ORANGE LINE RULING AWAITED COURT COULD ALLOW BUSWAY WORK TO RESUME.Byline: Lisa Mascaro Staff Writer The state Court of Appeals on Tuesday denied the MTA's request to reconsider its order to study alternatives to the Orange Line, but didn't rule on whether work on the $330 million busway can resume while the study is being done. The decision delivered a setback to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and its efforts to build a 14-mile busway across the San Fernando Valley San Fernando Valley Valley, southern California, U.S. Northwest of central Los Angeles, the valley is bounded by the San Gabriel, Santa Susana, and Santa Monica mountains and the Simi Hills. - a project that is 40 percent complete. The court is expected to rule today whether construction can resume. MTA (1) (Message Transfer Agent or Mail Transfer Agent) The store and forward part of a messaging system. See messaging system. (2) See M Technology Association. 1. (messaging) MTA - Message Transfer Agent. officials estimate that the shutdown shut·down n. A cessation of operations or activity, as at a factory. shutdown Noun the closing of a factory, shop, or other business Verb shut down is costing taxpayers $70,000 a day. Representatives of Citizens Organized for Smart Transit, the residents group that mounted the legal challenge to the Orange Line, declined to comment on the court's decision. But Los Angeles Los Angeles (lôs ăn`jələs, lŏs, ăn`jəlēz'), city (1990 pop. 3,485,398), seat of Los Angeles co., S Calif.; inc. 1850. County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky Zev Yaroslavsky (born December 21, 1948) is a Los Angeles County politician. He served on the Los Angeles City Council from 1975 until 1994, when he was elected to the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors. He was preceded in both offices by Edmund D. Edelman. , who has championed the busway, said the MTA will fight to save the project. ``We're going to leave no stone unturned to do everything that can be done; to use all practicable means to effect an object. to leave nothing untried for accomplishing one's purpose. See also: Stone Unturned to try to salvage salvage, in maritime law, the compensation that the owner must pay for having his vessel or cargo saved from peril, such as shipwreck, fire, or capture by an enemy. Salvage is awarded only when the party making the rescue was under no legal obligation to do so. this project,'' said Yaroslavsky, who also sits on the MTA board. ``The San Fernando Valley has waited for decades to get a transit line built,'' he said. ``This is a project which has broad support. The opposition is limited and transparent, and that opposition is holding the entire 101 (Freeway) corridor and its future transit options hostage to a technicality.'' COST filed suit in spring 2002, challenging a variety of issues in the environmental impact report. A Superior Court judge ruled in favor of the MTA, and COST appealed to the higher court. The appellate Relating to appeals; reviews by superior courts of decisions of inferior courts or administrative agencies and other proceedings. ruled July 19 in favor of COST, saying the MTA had erred in failing to consider a system of Rapid buses as an alternative to the Orange Line. Two weeks later, it temporarily ordered construction of the Orange Line halted while the study is conducted. The MTA is now conducting the Rapid study, which it says could take up to nine months to complete. It also is appealing the busway shutdown, which officials estimate could cost up to $100 million and delay the project's August 2005 opening by two years. Even if the study shows Rapid buses to be a better alternative to the busway, the MTA board could simply decide to continue with the Orange Line project. Yaroslavsky warned that if the work shutdown continues and the Orange Line's costs balloon by $100 million, the MTA may have to scale back on planned amenities along the route. Lisa Mascaro, (818) 713-3761 lisa.mascaro(at)dailynews.com |
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