MetroRiderLA

Metro is holding its monthly “live” internet “chat” today at noon. Metro Board Chair Pam O’Connor will be hosting the chat as usual, answering “your” questions about Metro. This month’s topic is: FUNDING.

• Can we afford traffic relief?
• Paying the bill for transit.
• Do we prefer a half sales tax hike?
• Toll roads?
• Public/private partnerships?
• Parking fees?

Although the chat is “live” your questions should be submitted in advanced before the discussion if you want them answered. That means you have a few more minutes to throw Pam a hard-hitting question. Then head over the Metro Interactive at noon to join the “chat”.

Update 12:01pm: Ummm here’s the direct link to the live chat.

Update 12:13pm:  Join the chat about the chat, here in the MetroRiderLA forum.  Trust me, it’s a lot more interesting (and interactive) than the official chat.

• The Governator doesn’t like trains and one man doesn’t think he plays fair.
• Marina Del Ray bus line on Metro’s chopping block, much to the chagrin of area residents.
• Arrival information coming to the shiny LCD screens in Red Line stations  “by the end of June at the latest”.

Rush hour commuters enjoy their subsidized ride.

Let’s talk subsidy. The American Automobile Association just released the results of a study called Crash vs. Congestion: What’s The Cost to Society [PDF]. Yes, the American Automobile Association, the group that lobbies for automobiles and was formed in order to get more auto roads built. The study reveals that in most metropolitan areas, the cost of traffic accidents far outweighs the already high costs of congestion. In the Los Angeles metropolitan statistical area (which includes almost 13 million people in Los Angeles, Long Beach, and Santa Ana) the report concludes that the yearly cost of crashes amounts to $10.5 billion. Traffic congestion in the metropolitan area costs $9.3 billion annually. Together, crashes and congestion cost Los Angeles and Orange County $19.8 billion a year. That comes out to $1,561 per person per year ($817 per person for crashes, $744 for congestion).

Yikes.

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Pedestrains cross Broadway in Downtown Los Angeles.

• The LA Straphanger provides a great video review that critiques the pedestrian friendliness of a block of Sixth Street in Downtown
• Women-only buses a hit in Mexico City - could a similar idea work to get more women Metro Riders in Los Angeles? Are pervs are problem on Metro?
• Gordon Price talks about Los Angeles’s transit failings compared to Vancouver’s successes
• RT Rider dreams of a multi-modal alliance of transit, bike, and pedestrian advocates to lobby for car-free funding