LACMTA Red Line

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The Metro Red Line of the Los Angeles County Metro Rail is a heavy rail metro line in Los Angeles.

It is Los Angeles' only all underground subway line, and also the busiest of the four Metro Rail lines (the other three are light rail, largely surface lines). As of March 2006, the Red line currently averages over 138,000 daily weekday boardings.

Trains run along two branches; both lines begin at Union Station in Downtown Los Angeles. At Wilshire/Vermont, it splits. One line runs to Koreatown/Wilshire Center, the other terminating at North Hollywood in the San Fernando Valley.

In late October 2005, the new Orange Line busway with train-like two-cabin articulated bus bodies went into service. It links up with the Red line at the North Hollywood station in 13 stops over a 14-mile (23 km) exclusive use corridor to Warner Center in the far west San Fernando Valley. The busway had been constructed instead of a further Red Line rail extension in the Valley at a relatively low cost. Within days, the traffic was doubling predicted levels and most "bus-trains" were running full.

Contents 1 History 2 Possible Red Line extensions 2.1 Westward expansion stopped 2.2 Westward expansion resurrected 2.3 West Valley service 2.4 Eastward plans 3 Hours of operation 4 Rolling stock and depots 5 List of stations, from East to West 6 In fiction 7 External links

[edit] History

The Red Line opened in several segments. The first segment, from Union Station to MacArthur Park, opened in 1993. A western extension into Koreatown at Wilshire/Western opened in 1996. In 1999, the second branch was extended from Wilshire/Vermont to Hollywood/Vine station, and in 2000, to North Hollywood.

The line was originally intended to run along the Wilshire Corridor to Santa Monica, but a 1985 methane gas explosion at a Ross Dress For Less in the Fairfax area incited Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) in 1986 to legislate a ban on Federal money used for tunneling under certain portions of Wilshire Blvd ostensibly due to methane gas safety concerns. The MTA has maintained that technological advances will allow it to tunnel safely.

In 1995, during construction of the subway, a sinkhole appeared on Hollywood Boulevard, barely missing several workers and causing damage to buildings on the street. Subway construction was halted until the situation was resolved.

A 1998, Los Angeles County initiative introduced by Los Angeles County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky was passed by the voters, which banned the use of existing sales tax revenues for subway construction (which has been linked to voters perceptions of problems with Red Line construction and costs).

In 2000, an urban art group known as Heavy Trash placed "Coming soon" signs advertising the "Aqua Line," extending the Red Line to the ocean, with ten prospective station stops. It was a hoax, but showed the frustrations surrounding the lack of a subway connecting Santa Monica and the Westside with Downtown Los Angeles. The Aqua Line name was repurposed as the proposed name for the Expo Line.

[edit] Possible Red Line extensions

Due to the 1986 ban on construction in the "methane zone," the Red Line heading west was rerouted in a southerly direction to the Santa Monica Big Blue Bus depot near Pico and San Vicente Boulevards in Mid-City. On the other end of the line, the Red Line was originally intended to continue east beyond Union Station to East Los Angeles. At the north end of the route, the Red Line was to turn westward to Warner Center. All of these extensions were scrapped following the passage of the 1998 proposition which banned using county sales tax revenue for subway construction. In 2005, plans were once again publicized in favor of continuing along the Wilshire Corridor beyond the current terminus at Wilshire/Western, and the route to Warner Center was turned into the Metro Orange Line.

[edit] Westward expansion stopped

The westward extension has been for decades mired in political and socioeconomic debate with politicians giving vent to anti-subway sentiments and NIMBY isolationism. Los Angeles mayor and MTA head Antonio Villaraigosa has declared an extension of the Red Line to downtown Santa Monica a major priority and is offering visionary slogans such as "subway to the sea" and "..the most utilized subway in the nation, maybe the world," and "..the most cost-effective public-transportation project in America."

Despite the lack of sales tax revenue and the two-decade old federal ban, the MTA is currently studying how to circumvent the constraints and the Wilshire extension of the Red line is included in the MTA's current 10-Year Plan. Transit advocates and some elected officials have proposed elevating the Red Line in the portions currently affected by the ban on tunneling in the Miracle Mile, but property owners and community groups have resisted such proposals.

In the past, Westside residents, specifically affluent Hancock Park denizens, reportedly balked at a subway that would make their community more accessible from the "economically disadvantaged" Eastside and South Los Angeles.[1] An initiative in 1968 that would have built a subway to West Los Angeles was rejected by voters.

[edit] Westward expansion resurrected

With present density and traffic gridlock, many people (the residents and government of the city of Beverly Hills included) have done a complete turnaround on the idea of a Wilshire Boulevard subway. Congressman Henry Waxman, who sponsored the tunneling ban in 1985, and whose Westside district the extension would pass through had previously indicated that he would be willing to sponsor a repeal of that law if engineering studies declared subway construction in the area to be feasible. In October 2005, a group of experts examined the feasibility of tunneling safely under Wilshire Boulevard and declared that tunneling along Wilshire was safe. In August of 2006, the LACTMTA voted to designate the Wilshire/Western branch of the Red Line as the Purple Line.[2] Subsequently, Waxman introduced legislation to lift the tunneling ban and there has been an upswelling of political support for the extension of the newly designated Purple Line towards Santa Monica.

[edit] West Valley service

The new Orange Line busway service is feeding about 15,000 new boardings into the Red Line at the North Hollywood terminus. Currently, little chance exists for further underground Red line extension at its northern terminus, though Mayor Villaraigosa has mentioned extending the Red Line along Lankershim Boulevard to the northeastern San Fernando Valley, with a terminus in Sylmar.

