It’s a good time to be a transit advocate who also likes public celebrations. While the Gold Line Eastside Extension is celebrating its first day of service this Sunday, another Gold Line extension is also taking the time to highlight a brighter transit future for its corridor residents: the Foothill Extension!
The Foothill Extension is celebrating last month’s triumph by unveiling the first of six station signs at the future Monrovia station site next Saturday. There will be food and activities for the entire family, and everyone is welcome.
We’re encouraging you to join us for the celebration – which will take place on November 21, 2009, from 10:00 AM to 12:00 PM at the Historic Santa Fe Train Depot in Monrovia, CA. In addition to residents joining in on the fun, the San Gabriel Valley delegation of elected officials will also be in attendance. Members of Congress, the State Assembly, the County Board of Supervisors, and local City Council offices are confirmed to attend. The unveiling ceremony will start at 10:20 AM sharp, so don’t be late!
Good Times Are Rolling
Not a week has gone by since the approval of the LRTP in October without a congratulatory piece appearing in the local papers – the latest of which can sum up how the San Gabriel Valley happily feels about the prospects of a light-rail line coming into the region. The Pasadena Star-News editorial board recently took the time to thank the elected officials who had fought tooth-and-nail for the Foothill Extension over the past few years, the Metro Board of Directors for showing a commitment to the Foothill Extension, and the City of Monrovia for (lack of a better term) taking one for the team in order to see the line a reality in 2013.
In addition, the paper reminds readers just how important last month’s LRTP vote was for the region:
This project, now funded east from Pasadena to the Azusa/Citrus College station, will begin creating positive economic waves in terms of contracts and jobs beginning now through its completion in 2013.
…
By extending the Gold Line light-rail tracks from east Pasadena at Sierra Madre Villa Street to Azusa, and then, eventually, to Montclair and maybe even to Ontario International Airport, it will remove many commuters from cars, put them into trains and thereby relieve congestion on the traffic-choked Foothill (210) Freeway. The light-rail system will finally reach east San Gabriel Valley and eventually Inland Empire residents – precisely the neighborhoods where people drive long distances to and from jobs in Pasadena, Glendale/Burbank and Los Angeles. By adding choices for commuters, it will speed up travel and reduce air pollution.
The Gold Line Foothill Extension Construction Authority held a workshop on Tuesday to pursue partnerships with the private sector in an attempt to accelerate construction of the Foothill Extension. While the focus of the day was all business for Authority CEO Habib Balian and the many firms present, our focus was on the keynote speech delivered by Metro Chairman Ara Najarian – and what a speech it was. The videos of the speech are posted below, but if you don’t have time to listen to a 12 minute speech (nobody blames you if you don’t), we’ve bullet-pointed the highlights for you.
Part 1
Part 2
Highlights from Ara’s keynote:
He was skeptical that Measure R would pass. He was also one of the opponents of Measure R at the time because of equity/lack of fair distribution of revenue. However, proponents get kudos for getting county to vote for Measure R.
Measure R will not only change the fabric of every community in the county, but it will also change how we, as a region, are perceived by the world.
In explaining the delay in passing the Long Range Transportation Plan, Ara noted that there was a lot of discord among the regions when he became Chair. He didn’t want to pass the LRTP with a 7-6 or 8-5 vote. He felt that would send the wrong signal to our county, Sacramento, and Washington.
They are working hard to get federal funding. Very few regions in the country have made the same kind of commitment to transportation funding. But other cities have done a great job lobbying Washington for money.
As the car culture center of the world, our county makes the best case for federal funding because we’re trying to get drivers out of their cars. If people start using the Foothill Extension, it should be a model for the rest of the country.
The Subway to the Sea and Regional Connector were chosen to apply for federal funding because they don’t have initial funding from Measure R.
There were forces inside Metro who wanted to kill the Gold Line Foothill Extension. But he has been trying to get everyone back together on the same page because we can’t succeed as a county if every sub-region only pushes their projects.
Our residents are committed to transit funding, and we need to sell that commitment to Washington.
Because the Foothill Extension will have several transit-oriented developments around its stations, there’s no reason why it can’t get HUD (Housing and Urban Development) funding as well. Would also get EPA benefits.
Ara will put pressure on Metro CEO Art Leahy to break ground on the Foothill Extension before his term as Chair ends on June 30, 2010. He wanted in on the fun of a groundbreaking.
For a breakdown of the workshop itself, the Pasadena Star-News has a report.
That seems to be the mantra for Los Angeles County when it comes to transportation.
We all know that Measure R was passed partly as a reactive (and somewhat proactive) effort to ease the everyday pain of being a commuter in Los Angeles. Of course, most major cities’ residents suffer the same fate every weekday to and from work as well – so why does our region deserve special attention? Because according to the results of an IBM survey – as reported in a recent article by Reuters, our commutes hurt THE MOST. In a survey of 4,446 commuters in the top 10 metropolitan cities in the country, Los Angeles took the title for giving its residents the most emotionally painful commutes. Ouch – reading that hurt, but it won’t hurt as much as getting back onto the 210. To calculate scores for the aptly-titled “commuter pain index,” IBM surveyors measured responses to time, traffic, congestion, stress, anger (lots here) and impact on work.
