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Post by James Fujita on Mar 30, 2009 12:11:09 GMT -8
it's funny what the mind gets used to. I remember I didn't like the name "Metro Center" very much when it first was announced - I thought "7th and Flower" would be more useful and more accurate. "7th Street/Metro Center" doesn't exactly roll off the tongue, either. and it got even worse when they added Julian Dixon's name to the mixture.
for what it's worth, "7th and Metro" doesn't make a whole lot of sense... it implies that there's a Metro Street ;D
still, you get used to it. like when my relatives from Japan came for a visit, I took them to Universal Studios on the train, and I was explaining to them that "you change trains at Seventh and Metro"
nicknames sorta happen without you wanting or needing it. and for better or worse, "7th and Metro" has become part of the local transit culture.
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Post by spokker on Mar 30, 2009 15:58:05 GMT -8
Naming stations after streets can backfire too, as the numerous anecdotes about people getting off at Anaheim in Long Beach and trying to find Disneyland show us.
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Post by masonite on Mar 30, 2009 16:03:10 GMT -8
Naming stations after streets can backfire too, as the numerous anecdotes about people getting off at Anaheim in Long Beach and trying to find Disneyland show us. I have always been a big believer in naming stations after landmarks and the actual neighborhoods they are in rather than just street names. I think it works better for all sorts of reasons including some that you outlaid above. Also, provides a better sense of place and community and neighborhood. |
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Post by ieko on Mar 30, 2009 16:17:46 GMT -8
But what if stations are within the same neighborhood? Would you just give it the intersection name?
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Post by metrocenter on Mar 30, 2009 17:50:47 GMT -8
The naming of stations has a long history: best practices can be found in the most widely used metro systems. Metros all over the world have stations named for neighborhoods and local landmarks. For example: "Waterloo", "World Trade Center", "Montparnasse", "Shinjuku".
Keep in mind, when the Downtown Connector opens, "Metro Center" will be the one universal transfer point in Downtown L.A., with trains serving:
Mid-Wilshire (Purple)
North Hollywood (Red)
Long Beach (Blue)
Santa Monica (Expo)
Pasadena (Gold)
East L.A. (Gold II).
So the name may one day be appropriate.
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Post by James Fujita on Mar 31, 2009 14:13:28 GMT -8
Naming stations after streets can backfire too, as the numerous anecdotes about people getting off at Anaheim in Long Beach and trying to find Disneyland show us. I've often thought that the Blue Line station names were too vague, as the Anaheim case clearly points out. If that area has an official neighborhood nickname, I'm not familiar with it. the best case scenario would be to name a station after the neighborhood, or after a local landmark. I definately prefer "Little Tokyo" over 1st/ Alameda, for example. Metrocenter mentioned "Shinjuku" as an example of a neighborhood being used for a station name. However, it should be pointed out that there is in fact more than one train station within the Shinjuku neighborhood, and Shinjuku is used to refer to the big Shinjuku train station (more like a Metrolink/Amtrak station than just a subway stop), while there is a nearby station called "Shinjuku Sanchome." Sanchome (3-chome) essentially means "third district." There are many "chome" stations in the Tokyo subway system, often used to distinguish a "main" station from a "secondary" one. Los Angeles doesn't divide up its neighborhoods into "chome" designations, so that won't work here. In cases where you might have more than one station in a given area, using intersections might be necessary. There's also compass point designations.... "Little Tokyo North" or "Little Tokyo West" in the event Little Tokyo ended up with two stations. You really have to be flexible about these things. There may be intersections without a defining neighborhood nickname or without a specific landmark. There may be parts of the city where an east-west line has one station and a north-south line had another one. |
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Post by bluelineshawn on Mar 31, 2009 17:45:09 GMT -8
The most confusing name on the Blue Line is probably Washington. That confuses local people that don't normally ride the train. I've seen a few people that are looking to get to LA Trade Tech that think that's where they should get off.
The next most confusing is the transfer with the green line. The green line trains call the station "Imperial/Wilmington" but before the automated announcements most of the blue line T/O's called it "Rosa Parks". Even when they announced that it was a "transfer to the green line" riders that remembered getting off at Imperial/Wilmington when they left were confused. It's better now because the automated announcement gives both names on the blue line although the green line still only uses one.
Overall the most confusing things in the system seem to be:
red/purple
metro/metrolink
gold/orange (people can't tell which is which on the map)
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Post by metrocenter on Apr 1, 2009 13:32:04 GMT -8
I agree, "Washington Station" is a horrible name. The two stations on Washington should be named:
Washington / San Pedro Street
Washington / Long Beach Avenue
Similarly, Metro should also consider
Trade Tech - 23rd Street
Trade Tech - Grand Avenue
and
USC - Jefferson Boulevard
USC - Exposition Park
and
Long Beach - Anaheim Street
Long Beach - 5th Street
Long Beach - 1st Street
Long Beach - Transit Mall
Long Beach - Pacific
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Post by antonio on Apr 1, 2009 22:08:29 GMT -8
I agree with metrocenter except you could keep the station as 23rd St without it being confusing. I'm not for making longer station names but with the massive grid that exists in LA its totally necessary to have the slashes in the station names especially on the Red/Purple lines. Ideally they should be neighborhood based wherever possible (love that idea and Foothill will be all independent city names) but realistically you can't have three stations called East Hollywood or 4 named Koreatown and in the future it will stay that way. Wilshire/Crenshaw sits at the confluence of four neighborhood borders (Windsor Square, Wilshire Park, Windsor Park, and that stretch of wilshire is called Park Mile), Wilshire/La Brea and Wilshire/Fairfax sit at opposite ends of the Miracle Mile (so I guess East and West Miracle Mile would work here), and Wilshire/La Cienega is needed because you wouldn't say East Beverly Hills. After that though the station naming is easier until you cross the 405 (Beverly Hills, Century City, and Westwood Village are all self-explanatory station names).
