LA "Circle" Line

[bzcat]

Just thinking out loud here... assuming the following:

1. Vermont subway extension gets going, AND Wilshire/Vermont station is rebuild to handle north-south through routing
2. Pink line gets build as HRT, AND we rebuild the Hollywood/Highland station to handle east-west through routing
3. 405 line gets build as HRT from SFV to LAX
4. Harbor subdivision preserves HRT ROW from Vernon to LAX

The idea is to stitch together all of our HRT lines to offer a contiguous loop in the most heavily populated area in the LA basin. It will be similar in concept to London's Circle line or Tokyo's Yamanote line, which use tracks of other subway or train lines to offer through service. People traveling in the individual corridors (e.g. District or Hammersmith in London; Red, Purple, 405 in LA) can also take the Circle line as it effectively increases the frequency on those corridors. Existing lines on each corridor will operate as they exist now or as planned (except maybe Pink will disappear as a stand alone line and just become part of circle line).

Here is what my proposed LA Cirlce Line would look like using these existing track:

Red line track:
- Vermont/Wilshire
- Vermont/Beverly
- Vermont/Santa Monica
- Vermont/Sunset
- Hollywood/Western
- Hollywood/Vine
- Hollywood/Highland

Pink line track:
- Santa Monica/La Brea
- Santa Monica/Fairfax
- Santa Monica/San Vicente
- La Cienega/Beverly
- Wilshire/La Cienega

Purple line track:
- Wilshire/Rodeo
- Constellation/Ave of The Stars
- Wilshire/Westwood

405 line track:
- Sepulveda/Santa Monica
- Sepulveda/Pico
- Sepulveda/Palms
- Sepulveda/Venice
- Sepulveda/Jefferson
- Sepulveda/Howard Hughes
- Sepulveda/Manchester
- Century/Aviation

Harbor Subdivision track:
- Florence/La Cienega
- Florence/La Brea
- Florence/Crenshaw
- Slauson/Vermont

Vermont corridor track:
- Vermont/Vernon
- Vermont/MLK
- Vermont/Expo USC
- Vermont/Wasington
- Vermont/Olympic
- Vermont/Wilshire (back to Red line track)

maps.google.com/maps/ms?oe=utf-8&client=firefox-a&ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&ll=34.025348,-118.303185&spn=0.183245,0.363579&z=12&msid=109982261189696647553.000491e7f4ea4bf7b66f4

[jeisenbe]

Existing circular rail lines in London and Moscow are much smaller than what you proposed, only a couple miles in diameter. Tokyo's circular rail line is wider, but nowhere near as big as what you posted.

Since people generally don't want to travel in circles, but rather to and from a destination, from home, there is not reason to run trains in complete circles.

In particular, few people will want to travel between the Harbor Subdivision and the Sepulveda sections of track; you could have each line end or continue at LAX rather than turning. I also doubt there is enough demand from service between the Sepulveda and Wilshire sections.

Passengers would be better served by higher frequencies on straight, linear routes, and easy transfers at connecting stations. Running a second, circular line limits max frequency from the main lines, while making the system more confusing and less legible.

[bzcat]

What you say is true if we had a fare system that allows transfers. No one is going to pay 3 fares to go from North Hollywood to LAX, stopping each time at a station to buy ticket for the next segment. And Metro is not going to change this stupid fare policy. That's why we'll need a contiguous line that offer continuing service.

But anyways, I'm more in favor of fare restructuring to distance based fare than the circle line. The justification for circle line is entire based on the fact that we can't transfer now.

[metrocenter]

Hey hey, ho ho. The "single fare no transfer" policy has got to go.

[James Fujita]

Oct 5, 2010 22:52:04 GMT -8 jeisenbe said:

Existing circular rail lines in London and Moscow are much smaller than what you proposed, only a couple miles in diameter. Tokyo's circular rail line is wider, but nowhere near as big as what you posted.

This is sort of a moot point. Of course it's wider than the Yamanote Line, but Metropolitan Los Angeles is also more widespread.

This is not the first "circle line" proposal that I've seen for Los Angeles; in fact some have been much, much bigger than this one. Following the "satellite downtown" logic of the Yamanote Line, it would be better to have a circle which roughly followed the 405 from Sherman Oaks down to Century City and from there to LAX and Long Beach, closing the loop by heading north from Long Beach-downtown-Burbank-back to start. Now THERE'S a circle!

We have to be careful not to be building circles just for the sake of building circles. However, there would be no harm in connecting together two or three already established transit routes or commuting patterns.
(In my above example, plenty of people commute from the San Fernando Valley to the Westside, or from the South Bay north, or from the Valley to downtown). We're just not quite there yet, is all.

=

Oh, and our current fare system is ridiculous. Distance-based (with a time element to prevent looping the loop) would be a lot better.

[jeisenbe]

Oct 6, 2010 12:31:38 GMT -8 James Fujita said:

Oh, and our current fare system is ridiculous. Distance-based would be a lot better.

Agreed. With the tech already built into TAP it would even be possible to charge bus fares based on distance, which would be much more fair. Short, 1 mile trips could be half the current cost, while 25 mile trips (like my trip from Long Beach to Century City tomorrow!) might cost $8 or more, while still being much cheaper than driving.

The freeways should also be tolled based on distance, to be fair...

[jdrcrasher]

Oct 6, 2010 12:31:38 GMT -8 James Fujita said:

, it would be better to have a circle which roughly followed the 405 from Sherman Oaks down to Century City and from there to LAX and Long Beach,

Like you said, this could be one half of the circle. The other half could be created by extending it along Willow (or PCH) to Lakewood/Rosemead Blvd, then going ALL THE WAY UP to East Pasadena.

That would give us 3/4's of a circle... ;D