Merits of Subway and Light Rail Transit

I am always somewhat amazed by the argument posited by the anti-subway, pro-more-buses camp in Los Angeles (Sept. 27). To compare the speed, efficiency and comfort of a subway to a bus has about as much relevance as comparing a transcontinental jet to a wagon train for continental travel. To compare the merit of subway versus bus travel as relates to time of travel, I recently took the Red Line in Los Angeles from the Western/Wilshire station to City Hall. The ride, including waiting for the train, took 10 minutes, 23 seconds. The same trip on a bus traveling down Wilshire Boulevard, including a bus transfer, took 39 minutes, 44 seconds. The bus took 3.83 times as long.

I expanded my experiment to include the Blue Line from downtown L.A. to Long Beach. The Blue Line took 52 minutes, 56 seconds. The same trip on the bus, including transfers, took two hours, four minutes and 11 seconds. Here, the bus took 2.35 times as long.

These trips were not done at peak traffic times. The quantity of time for the bus trip (and certainly the car as well) would have only increased.

CARTER C. BRAVMANN

West Hollywood

In response to the reduction in federal funds for the MTA, the resulting letters and now the proposed settlement for bus riders, it is time for a reassessment of L.A.’s rail transit plans.

What have we learned? The politically expedient decisions to build rail in subways--to placate neighbors--have been a disaster. The construction impacts are well-known. Less noted are the exorbitant costs of subway construction--some $300 million per mile--that have crowded out not only the bus system but also other more cost-effective light rail lines.

Light rail has been a successful and expanding alternative to subways in other cities including San Diego, Sacramento, Portland and Denver.

The issue should not be rail vs. bus; it should be to choose both buses and the right, cost-effective rail that will serve both current transit riders and the much larger group of automobile drivers. In particular:

Build the Pasadena line, ASAP. This entire 13-mile line will cost less than three miles of subway because it’s ground-level light rail.

* Finish the tunnel from Hollywood to Universal City, but stop there. Not to finish the Hollywood Hills tunnel would be like BART not crossing San Francisco Bay. The proposed subway extension across the Valley is breathtaking in its economic absurdity.

Defer the Red Line extension west of Western Avenue until politics permits it to be built under Wilshire Boulevard. Not only does the route to Pico-San Vicente miss the population and destination of the Wilshire corridor, it raises the cost by a half-billion dollars.

DARRELL R. CLARKE

Santa Monica