I have outlined earlier in this thread which Pasadena Gold Line names need to be changed though I commend Metro for choosing good station names for the Eastside Gold Line (with the exception of Pico-Aliso since those projects don't exist anymore). As for Expo, I propose the following station names:
23rd St
Jefferson
USC/Exposition Park
Expo/Vermont
King Estates (Expo/Western)
Expo/Crenshaw
Expo/LaBrea
Expo/LaCienega
Culver Junction
Palms
Rancho Park
Expo/Sepulveda
South Bundy (to differentiate from a future Wilshire/Bundy station) or Olympic/Bundy
Bergamot
Santa Monica 17th Street
Santa Monica Transit Center
For Crenshaw:
Wilshire/La Brea
Midtown Transit Center (Pico/San Vicente/Rimpau)
West Adams Terrace (Crenshaw/Adams)
Expo/Crenshaw
Crenshaw/MLK
Leimert Park (Crenshaw/Vernon)
Crenshaw/Slauson
Hyde Park
Downtown Inglewood (LaBrea)
Manchester
LAX Transit Center (Century/Aviation)
For Westside Extension
Wilshire/Crenshaw
Wilshire/La Brea
Wilshire/Fairfax
Wilshire/La Cienega
Beverly Hills
Century City
Westwood Village
Federal (I'm praying they include a station there)
North Bundy
Santa Monica 26th St.
Santa Monica 16th St.
Santa Monica 4th St.
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Post by bluelineshawn on Apr 5, 2009 7:30:38 GMT -8
I don't like the idea of using local landmark or neighborhood names exclusively as the station names as was mentioned earlier. Having the name of the street listed is often useful for people continuing their journey by walking or bus. Having landmarks or neighborhoods provides little benefit unless that's where you're headed. I guess in the long run it won't make much difference to regular riders, but listing major streets would make it easier for others, unless they are headed to the specific place listed (like a Staples Center station).
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Post by masonite on Apr 5, 2009 18:01:14 GMT -8
I don't like the idea of using local landmark or neighborhood names exclusively as the station names as was mentioned earlier. Having the name of the street listed is often useful for people continuing their journey by walking or bus. Having landmarks or neighborhoods provides little benefit unless that's where you're headed. I guess in the long run it won't make much difference to regular riders, but listing major streets would make it easier for others, unless they are headed to the specific place listed (like a Staples Center station). On some maps you could show the street in parantheses below the station name. Personally, I see more of a problem of people not knowing that there is a station near a certain neighborhood or landmark than not knowing if a certain street is nearby. For example, has anyone ever had someone ask where Alvarado is when they were near the MacArthur Park station or anything similar. The neighborhood/landmark names attract more casual riders or visitors who are not as familiar with the system vs. bus riders who are more frequent users of the system and already know the station locations and bus connections. |
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Post by thanks4goingmetro on Jun 5, 2012 15:57:19 GMT -8
Hey guys, not sure when this happened, but on the Metro Gold Line to Pasadena the Mission station and all documentation on maps has been changed to South Pasadena. I took some photos which I can share later. It appears that Metro simply covered the Mission signs with giant stickers that say South Pasadena. Good move! Way logical. The train announcements still, however, call it by Mission.
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Post by bobdavis on Jun 5, 2012 21:06:23 GMT -8
It's about time--we have many streets with "Mission" in the name, but there's only one Gold Line station in South Pasadena (a city with no actual mission building). While the folks at Metro in charge of such things are at it, lets change "Sierra Madre Villa" to "East Pasadena", which is what we called the area in the days of yore. ( I thought of Lamanda Park, but the station is too far east for that.) But at least we wouldn't have people thinking they would be in the city that's a long uphill hike away from the station. ("If this is Sierra Madre, where's the Buccaneer Lounge?")
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Post by bzcat on Jun 6, 2012 9:40:28 GMT -8
It was part of the name change proposal from a few months ago.
I believe the 103rd st station on the Blue Line was also renamed Watts Tower.
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Post by bhowald on Jun 6, 2012 10:34:49 GMT -8
Station renaming seems to me a bit of a false choice. Is it not possible to name the station something symbolic or less granular, like South Pasadena, but leave a secondary name of the intersection on the signage in smaller and less highlighted font?
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Post by bobdavis on Dec 26, 2012 19:11:18 GMT -8
I rode the Gold Line to Union Station and back today; the operator on the inbound train spoke on the PA system and "corrected" the recorded message when we got to South Pasadena, but the outbound operator didn't say anything.
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Post by bobdavis on Jan 7, 2014 22:41:59 GMT -8
Well, here we are a little over a year later, and the announcements on the trains I rode into LA (jury duty) have announcements for "South Pasadena at Mission and Meridian". Not only that, but the train I rode to the current eastern terminal said "Pasadena" on the headsign, not "Sierra Madre Villa", although the station and the announcements are still for "SMV".
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