alt Hacker NewsGod it's frustrating how slow making these rail transits has been. The D line was literally planned out back in the 1960s and it took this long? I understand the plethora of problems the engineers faced when completing this. But I find it funny that once the World Cup was planned to be in LA, that's when LA leadership expedited all the legal and corporate hurdles in order to make sure we don't have another carmagetton
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In 1985, a Ross Dress for Less exploded due to methane gas, and congressman Henry Waxman representing the westside used that to federally ban any idea of a subway for decades.
Prior to that, Henry Wilshire, who donated the land for Wilshire Blvd in 1895, made a condition that no rail lines would be built on Wilshire.
Yeah... Kinda like how Paris used the Olympics to get the political willpower to cleanup the river.
City's trying to brand themselves and look good on a global stage does funny things.
I once watched the TTC (Toronto Transit Commission) close a section of doorways from the street into a station (Runnymede) to replace a small section of tile floor on the inside. It was about 10 ft x 4 ft section, it took somewhere around 2.5 years. After they ripped out the tile on in the first week, I didn't see anyone until it was done 2.5 years later. It took about another 2-3 weeks to remove the plywood and caution tape so people could use the doors again instead of having to walk around to another entrance.
The Eglinton line has taken 15 years and good portion is above ground where they don't even have to tunnel. Still not done, probably another 15-20 years left.
It's why I laugh when Carney proposes a high speed rail link between Toronto and Montreal, it would take a couple of centuries to build.
Some cities and countries are inept, they can no longer build anything because of the bureaucracy and the need for consensus from 100000 different interest groups.
Some of this was covered in the article, but it’s not actually Los Angeles’ leadership’s fault (rare praise for a city I love and call home), it was shovel-ready and funded to be built in the 80s. Then there was a ballot measure due to ongoing construction problems of a separate line in the 80s that banned tunneling in Los Angeles. This wasn’t overturned until 2007! Then Beverly Hills (which is also not part of Los Angeles city government) fought this line for another 10 years, again with tunneling concerns, because they didn’t want it under them (not so fun fact, Doug Emhoff, Kamala Harris’ husband, represented them). It went to the California Supreme Court and then the Federal Appeals Court, and finally, in 2017 was allowed to commence construction. Then Beverly Hills decided they wanted (and got) not one but TWO stops (and the only ones outside of downtown with turnstiles). Funny.
An indictment of the state legal system’s slowness, yes (see CAHSR), but the city consistently has fought many of its own nimby residents, other cities, the state, and the United States trying to claw back funding for this for those 60 years. It would not have been built without generations of support from city leadership. So there is hope!
With hundreds of miles funded and planned for or already under construction in the next two decades, the city’s rail future may be the brightest in the country.