Los Angeles County is being reinvented -- in large part because of Measure R -- moving from "sprawl to community development, from car dependence to transit orientation, from municipal fiefdoms to functional realism, from inequality to equity," to use the words of Dr. Manuel Pastor. Research shows that regions with more equitable development result in more sustainable economic growth but realizing this vision, which Dr. Pastor calls "Just Growth," in Los Angeles requires collaboration on new policies that help move us from vision to reality. Dr. Pastor, director of USC's Program for Environmental and Regional Equity, will discuss his new report "An Agenda for Equity: A Framework for Building a Just Transportation System in Los Angeles County" online June 24 at noon. Click here to register, and then join the webinar at www.scanph.org/webinar.

Governor Jerry Brown and the Legislature reached a budget agreement yesterday that includes a breakdown on how to spend Cap & Trade dollars and that ensures funding for public transit, affordable homes and sustainable communities (defined as within a quarter mile of transit). The Legislature will make the decision final on Sunday -- though the breakdown will probably be fine-tuned between now and then. Here's how the agreement would spend the $872 million in Cap & Trade revenues available this year (read more on the blog of the Oakland-based nonprofit organization Transform):
*  $250M for high-speed rail
*  $25M for transit and intercity rail capital
*  $25M for low-carbon transit operations
*  $65M for affordable housing
*  $65M for sustainable communities
*  $200M for low-carbon transportation

Beginning in 2015, 35% of Cap & Trade revenues -- expected to rise to $3-$5B by 2020 -- will be spent on sustainable communities according to this breakdown:
*  10% for transit and intercity rail capital
*  5% for low-carbon transit operations
*  20% for affordable housing and sustainable communities

The remaining 65% would be distributed this way:
*  25% for high-speed rail on an annual basis
*  40% for a variety of projects with specific amounts to be decided each year, including: low-carbon transportation, energy efficiency, urban forestry, forestry, water, waste.

Again, read more on Transform's blog.

Here are the 3 different proposals for slicing the Cap & Trade pie. Next week during state budget negotiations legislators will choose 1 or mix and match. From LA Streetsblog.

Check out the chart below from the Let's Go LA blog: Metrolink stations with the highest ridership are on lines in Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties, also in Glendale, Burbank, Irvine, Tustin, and the City of Industry! The Ventura and Antelope Valley lines perform poorly, as do stations in Van Nuys and Sun Valley. Overall, ridership is trending downward, though only slightly.

From Curbed LA: The rents keep rising and in this map of rents for 1-bedrooms in April 2014, the darker the pink, the higher the rent -- with Marina del Rey the highest at $2,456 and Venice nudging out Santa Monica with $2,320. Historic South Central is cheapest at $900 followed by Glassell Park at $993. For 2-bedrooms, Bel Air ($4,250) and Santa Monica ($4,051) are tops while MacArthur Park is a bargain at $1,325. Full story here as well as map of rents for 2-bedrooms.

The goal of his Great Streets program is to make streets more pedestrian friendly and prosperous. Here are the first 15 (full story in LA Times here), with 1 in each council district:
District 1: North Figueroa Street between Avenue 50 and Avenue 60
District 2: Lankershim Boulevard between Chandler and Victory boulevards
District 3: Sherman Way between Wilbur and Lindley avenues
District 4: Western Avenue between Melrose Avenue and 3rd Street
District 5: Westwood Boulevard between Le Conte Avenue and Wilshire Boulevard
District 6: Van Nuys Boulevard between Victory Boulevard and Oxnard Street
District 7: Van Nuys Boulevard between Laurel Canyon Boulevard and San Fernando Road
District 8: Crenshaw Boulevard between 78th Street and Florence Avenue
District 9: Central Avenue between MLK Boulevard and Vernon Avenue
District 10: Pico Boulevard between Hauser Boulevard and Fairfax Avenue
District 11: Venice Boulevard between Beethoven Street and Inglewood Boulevard
District 12: Reseda Boulevard between Plummer Street and Parthenia Avenue
District 13: Hollywood Boulevard between La Brea Avenue & Gower Street
District 14: Cesar Chavez Avenue between Evergreen Avenue and St. Louis Street
District 15: Gaffey Street between 15th Street & the 110 Freeway

Planning guru Bill Fulton is back in SoCal after a brief stint in Washington DC. He's now planning director in San Diego, and he's come back to the land of the car without one in order to experiment with shared-use options. He says he's widely pitied by friends and colleagues, who wonder how he manages without a car. But he says they just don't get it because they're making a fundamental mistake: "They are equating owning a car with using a car."

And he writes (in the California Planning & Development Report -- link to article is at the bottom of this post):

"Cars? I have more cars than I know what to do with. I use cars all the time, in order to go all kinds of places, and I am never without access to a car. My overall automobile cost is probably less than half of what it was when I owned a car – because I usually pay for a car only when I am traveling in it, not when it is just parked somewhere.

"I’m well aware that I am on the leading edge of this on, at least in modern urban neighborhoods: Our complete reliance on a “monoculture” of owner-occupied automobiles is being augmented with a much more varied ecosystem that includes not just alternatives to driving, but many whole “car-sharing” thing and that the vast majority of people don’t have the same options because of where they live and work. But the fact that I am doing just fine without owning a car in a traditionally suburban place like San Diego suggests that something important is going different ways to use a car.

Read the whole essay here.

This week Metro received $1.25 billion for the Purple Line Subway extension under Wilshire Boulevard as well as an $856 million low-interest loan. Metro has gotten more New Starts funding recently than at any time during the past two decades. Download Hi-Rez PDF

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The Metro Board of Directors voted in increase one-way bus and rail fares in September from $1.50 to $1.75, day passes from $5 to $7, and monthly passes from $75 to $100. This is to offset an expected $36 million gap in the agency's 2016 operating budget.

Metro's fares have remained among the lowest of big-city transit agencies because it heavily subsidizes fares: Metro's farebox recovery rate is 26%, and there is concern that unless that ratio is increased to 33% it could jeopardize the agency's chances of receiving future federal grants.

This is Metro's fourth fare increase since 1993; the most recent was in 2010. Fares for seniors and the disabled have not increased since 2007.

Read more in the LA Times.

 

LA Mayor Eric Garcetti and LA County Supervisors Zev Yaroslavsky and Mark Ridley-Thomas have drafted a plan to temporarily halt a Metro proposal to raise bus and rail fares by 25 cents 3 times over the next 8 years. The proposal, to be presented at the Metro board meeting Thursday, May 22, would allow one increase this summer but put the other 2 on hold until a panel of transportation experts could assess the feasibility of alternatives such as raising parking fees at stations or annually adjusting fares to reflect changes in the consumer price index.

Metro has said that a fare increase is necessary to close an expected $36 million gap in the agency’s 2016 operating budget, which is expected to grow to $225 million over the next decade. Metro’s fares are among the lowest of any major transit system in the U.S., but critics point out that fare increases will hit the county’s poorest residents hardest — the average income of more than 80% of riders is less than $20,000 a year.

Read more in the LA Times. And listen to comments by LA Times reporter Laura Nelson, Bus Riders Union co-chair Eric Mann, and Kymberleigh Richards, who serves on Metro San Fernando Valley Service Council — all on KCRW’s “Which Way LA?”

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