Transit Officials

Los Angeles County transit officials Thursday budgeted $6.78 million more for improvements on the Blue Line - one of the busiest light-rail lines in the nation, with 26 million riders annually and a history of accidents and fatalities. There have been eight deaths along the Blue Line so far this year, at least four of which were suicides, according to Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority officials. The most recent fatality occurred Thursday about 12:45 a.m., when officials said a woman apparently tried to swerve her Hyundai around lowered gate arms at a crossing in Compton and was struck by a Blue Line train.

Transportation officials in Los Angeles County plan to offer a ballot measure next fall or in 2016 that would raise the county's sales tax by half a cent or extend the life of Measure R, the levy voters approved in 2008. The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority and multiple advocacy groups say more transportation money would help expand the region's fledgling rail network, improve complementary service on bus lines, and speed construction and repairs on rail lines and highways.

Transit officials adopted a resolution Monday condemning a federal transportation policy that they said could put some of them out of business, but some praised its author, Transportation Secretary Samuel K. Skinner. The American Public Transit Assn., which includes transit officials and suppliers from around the country, urged a federal gasoline tax increase of 7 cents a gallon for mass transit and said that Skinner's policy "fails to set clear, meaningful goals for increased transit use."

Bay Area transit officials are investigating a report that a BART commuter train struck two employees working along a section of track. The report said that the incident occurred between Walnut Creek and Pleasant Hill stations, according to BART's website. "We are working to gather more information and will update the public later this afternoon," according to the statement. Transit workers went on strike Friday after negotiations broke down over salaries and benefits. BART, the nation's fifth largest transit system, carries about 400,000 round-trip passengers each workday.

Los Angeles City Council members blasted county transit officials Friday for failing to follow proper procedures in budgeting money for the San Fernando Valley. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority's inspector general recently found the agency had failed to follow procedures under which all Valley transit money should have been set aside in a special fund. The amount promised for building the Red Line subway to North Hollywood was in fact spent on the project, according to the report.

San Diego cab companies will be required to charge identical fares and give discounts to local residents who are frequent taxi riders under a proposal endorsed by Metropolitan Transit Development Board officials. The recommendations, which are expected to be approved Thursday at a board of directors meeting, will replace a variable rate system that has brought howls of protest from tourists and airport officials.

Orange County transit officials said Monday that they will seek congressional relief from conflicting federal regulations as a result of recent incidents in which passengers have been forced off local buses cited as overloaded. The California Highway Patrol has issued five tickets for overweight buses since Jan. 26. Riders--mostly dayworkers--have been forced off to wait for backup vehicles. The latest round of ticketing by the CHP comes after three similar incidents last year.

A little-noticed bill on Gov. Pete Wilson's desk threatens to slash the pay of California's highest-compensated local transit officials by thousands of dollars a year.

When voters passed Measure M in 1990, they thought that a wide assortment of tantalizing highway and transit improvements would be underway by now, from new, streamlined "super-streets" to expanded commuter rail services. Instead, county transportation officials have paid $250,000 in legal fees successfully defending the half-cent sales tax against court challenges, with resolution possibly a year away if the California Supreme Court reviews the matter.

Transit officials told a Los Angeles City Council committee hearing on Wednesday that trouble-plagued subway tunnels between Union Station and Pershing Square are nonetheless safe and structurally sound. If a major earthquake had been centered Downtown during the last two years, said Metro Rail design executive Martin Rubin, "there would have been no need for this public hearing . . . because the tunnel would have stood perfectly."

Re "Transit, meet LAX. Maybe.," Editorial, Oct. 13 What is so difficult about connecting rail transit to the Los Angeles International Airport? Officials with Metro and Los Angeles World Airports should go to New York and experience JFK airport's AirTrain - and then copy it here. They should connect the terminals, parking lots, the 96th Street bus terminal and the Green Line Aviation stop with a rail system like New York's (or Newark's) and be done with it. They should make the ride into downtown less convoluted by building a connector between the Green Line and the Blue Line - which already intersect - and run airport express trains to LAX. How nice would that be?

