Express Service What If

[K 22]

I was thinking about this the other day.

What if the Purple Line had an express track? On a few lines here in New York, the express track is on the lower level and the local is on the upper level. I was thinking what you could do with the Purple Line with a set up like this.

Let say the Purple Line was completed all the way to Santa Monica - you could possibly have express stops at Union Station, 7th/Metro, Vermont, La Cienega, Century City, Westwood and 4th Street. 25 minutes to Westwood would get knocked down to maybe... 15-18 minutes?


Here's another - and this one is way way WAY out there.

Let's say the Red Line actually was constructed as planned to go to the Warner Center and the Orange Line was constructed as an LRT headed to Chatsworth (I know this doesn't make sense but just bear with me. . The Orange Line would be your local service and the Red Line would be your underground Valley Express Line: stopping only at North Hollywood, Van Nuys, Reseda, Canoga and Warner Center.

I know this is impossible and this most likely wouldn't work in LA - but this is the "dreamland" forum after all.

[James Fujita]

Express service on the subway is always going to be trickier because you need to dig out the additional tunnels.

Theoretically speaking, it would be much easier to express track the Blue Line, which already has a pretty wide ROW, if you count the freight tracks.


Even better than express Purple Line tracks, separate out the Purple Line from the Red Line. Even if the Purple was directly below the Red Line. Or side-by-side.

That way, people wouldn't have to wait for the Red Line train or the Purple Line train at 7th/ Metro and it would still be faster that way. Less wait time at the station.

[Philip]

In my fantasy map for Philadelphia, I included a few lines that were intended to be four tracks (with multiple lines filtering through different trunks, a la New York). I think it would be fantastic if this could be done for L.A., but the realist in me does know deep down that the era for four-track and three-track lines may be long gone.

The biggest hurdle, as always, even moreso than engineering and design, would be the money. The Purple Line extension is already costing somewhere in the billions. To dig express tunnels could potentially double the cost, and there's no government agency or group of people who would be willing to pay that much for such a project. It's also, unfortunately, the time we're living in of reduced budgets and public transit subsidization. Very sad, indeed.

James makes a great point though about the Blue Line; this, in contrast, could be very doable, assuming Metro can come to some kind of agreement with the freight services.

[transitfan]

Dec 6, 2011 19:48:45 GMT -8 Philip said:

In my fantasy map for Philadelphia, I included a few lines that were intended to be four tracks (with multiple lines filtering through different trunks, a la New York). I think it would be fantastic if this could be done for L.A., but the realist in me does know deep down that the era for four-track and three-track lines may be long gone.

Afraid so. Even in NYC, the-under construction Second Ave line will only have 2 tracks. Not such a big deal for the initial segment to 96th St, but express service could've been useful when it extends to 125th St (or further into the Bronx?), also when they built the segment below 63rd St (the future "T" line).

Dec 6, 2011 19:48:45 GMT -8 Philip said:

James makes a great point though about the Blue Line; this, in contrast, could be very doable, assuming Metro can come to some kind of agreement with the freight services.

This is a hope of mine also. I would think since the Alameda Corridor opened, there wouldn't be that many Union Pacific freights running in the Blue Line corridor, probably just infrequent local deliveries along the line, no more of the long container trains headed to the harbor.