County wins green light to move ahead on east-west subway.

County wins green light to move ahead on east-west subway

Plans to expand the huge Metro Rail subway system into Westwood and East Los Angeles took a major step forward last week as transit officials received the go-ahead from the federal government to study nine potential routes on the $4 billion project.

Officials from the Los Angeles County Transportation System, builder of the region's multibillion-dollar subway and light rail system, gained approval from the U.S. Department of Transportation to study the proposed east-west extension, tentatively called the Orange Line.

If built, the 14- to 18-mile subway route could be as large as the $4 billion, 17.4-mile Metro Rail Red Line, which will eventually stretch from Union Station in downtown Los Angeles to North Hollywood. The east-west Orange Line's cost per mile is estimated at $220 million and would result in scores of contracts and jobs for construction and design firms.

"We are not resting on any of our current projects," said LACTC Commissioner and Rancho Palos Verdes Councilwoman Jacki Bacharach about the Orange Line. "We want Washington, D.C., to know that a day doesn't pass where there isn't an L.A. project ready for funding."

Specifically, the commission got the green light from the Department of Transportation's Urban Mass Transportation Administration to study nine possible routes for the Orange Line as well as their environmental impacts. Those reports are a preliminary but critical part of the Orange Line's development, according to Bevan Dufty, the LACTC's administrator of federal affairs.

A commission panel last fall approved a $3 million contract with Parsons Brinkerhoff, a construction engineering firm, to study nine potential routes for the extensions and their environmental impacts. Moreover, the LACTC board is expected to outline "an action plan" for the Orange Line later this month. A final decision on the routes will probably be made in 1992, after a series of public forums is held.

Before the federal government's Urban Mass Transportation Administration agrees to fund part of the Orange Line, the commission must show that daily ridership projections are above 15,000 and that the routes can pass federal environmental guidelines. Estimates in one technical LACTC report obtained by the Business Journal, the Draft Transitional Analysis, project daily ridership for one westerly route at 92,000 and 42,000 for an easterly alignment.

The East Los Angeles area, just north of the City of Commerce and Vernon where the line would run to, is considered some of most congested real estate in Southern California, with population densities in some parts at 12,000 residents a mile. "And the Westside congestion can be just as intense," said Tom Jenkins, project manager for the Orange Line at Parsons Brinkerhoff.

Half of the cost of the Metro Rail Red Line is being picked up by the federal government, with state, city and sales tax monies making up the balance. A similar funding scheme is envisioned for the Orange Line.

But this time could be different, with federal money tight as budget deficits set new records and with 18 other U.S. cities vying for rail subsidies.

"We need to do a lot of work to ensure Los Angeles gets its share," Duffy said.

For that reason, the LACTC is already lining up support from Los Angeles' congressional delegation, including Julian Dixon, Tony Beilenson, Edward Roybal and Esteban Torres. Where influential Los Angeles Congressman Henry Waxman - who helped sponsor a law preventing Metro Rail from being constructed through a methane area - stands is unknown.

If funding is approved by Sacramento and the federal government and the mountain of needed permits is obtained, construction could begin in 1995 or 1996 and end sometime in the 21st Century, according to preliminary estimates. That would continue the contract bonanza for construction, engineering and design firms that began when the first stage of Metro Rail broke ground several years ago.

Said Ray Butler, a spokesman for the Associated General Contractors of California, "The economy is sluggish, to say the least. Consequently, it (the Orange Line) would be a boon . . . (Transit) money finds its way past the general contractors to myriad subcontractors."

Added the LACTC's Bacharach, "We will provide business for the next 30 years. These projects can be economic pump-primers."

One study prepared for the commission has narrowed the westerly Metro Rail down to four possible routes. Cost estimates range from $900 million to $1.2 billion for those Los Angeles-Westwood routes.

But Nick Patsaouras, a LACTC board member and president of the Southern California Rapid Transit District, said the costs for the east-west extensions could be more than $4 billion - even if the lines are not extended to Santa Monica and Norwalk as envisioned by planners back in 1980, when Proposition A was approved to fund rail projects.

One possible westerly route, a 9.4-mile alignment dubbed Pico Corridor Short, would begin at a Red Line station at the corner of Wilshire Boulevard and Western Avenue, move underneath Wilshire, then jog south under Pico Boulevard as it heads northwest into West Los Angeles. From that point, the subway would travel southwest down Santa Monica Boulevard until it intersected with the San Diego (405 Freeway in Westwood Village.

Another potential course would take the Orange Line underneath Wilshire Boulevard, until it reached known methane fields, where the subway would move above ground. Other westerly routes would link the new line with the Red Line's Hollywood routes, moving it southwest underneath West Hollywood and Beverly Hills until it bypassed the San Diego Freeway. A route snaking underneath both Olympic and Wilshire boulevards is also being examined.

Metro Rail's easterly extension has been a hot political topic for years, with minority leaders in government and industry complaining that the Metro Rail system under construction would do little to ease traffic congestion east of downtown Los Angeles.

"That part of the county needs economic development and a subway would provide some of that," said RTD's Patsaouras. "We also believe that ridership would be strong because 50 percent of the population is Hispanic and working-class people."

One easterly route, called the Freeway Alignment, would start underground at Union Station, cross the Los Angeles River and then move at street level along the San Bernardino (10) Freeway until it reached California State University at Los Angeles. From there, the Orange Line would dive under ground again beneath the Long Beach (710) Freeway, ending above ground near the intersection of Olympic Boulevard and Arizona Avenue.

An alternative route would send the subway on a more southeasterly route, from Union Station down Brooklyn Avenue, across the Pomona (60) Freeway and Long Beach freeways. Other corridors envision the subway moving southeast under First Street, Eastern Avenue and Atlantic Boulevard, while another path would send the subway almost exclusively under Sixth Street and Whittier Boulevard.

Still, the eastern routes, like the western counterpart, will have major impacts on Los Angeles aside from construction company bidding wars or the rush to acquire valuable land associated with major rail projects.

Traffic, for example, could be snarled by some elevated rail supports and there would, almost undoubtedly, be areas where LACTC might have to use its powers of eminent domain. Besides environmental problems with methane, unchartered water tables and hazardous waste sites on the Westside, there are structures in the way of possible routes with historical or archaeological value.

On the easterly Freeway Alignment route, conversely, the LACTC report says the potential for encountering both hazardous materials and groundwater along the Los Angeles River is "high," as is the chance of hitting utility-owned sewers and storm drains.

"We know there are environmental problems," Jenkins said. "But, I think, the Red Line shows we can handle them."

PHOTO : Western route: This Orange Line proposal would run under Pico and Wilshire boulevards

PHOTO : Eastern route: This proposed plan would send the Orange Line south after traversing the Long Beach (710) Freeway