SACRAMENTO - Gov. Jerry Brown is seeking a judge's help to prevent a potentially crippling Bay Area transit strike as negotiators continue working to end an acrimonious, months-long contract dispute. If the Bay Area Rapid Transit system and its biggest unions do not reach a deal by Sunday morning, Brown will ask a San Francisco judge to order a 60-day "cooling-off period" in which workers would be prevented from walking off the job. A strike would "significantly disrupt public transportation services in the greater San Francisco Bay Area and endanger the public health, safety and welfare," according to a petition filed Friday by Brown and California Atty.

As striking Bay Area Rapid Transit workers placed the region's commuters in a stranglehold Monday, they were joined by more than 3,000 Oakland city employees whose contract negotiations have also stalled. The workers -- who do not include police, fire or other emergency personnel -- are represented by two unions and have been negotiating with city officials for the last 15 weeks. Like the BART workers, their contracts expired at midnight Sunday. As temperatures approached 80 degrees by mid-morning, hundreds of workers in brightly colored union shirts rallied in front of Oakland City Hall, then moved onto the street to block traffic.

Workers in two of Bay Area Rapid Transit's largest unions were on strike Monday morning, halting service for an estimated 400,000 passengers who use the nation's fifth-largest rail system each weekday. SEIU Local 1021 spokeswoman Cecille Isidro said workers began their strike across the Bay Area around 2 a.m. Monday after the final trains were put to bed. From a picket line at the Lake Merritt station in Oakland, she said the union expects that a majority of workers will take part in the strike.

Los Angeles County transportation officials have released the final version of their analysis of alternatives for closing the so-called 710 gap between Alhambra and Pasadena, setting the stage for more vigorous environmental review. The analysis by the county Metropolitan Transportation Authority focuses on five options - down from an initial 39 - for reducing traffic and providing better transportation access in the area between the end of the 710 Freeway in Alhambra and the 210 Freeway in Pasadena.

Local transit officials Tuesday outlined plans to permanently repair the flawed intersection of two light-rail lines in downtown Los Angeles that had raised safety and maintenance concerns. The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority asserts that the repair should prevent further problems at Washington Boulevard and Flower Street, the busiest junction in Metro's 87-mile rail network. Officials plan to slightly narrow the width between the rails along 15 feet of track where the popular Blue Line curves to merge into the recently opened Expo Line before the route heads into the Metro Center station.

If you are elderly or disabled and need a ride, a van will pick you up at your door and deliver you anywhere in Orange County--for $1.70. The hugely successful public service, run by the Orange County Transportation Authority, transports an average of 1,050 people a day. Most trips cost an average of $23.91 per passenger. And therein lies the problem, say critics. They say the service, called Access, is way too expensive.

In yet another blow to the county's beleaguered transit agency, a panel of independent experts concluded Monday that the firing of the firm digging the Hollywood subway "makes no sense at all" and will mean "horrendous" costs and delays.

Los Angeles County transit officials Thursday budgeted $6.78 million more for improvements on the Blue Line - one of the busiest light-rail lines in the nation, with 26 million riders annually and a history of accidents and fatalities. There have been eight deaths along the Blue Line so far this year, at least four of which were suicides, according to Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority officials. The most recent fatality occurred Thursday about 12:45 a.m., when officials said a woman apparently tried to swerve her Hyundai around lowered gate arms at a crossing in Compton and was struck by a Blue Line train.

Carmageddon may have been an L.A. moment, as was last month's spin-off Sportsageddon, when the Kings, Lakers, Clippers and Dodgers all played at home the same weekend. But Orange County residents could get a taste of their own traffic nightmare this weekend with the opening of Disneyland's new Cars Land attraction, the Angels playing at home, concerts at the nearby Honda Center and the Grove of Anaheim, and a series of events at the Convention Center - all mashed into the same Anaheim neighborhood.