By Ken Alpern Santa Monica President, The Transit Coalition Steering Committee, Friends4Expo Transit
It’s definitely exciting that Santa Monicans and other Westsiders are focusing on a Red Line “to the beach,” but here’s some regrettable fiscal realities: 1) Expo Line to Culver City: $640 million, of which only $600 million exists to date. 2) Expo Line from Culver City to Santa Monica: $711 million, estimated. 3) Expo from Staples Center/downtown terminus to Union Station via a downtown connector subway: $450-500 million, estimated. 4) Red Line Subway to Fairfax/Wilshire boulevards: $1.2 billion, estimated. 5) Red Line Subway from Fairfax/Wilshire boulevards to Century City: $2 billion, estimated. 6) Red Line Subway from Century City to UCLA (Wilshire/Westwood): $1 billion, estimated.
Discussions of the “Red Line to the beach” have to date usually been to UCLA/Westwood Village or thereabouts. To some planners, the congestion west of the 405 freeway traffic doesn’t necessarily warrant a subway.
As for a Wilshire Boulevard monorail, a technology which is still mired in the 1950s, or some other elevated rail, what would Santa Monicans think about the visual impact of a virtual freeway overpass running down the middle of the street?
Like it or not, the whole Expo Line costs about the same as the Red Line to Fairfax Boulevard, and the $4 billion quoted in your article (SMDP, Dec. 9, page 1) really only gets the Red Line Subway to Westwood. I vigorously favor the Expo Line to Santa Monica, which remains at the top of the MTA Long Range Transportation Plan, as well as the Red Line to Fairfax Boulevard, considerably lower on the priority list of this plan, but guess which one we’ll see in the next several years?
Go West, Expo and Red Lines. Yet, let’s keep our eyes on the Expo Line first.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on January 11, 2006. Read the original PDF.