Is Light Rail the Road to Better Transit?

Once again, public officials are debating the merits of a rail system along the Ventura Freeway against a subway along Burbank and Chandler boulevards.

Although the Metropolitan Transportation Authority is already pursuing a $3.5-billion extension of the Metro Red Line along Burbank and Chandler boulevards, a company proposes building a trolley line along the freeway from Burbank’s Media District to Woodland Hills.

The company, Fredric R. Harris Inc., a New York-based engineering firm, suggests that a freeway line could be built for $2 billion less and tentatively be completed by 2003, 20 years sooner than current MTA plans. But critics maintain that the offer will only derail the most practical and needed route for the Valley.

Should a new light-rail system along the Ventura Freeway be pursued?

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County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky:

“This is a scheme that is being proposed by people outside of the San Fernando Valley. . . . If someone wants to build a privately financed railroad . . . why not the Burbank-Chandler route, as it has already been approved? . . . The danger is that people in a policy-making position . . . will say that as long as there is a private company studying this proposal, maybe we should hold off on spending money on the Burbank Chandler route. . . . It is not a serious proposal on financial grounds or otherwise. Secondly, there is the issue of the route itself. . . . On either side of the freeway, it’s residential. To build a rail line you’d have to build park-and-ride lots, and that would be extremely disruptive. It would require widening the freeway 15 feet on each side . . . The end result of this insane debate is that the San Fernando Valley . . . will be the one area of Los Angeles County not connected to the rail grid.”

Don Schultz, president of Van Nuys Homeowners Assn.:

“On this issue, I think it’s shortsighted on the part of our elected officials to keep their heads in the sand and not allow private industry just to study a proposal. . . . It’s just another proposal on the table that’s not going to cost us anything. I’ve always felt the freeway is a better route, primarily because it can connect to other counties . . . [and] open up other sources of funding so that we are not the only ones paying for it.”

Nate Brogin, transportation chairman for the Valley Industry and Commerce Assn.:

“It doesn’t meet the destinational requirements for the Valley: the two colleges, the Van Nuys Civic Center and Warner Center. And it’s not central enough to work as a collector location for buses and automobiles feeding it.”

Richard Close, president of the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Assn.:

“If it sounds too good be true, it probably is. . . . The MTA and its predecessor has been studying routes and different types of systems for over 20 years. Instead of more studies--which is being proposed--we need a rapid-transit system. Other areas of the county get transit. We get studies. . . . We see [the freeway route] as a detriment, increasing traffic, increasing parking problems, increasing development. It would seriously impact all south Valley communities.”