenses of monorail switches over regular rail makes a big difference and makes conventional rail more economical.

We need stop free parking by landlords, merchants, and employers unless an equivalent benefit is given to transit users, bicyclists, and walkers. Also, a parking tax should be implemented to make the car pay for all the damage it causes to our environment!