Subway Problems Prompt Renewed Federal Scrutiny

Less than nine months after briefly cutting off $1.6 billion in subway funds to Los Angeles, federal officials said Monday that they again will step up their oversight because of new problems on one of the nation’s largest public works projects.

“Here is a project we thought we had set right, and something else has gone wrong, and that causes concern,” Federal Transit Administration spokesman Brian Cudahy said in an interview. “At this point, this project is going to have to be reviewed again. This is becoming a very troublesome project again.”

The concerns from Washington followed two dramatic developments along the second segment of the $5.8-billion subway: Records show that some tunnel walls along Vermont Avenue were built thinner than designed, and half a block of Hollywood Boulevard collapsed into a giant sinkhole last week.

Those problems also intensified pressure on the Metropolitan Transportation Authority from state and local elected officials.

Los Angeles City Councilwoman Jackie Goldberg said in an interview Monday that she plans to call for a halt to all subway construction in her area.

“I have no confidence at this point in the MTA or its contractors,” said Goldberg, who represents the Hollywood district--site of last week’s collapse and last year’s sinkage of up to 10 inches in some stretches of ground above the newly built subway tunnel.

An alternate to the MTA board, Goldberg is planning a news conference for today to announce the steps she believes should be taken to right the shaken agency.

But MTA leaders urged patience. “This isn’t the time to do any grandstanding, to bring politics into this,” said MTA Director Larry Zarian, who takes over Saturday as chairman of the board.

“When we’re talking about human safety and the future of MTA, we have to have all our facts before we decide what to do,” Zarian said. “It’s easy to say, let’s stop construction, let’s bring in new leadership, let’s do all these things, but these people who are making outlandish statements . . . need to have all the facts in front of them.”

Frustrations reached a similar pitch last fall before the federal transit agency cut off funding in October in an attempt to restore control over the project. The government had cited a litany of engineering, construction and inspection problems that had plagued the subway’s first two phases through the Downtown and Hollywood districts.

*

Five weeks later, FTA officials restored the money after they said they were satisfied that a series of organizational changes at the MTA would improve construction quality and safety.

But the MTA has not escaped controversy in the interim.

In March, the agency was forced to scrap the awarding of an $80-million contract for a new construction manager on the North Hollywood subway construction job amid allegations of favoritism, leaked data and document-shredding.

In April, workers had to stop new tunneling in North Hollywood for two months after it was discovered that heavily traveled Lankershim Boulevard had sunk up to five inches.

And earlier this month, MTA officials opened an investigation to determine why a contractor on a planned above-ground rail line to Pasadena had been allowed to spend at least several million dollars in unauthorized design funds on a project that is already well over budget. The MTA’s project manager for the Pasadena line was demoted over the incident.

Then came the latest two incidents along the Vermont and Hollywood lines.

Last Thursday, as overnight crews were “remining” a section of tunneling to correct alignment problems, a 70-by-70-foot section of earth opened up on Hollywood Boulevard. MTA officials have suggested that a water line damaged in the Northridge earthquake may have triggered the mishap, but water officials say the tunneling work is more likely to blame. The investigation is continuing, and part of the road is now reopened.

On Sunday, meanwhile, The Times reported that a section of tunnel wall just south of the sinkhole along Vermont Avenue was built up to 29% below specifications for concrete thickness. An inspector said in a memo earlier this month that the problem had gone undiagnosed for five months, and he questioned whether project officials were repeating the same mistakes that had plagued the subway’s Downtown leg.

MTA executives say that the contractor has repaired a 5-by-5-foot void or air pocket in the concrete tunnel arch, but the agency plans more testing next month to determine whether that is the extent of the problem. The contractor, Shea-Kiewit-Kenny, has declined to comment.

MTA Board Chairman Michael Antonovich, a longtime critic of subway construction who believes the money should be spent on above-ground rail lines, said Monday that the agency’s new problems reinforce the fallacy of the subway approach.

*

MTA should now stand for “money thrown away,” he said. “The taxpayers are subsidizing their own suicide.”

Raul Perez, chairman of the MTA board’s construction committee, said Monday that he was never told of any problems with thin walls along Vermont Avenue.

“We should have been notified . . . ,” he said. “I really don’t know why [we weren’t] . . . but before I make any hard comments, I’d like to see all the information.”

As the council representative from Hollywood, Goldberg said she is bothered that she was never notified about the discovery of thin concrete.

“I’m astonished that there was a report that’s 5 months old affecting my area and that I’ve never seen it,” she said. “. . . It raises serious doubts about whether [the MTA and contractors are] doing due diligence to make this a safe program. I no longer have any faith that we can trust them.”

Federal officials want more answers too.

“All of this will have to be looked at. . . . The matter will be reviewed at the highest levels [of the FTA],” said Cudahy, the federal transit official. “We don’t want Hollywood Boulevard collapsing on a regular basis, or [the discovery] of thin walls.”

The Los Angeles subway project is already the most closely watched FTA program in the country, with a consultant monitoring the work and reporting back regularly to federal officials, Cudahy said.

He said the most recent spate of problems will mean a “stepped-up” although still-undetermined approach to ensure an effective return on the federal investment, which represents nearly half of all funding for the project.

Answers could range from tighter oversight controls to another cutoff in federal funds, Cudahy said. “That obviously remains an option,” he said.

MTA spokesman Steve Chesser said, “We’ve heard nothing from the FTA, so we have no comment at this time.”

State Sen. Tom Hayden (D-Santa Monica) questioned in an interview whether the FTA can ably oversee the project, saying the federal government has become more of a “promoter” than a watchdog.

He said he has urged federal officials in recent months to intervene in the project, but added: “The federal government seems bent on making a success of their having spent more on this than any other public works project in the United States. . . . This is getting to be one of the greatest embarrassments in the history of public works projects.”