MTA Says Digging Completed for 2 Miles of Valley Tunnels

Delighted to have a distraction from mining mishaps in the Santa Monica Mountains, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority announced on Wednesday that it had completed digging twin tunnels that will one day connect subway stations in North Hollywood and Universal City.

The transit agency expressed pride that its contractor’s employees lost no work days to accidents as they excavated the two-mile-long tunnels over the past two years, and that the tunnels had passed beneath the concrete bed of the Los Angeles River without displacing a drop of water.

But the project is at least $20 million over its $64-million budget and 367 days late, according to records kept by the federal government, which is paying for half the project.

Another construction firm is building a separate subway tunnel under the Santa Monica Mountains, where work has come to a halt because ground pushing in on the tunnel has trapped a 300-foot-long digging machine.