Council Adopts Panel’s Metro Rail ‘Feasibility’

The proposed Los Angeles Metro Rail subway, buffeted by a growing controversy over safety, won an important vote of confidence Friday when the City Council overwhelmingly approved a report in which a panel of technical experts concluded that the project is “feasible” to construct.

In a surprise related development, John Dyer, general manager of the Southern California Rapid Transit District, told the council during a lengthy debate that the agency has found a sophisticated electronic probe system that may be able to detect hazardous abandoned oil wells along the tunnel construction route.

Dyer, whose announcement caught even some of his own staff off-guard, said the system is still being evaluated. If effective, it would address one of the top concerns of the technical experts, who have warned that during construction the huge subway boring machine could unexpectedly rupture an old, uncharted well and spew explosive methane gas into the tunnel.

Though not unexpected--a lopsided majority of the 15-member council supports the $3.3-billion downtown-to-North Hollywood commuter line--the council vote was seen as a test of political strength for Metro Rail supporters in the face of claims by Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Los Angeles) that the subway project should be abandoned because tunneling is too dangerous.

Council members ordered continuing reports from RTD on safety issues and approved a motion that would cut off the city’s share of funding unless about a dozen additional precautions recommended by the technical experts are implemented.

But after a debate laden with references to the technical failure that caused the explosion this week of the space shuttle Challenger, Metro Rail proponents prevailed 11 to 3, without losing any past supporters.

Westside Councilman Zev Yaroslavsky, a political ally of Waxman and a supporter of the subway, said: “Notwithstanding the events of earlier this week, I still have strong belief in American technology.

‘Ability to Move Forward’

“So many things can go wrong in this world. . . . In a sense, it is not Metro Rail on trial here, but our ability to move forward.”

Harbor area Councilwoman Joan Milke Flores voted to approve the report but said she was troubled that it took people outside RTD to alert council members to important safety issues. “We are the elected officials that have to take the accountability and responsibility if something goes wrong,” she said, adding she reserves the option to seek withdrawal of city financial support of the project in the future.

San Fernando Valley Councilman Ernani Bernardi, a longtime critic of the project, said by supporting the start of construction the city may be pouring tax dollars “down a rat hole” because the project might never be completed if the influential Waxman, whose district would include much of the subway, fights to stop federal funding.

In Washington, a Waxman aide said neither the council action nor Dyer’s revelation about the possibility of detecting abandoned oil wells is likely to change Waxman’s stand. “The congressman’s concern relates to the combined risks” identified by the 10-member technical safety panel, the aide said.

Waxman has declined to say how he will press his opposition. “I’ll take it one step at a time,” he told The Times this week. But his options include authoring legislation to cut off funds for the project before construction begins.

After an explosion last year of seeping gas in a Fairfax clothing store, it was Waxman who forced supporters of the subway to create the technical panel to review tunneling safety and present a report to the council.