One long term possibility might be an underground extension of another mile or two to a future high-rise housing district, or to a multi-modal transportation hub at Bob Hope Airport in Burbank, a distance of approximately four miles. It would possibly go under Vineland Avenue and Vanowen Street. In 2006 a large number of housing units, including a high-rise tower will be completed very near the North Hollywood (NoHo Arts District) station. A master planned multi high-rise complex further to the north could justify a future short extension, and also allow more commuter parking to be developed. No plan of this sort has been formally proposed, though some transit advocates have suggested that the Orange Line may be extended along the same route as mentioned above.

[edit] Eastward plans

Although plans of extending the Red Line to the Eastside have been cast aside, construction of the Gold Line extension to that region is now underway. Ironically, 1.8 miles of the Gold Line Eastside Extension is being built as a subway underneath the low-income minority neighborhood of Boyle Heights. Although there are no plans to do such, it is conceivable that plans for a future eastward extension could involve the San Gabriel Valley rather than the Eastside. Some citizen proposals have included the conversion of the El Monte Busway to heavy rail, although this would disrupt the existing bus and Metrolink service along that corridor.

[edit] Hours of operation

Trains run between approximately 4:30 am and 1:00 am the following morning. First and last train times are as follows:

To/From North Hollywood
Eastbound

• First Train to Union Station: 4:31 am
• Last Train to Union Station: 12:54 am

Westbound

• First Train to North Hollywood: 4:30 am
• Last Train to North Hollywood: 12:17 am

To/From Wilshire/Western
Eastbound

• First Train to Union Station: 4:41 am
• Last Train to Union Station: 11:42 pm

Westbound

• First Train to Wilshire/Western: 4:56 am
• Last Train to Wilshire/Western: 11:27 pm

[edit] Rolling stock and depots

The Red Line uses 75-foot electric multiple unit cars built by Breda. Trains usually run at six-car lengths during the day and become smaller as closing time nears. Trains running to Wilshire/Western have a maximum of four cars. Their acceleration is similar to that of cars used by the Washington Metropolitan Area Transportation Authority.

[edit] List of stations, from East to West

Station	Metro Rail Services	Other Connections	Date Opened
All Spurs
Union Station	Red Gold	Amtrak Metrolink Metro Rapid: 740; 745 El Monte Busway	January 30, 1993
Civic Center	Red	Metro Rapid: 714; 740; 745	January 30, 1993
Pershing Square	Red	Angels Flight Metro Rapid: 714; 720; 740; 745	January 30, 1993
7th St/Metro Center	Red Blue		January 30, 1993
Westlake/MacArthur Park	Red	Metro Rapid: 720	January 30, 1993
Wilshire/Vermont	Red	Metro Rapid: 720; 754	July 13, 1996
North Hollywood Spur
Vermont/Beverly	Red	Metro Rapid: 714; 754	June 12, 1999
Vermont/Santa Monica	Red	Metro Rapid: 754	June 12, 1999
Vermont/Sunset	Red	Metro Rapid: 754	June 12, 1999
Hollywood/Western	Red	Metro Rapid: 757; 780	June 12, 1999
Hollywood/Vine	Red	Metro Rapid: 710; 780	June 12, 1999
Hollywood/Highland	Red	Metro Rapid: 780	June 24, 2000
Universal City	Red	Metro Rapid: 750	June 24, 2000
North Hollywood	Red	Metro Orange Line	June 24, 2000.
Wilshire/Western Spur
Wilshire/Normandie	Red	Metro Rapid: 720	July 13, 1996
Wilshire/Western	Red	Metro Rapid: 720; 757	July 13, 1996

[edit] In fiction

• In the videogame Grand Theft Auto:San Andreas Market Station in Los Santos is a fictional train station served by Brown Streak Railroad in the game is one of the stations based on the Red Metro Lines.

• In Heroes, Hiro Nakamura rides the Red Line
• On the popular television series Alias, the CIA black ops unit Authorized Personnel Only is located behind a maintenance door at the Civic Center station near the Los Angeles City Hall.

• Part of the movie Speed transpires on a Red Line train departing Pershing Square station and ultimately crashing through the street surface at the then-under construction Hollywood/Highland station.

• Part of the movie Volcano takes place on the Wilshire branch of the Red Line where lava stops the train from operating and the passengers must be rescued in the tunnel.

• In The Italian Job, a heist takes place underneath the Hollywood/Highland station and through the Red Line tunnels until it reaches the Blue Line tunnel opening between 7th/Metro Center station and Pico station.

• The Red Line is also featured in S.W.A.T. where police chase a fugitive from Pershing Square station (though this portion was taped at 7th/Metro Center station) to Wilshire/Normandie station.

• In the P. T. Anderson-directed music video for "Fast as You Can" by Fiona Apple, much of the action takes place on a moving Red Line train, which originates at the Hollywood/Western station. Anderson directed another music video for Apple, "Paper Bag," which was filmed at Union Station, but that was because of the Art Deco surroundings; the Red Line terminus was not featured.

• In the music video for "Bad Day" by Daniel Powter, the Red Line is used as part of the daily commute for two singles and eventually where they meet.

• In the music video for "All for You" by Janet Jackson, Janet and company ride a subway to Venice (Beach), California. While not explicitly shown to be the Red Line, it is an interesting nod to proposals to extend the subway from midtown to the beach.

[edit] External links

• MTA Home Page
• Red Line Home Page
• Take a Virtual Tour of the Red Line (QuickTime Required)
• Transit Rider Photos

Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (website)
Metro Buses	Metro Local – Metro Rapid – Metro Express
Metro Busways	Orange Line – Harbor Transitway – El Monte Busway
Metro Rail	Red Line – Purple Line – Blue Line – Green Line – Gold Line – Expo Line
Connecting rail	Amtrak – Amtrak California – Metrolink
Other information	Union Station – Transportation of Los Angeles