But the pain doesn’t stop there.
Facing a different kind of hurt are the cities that sit further east along the Foothill Extension corridor. In an article published a few weeks ago in the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin, several inland cities expressed their angst and displeasure at the extremely long wait before their transit-oriented development plans – centered around their respective Foothill Extension stations – can come to fruition. In the words of La Verne resident Richard Taskesen: “maybe we’ll be dead by then.”
According to the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin, the City of Montclair officials are hoping to create their own downtown – complete with residential buildings, shopping centers and restaurants – with transit (read: Foothill Extension) at the heart of it. La Verne has reserved land for similar development around its station. Claremont has already made its transit-oriented plans come to life, but is waiting for the Foothill Extension to arrive to make the “transit” in “transit-oriented” work. Ontario, which will be the last city to see the Gold Line as part of the Ontario Airport extension, has already identified land to be used when the train does finally arrive.
Unfortunately, talking about these plans nearly a decade before they can even start construction (because there’s no other choice) just adds more points for anger to the San Gabriel Valley commuter pain index. The culprit? Politics. But you already knew that.
Three articles in Friday’s editions of the Los Angeles Times and the Los Angeles Daily News focused on the the Subway to the Sea and its federal funding status (status: unknown). Now we support the Subway to the Sea as much as your average West LA folk, so there’s no issue with the project itself. Mass transit options, whatever and wherever they are, are good. The whole county is in dire need of a legitimate public transit alternative to the congested freeways as well as freedom from the polluted air that comes with traffic snarls.
In one Los Angeles Timesreport, it was revealed that much of the federal stimulus money that California had received for transportation was going to “routine” projects – not toward projects that President Obama had hoped “would both be built quickly and achieve long-term goals such as reducing pollution and congestion.” Now if you’re a Foothill Extension supporter, you can’t help but read this and scream: Oh come on! The explanation for perhaps why the ready-to-go Foothill Extension was stymied and not put up for federal stimulus money can be found in this excerpt:
The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority thought about applying for stimulus funds to stretch the Red Line light rail to the sea but scrapped the idea when officials realized the project couldn’t be completed in the timeline the president outlined, said David Yale, MTA’s deputy executive officer of regional programming.
“The president’s charge was to get the economy jolted, so we needed to identify projects that could move quickly and get out to bid quickly,” Yale said.
The Foothill Extension seems to fit that “charge,” seeing as how with the help of federal funding, the entire line to Montclair can be finished and operating by 2017. Not to mention the thousands of construction jobs that would come with it, the billions of dollars that would jolt the San Gabriel Valley economies, the reduction in congestion on the 210, and the improvements in air quality for millions of residents.
However, all is not lost, as a group of the Subway’s biggest supporters –including Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky – are urging “local governments to put aside their differences over planned transportation projects and launch a coordinated effort to secure enough federal stimulus dollars and matching funds to expedite the subway extension as well as other much-anticipated projects to be financed by Measure R, the county’s new transportation sales tax.” The list of projects they want to come along with the ride to the federal government?
Those include the Expo Line light-rail route from downtown to Santa Monica with a completion date in 2015, the Gold Line’s Foothill extension to perhaps Azusa by 2017 and a downtown light-rail line to connect the Blue, Gold and Expo lines by 2025.
Though we’re currently emphasizing the use of federal funds to build out these projects, remember that the revenue from Measure R’s half-cent sales tax increase is still slated to pay for the majority, but not all, of the cost of these lines. And with the Subway to the Sea doing its best roommate-who-raids-your-part-of-the-fridge-without-paying-their-fair-share impression, Supervisor Michael Antonovich’s office seems to be having none of it:
Tony Bell, spokesman for county Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich, said the subway extension will only serve three of the county’s 88 cities, all of which will be required to “foot the bill.”
“The residents of the San Fernando, San Gabriel, Santa Clarita and Antelope valleys will all be paying for a gold-plated, multi-billion dollar underground subway that will have no impact on our regional transportation crisis,” Bell said. “In fact, it will funnel money away from projects that will improve mobility on a regional basis.”
This week’s Voice of the San Gabriel Valley will be an extended one. How else do you fit an entire fast-growing region’s worth of comments into a blog post?
The San Gabriel Valley Joint Powers Authority had met right before the last Metro Board meeting on June 25, and we were able to get some comments on the Gold Line Foothill Extension from a few representatives from around the San Gabriel Valley. In addition to posting comments from the residents, we’re also posting what these representatives had to say about the Foothill Extension – along with their messages for Metro.
Francis Delach, City Manager for the City of Azusa, on the economic benefits of the Metro Gold Line Foohtill Extension – and why a large employer particularly favors Azusa.
Scott Ochoa, City Manager for the City of Monrovia, explains how the Foothill Extension addresses congestion and environmental issues, sustainable development, proper use of old land, and the hope for a world-class region.
