The board of the Exposition Metro Line Construction Authority approved the final leg of the long-awaited transit line last week. The proposed route has the project traveling down Colorado Avenue to Fourth Street in Downtown. Does the Colorado alignment make sense to you or would you like to see another route?
Here are your responses:
“Frankly, I wish they would forget about this over-rated nightmare project all together. Santa Monica is so overbuilt and overcrowded as it is. This fiasco will only worsen things. Traffic will be disastrous, vehicular and pedestrian. And not enough emphasis has been put on the danger to both.”
“I personally believe the entire rail line concept into Santa Monica is the conjure of addle-brained nincompoops who do not have a microscopic iota of understanding regarding the aesthetics of a community, especially a beach city. The rail system will do nothing more than create more congestion within the city’s perimeter. I personally do not like the concept of a rail system inundating Colorado Avenue. I believe a better route would be either San Vincente Boulevard or Montana Avenue and let it stop and empty out on Ocean Avenue. My chosen route will enable those swell folks who reside on those streets who fly to their destination in private jets and 747s to see what a rail train looks like as they watch their property value plummet. Also, if my route is chosen I believe we should have an older gentlemen with a deep, wind-blown tan wearing shorts and carrying a sand bucket standing on Ocean Avenue waving to the train’s passengers as they disembark from the train in the same manner as the former famous Laguna Greeter. It makes sense to me.”
“Yes, I think it’s a bloody good idea for the railroad to come down Colorado Boulevard as long as it doesn’t take a lot of room. But maybe Olympic would be better, but I think Colorado would work out just fine.”
“It should stop at City Hall and load up our City Council kooks and continue down Colorado to the end of the pier and dump them into the ocean.”
“Your question hides a false premise — why do we need light rail into Santa Monica? What does L.A. do for us? All of this is about a few business and real estate people making millions and some politicians getting a nice retirement investment. Why go down any street unless, as your Bill Bauer says, the rail line should be raised. Street level purposely impacts the automobile. Why does City Hall crave street level? In the car you are an individual. In mass transit you are part of the herd — easier to scare an control.”
“The Colorado alignment for the Expo makes absolutely no sense when Olympic Boulevard already has that median strip all set up for the two trains either direction. It’s wide enough, there’d be less disruption, less cost. Colorado makes no sense at all.”
“I just read in the daily paper that you put out that the rail line is going to go down Colorado Boulevard. I think it should go down Olympic because there’s that wide median and they can take that out and put the tracks there. There’s going to be a lot of noise and congestion and pollution at Fourth and Colorado and there’s a lot of residences around the area. We should not have to breath in that crap.”
“Whatever route they chose, some people will object to it. Each route has people accepting it. Of course if they don’t build the thing at all, then another bunch of people will complain. So, you can’t win any way you do, so they should just build whatever’s cheapest.”
“No, the Colorado site makes no sense to me. I can think of a about a dozen reasons not to have it here, each one being enough in itself to cancel the present plans. Pollution comes to my mind immediately. Pollution from the trains themselves, pollution from the increase in traffic for obvious reasons and all this in a city bragging about its pollution record with regard to strict smoking laws. And then the noise all night long. And the danger to pedestrians and cars. Need I say more?”
“The Santa Monica community overwhelmingly endorsed the Colorado Avenue light rail route many months ago. So I don’t know why this is even considered a timely question, except for the very small vocal minority that wanted Olympic Boulevard, even though it would have destroyed 44 beautiful coral trees, the entire Olympic Boulevard grass median and would have cost more than $50 million more.”
“No, if the line must come to Santa Monica, please stop these many-times-daily trains at the city’s east end. Neither Colorado or Olympic or any other of our town’s now barely car traffic sustaining roadways are suited for these two big trains. Please go ride the lines already running. A better option is to try further to set up a workable train switching/debarking station near or maybe within Santa Monica’s east end. And then link such with electric trolley cars to loop around some of our key road ways, affording residents and visitors better on/off ease, enhancing business trade along them and bolstering the feel and pace of neighborhoods they pass in the process, too.”
“It is great that the exposition line has been given the green light and will connect Downtown L.A. to Downtown Santa Monica. It’s about time. I simply hope there’s ample parking in Santa Monica and not too many stops so we can get Downtown quicker because the 10 bus is too slow. Yeah, it’s about time. Welcome to 2010, guys.”