Sam Pedroza, City Councilman for the City of Claremont, speaks about transit-oriented development opportunities that the Foothill Extension presents. He also comments on the progress Metro has made.
“Respectfully I hereby request Metro to expedite this long awaited project “Gold Line”.” My young family needs it now and even more so in the future.”
“It is appalling that one of the world’s greatest metropolitan areas can’t have a public transportation worth speaking about. Is anyone concerned about the future?!”
“We need the Gold Line project to be completed. Do you know how much air quality will improve because people will ride the Gold Line instead of using the 210 FREEWAY!!”
This week’s Voice of the San Gabriel Valley series is dedicated to the National Dump the Pump day. With gas prices rising again for the summer (and that economic issue going on), everyone’s trying to find a way to go about their daily lives without making any further dents in their wallets. We already told you how much you could save by using public transportation, but that $8,416 in annual savings for Los Angeles residents was based on when gas prices were somewhat (a little? kind of? relatively?) low. The most recent figure by the American Public Transportation Association puts the annual savings for Los Angeles residents at… *drum roll*… $9,915.
So what say you San Gabriel Valley? Ready to dump the pump? We’re getting there.
“I commute daily from Azusa- Pasadena. It’s a ‘nightmare’ getting worse daily with traffic congestion. Please get the Gold Line built sooner than later!”
“Great job!! Looking forward to visit my son + family that lives in Claremont by using (the Gold Line).”
“This is nuts. Get the trains expanded. Stop playing politics. We need the alternative sources of transportation.”
“There’s an old saying: ‘Pennywise and poundfoolish’ There’s no more time and money to waste.”
This Saturday, Assemblymember Ed Hernandez (of the 57th Assembly District) and other San Gabriel Valley legislators are hosting an informational forum to discuss the potential impacts of Measure R on the San Gabriel Valley region. In addition to state elected officials, the speaker list includes Metro CEO Art Leahy, whose recent Measure R update was reported on LA Streetsblog.
The Assemblymember describes the meeting this way on this website: “In November of 2008, Los Angeles County voters passed Measure ‘R’, implementing a half-cent sales tax increase countywide that will generate $40 billion in funds towards traffic relief and transportation upgrades throughout the county over the next 30 years. Come and learn how these funds are being implemented and their impact on important San Gabriel Valley projects.”
The meeting will also include Measure R-related updates on the Foothill Extension, highway projects, the Alameda Corridor-East Project and the impact of the measure on jobs in the San Gabriel Valley.
Measure “R” and Economic Recovery Forum
Saturday, May 9, 2009
9:30 a.m.-11:30 a.m.
Azusa Senior Center
740 N. Dalton Ave., Azusa, CA 91702 Map
One of the biggest and most touted health benefits of electric-powered light rail systems – like the proposed Metro Gold Line Foothill Extension – is the decrease in air pollution. It’s a no-brainer. A viable transportation alternative leads to less cars, which means less smog going into our immediate atmosphere, thus increasing the amount of clean air we breathe and improving our quality of life. And obviously, as we face our century’s newest challenge of global warming, public transportation agencies and advocates have been touting these same benefits. It’s a meaningful argument, because unfortunately there are those who can attest to the impact of pollution on their health.
But what about the impact of vehicle dependency on our lifestyle? The modern day obesity epidemic can certainly be attributed to several different lifestyle factors, one of which is the inactivity that comes with a reliance on personal transportation. So would public transportation riders see any improvement in this aspect? Most likely.
From Science Daily, the Journal of Public Health Policy recently published findings that people who take public transportation were three times more likely to meet the US Surgeon General’s recommendation of 30 minutes of physical activity per day – an amount that (even in short bouts of activity) is considered enough to reduce “obesity levels, coronary heart disease, and hypertension.” The reason is simple: people who use public transportation have to walk more than their auto-dependent counterparts. And these “short walks throughout our day are historically how we have gotten our activity,” which unfortunately have been phased out of many people’s daily routines.
While the study found a positive correlation between public transportation use and meeting the daily physical activity recommendations to starve off obesity, it also found (obviously) the exact opposite negative correlation for car use.
So to correct the question in our headline: Would we see a positive correlation between the health of San Gabriel Valley residents and the opening (and operation) of the Foothill Extension?
What would you do if you had an extra $8,416 per year in your pocket? Because that’s how much you would save each year if you took public transit.
The American Public Transportation Association recently released a report on the average annual savings for public transit riders around the country. The average savings across the board came out to $8,498 – with Los Angeles residents coming in on the list at 15th with an average annual savings of $8,416.
Of course, this is assuming that you have some passableviable mass transit system in place that reliably serves your area.
Topping off the list were residents in public-transit-heavy areas like Boston, New York, and San Francisco, who save $12,428, $12,390, and $11,516 annually.
With Measure R having passed and the potential for the Gold Line Foothill Extension to be funded (it’s currently not slated to be funded in Metro’s draft plan), maybe one day we’ll save as much as our northern and eastern counterparts.
