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LA TRANSPO - In Los Angeles, vehicles are the favored oppressors over transit riders. It seems the creature comforts of drivers get first priority over the basic needs and comforts of transit riders. This happens throughout the county in the planning of rail lines and bus stops, or finding alternatives if obstructions arise.
If there are changes to roads because of construction, drivers, in their comfortable seats, with heat or A/C, rolled up window, and other creature comforts, just use the accelerator, and can drive around the obstacles.
For transit riders, who are also pedestrians, changes to and diversions from trains stations and bus stops present serious challenges and obstacles, some which are very difficult to overcome, all while in the open air.
The latest is the E/Expo Line Grand Avenue Arts/Bunker Hill Station. This station is part of the game changing Regional Connector which saves riders transferring to the B/Red or D/Purple subway lines to access parts of Downtown Los Angeles. This is a gift to transit riders.
The Grand Avenue Arts/Bunker Hill Station is the transit station to serve what is planned as a centerpiece of Los Angeles’ performing arts and culture, the Grand Avenue Arts Corridor.
But as the fates would have it, or the constant changes and expansions in the city, this station is now nearly inaccessible to enter, and a maze of obstacles to exit. This is due to the expansion of the Broad Museum which sits across Hope Street, to the east of the station.
It is fantastic that the Broad Museum is expanding its footprint. After all, it is part of the so-called Grand Avenue Arts Corridor. The problem is that there now is a protective fence around the construction area which closed access to Hope and 2nd Streets.
This station is a short block east of Grand Avenue on Hope Street and 2nd Street. Before construction, transit riders could easily exit the station and either use the Street Level exit and walk up the hills to Grand Avenue, or to avoid the hills take the Concourse exit to a level entry to the plaza of the Broad Museum. I’ve used both.
But the construction fence blocks this station, and the alternative treats transit riders like units of measurement for passenger calculations instead of humans.
Who devised this thoughtless alternative, Metro; Los Angeles County which owns property in Downtown Los Angeles and owns and operates Metro; or City of Los Angeles?
Who concocted the ridiculous official alternative of exiting the station from the Concourse level by climbing two sets of stars or taking a shuttle to Grand Avenue. I have not tried that alternative to exit the station, but I did try the Concourse alternative to get to the station from Grand Avenue, and it was a disaster.
From the Broad Museum Plaza, I looked at the steep two sets of stairs, and with my bad knees and rolling briefcase, knew this was a non-starter.
I then turned around, walked back to Grand Avenue, and tried the publicized shuttle alternative. There is one sign on the sidewalk indicating the spot to pick up the shuttle. It is placed between a food truck and coffee cart. The space for transit riders between the two is about ten feet. There is no space for the shuttle to drive to the curb. It is a high step from the sidewalk onto Grand Avenue, which is another no-go for those with mobility issues. And, it involves the transit rider to step blindly onto Grand Avenue between a food truck and coffee truck parked on the avenue.
To make matters worse, both the food truck and coffee cart run generators which emit unregulated and unhealthful emissions directly to the lungs of the waiting transit rider. And this is not good for the environment, where is the AQMD? I stood there in the hot sun waiting for the shuttle-there are no posted times of service-which did not arrive, and there was no indication when it would arrive. I turned around and tried another way.
This shuttle stop alternative is incredibly ADA non-compliant. How could anyone involved in this shuttle stop from the planners to management to the Metro staff allow such a reckless and dangerous shuttle stop?
I have not used the Concourse alternative, but like many others whom I see in person or through their footprints, bushwhack our way to Hope Street and 2nd Street to get to Grand Avenue or elsewhere.
There was a nicely planted xeriscape median between Hope and 2nd Streets. The construction fence now forces transit riders, who will have nothing to do with waiting for a shuttle or climbing stairs, to march through the planted median. There is now a clear footpath with broken and missing plants in the wake. I tried the bushwhacking once, with a rolling briefcase, and it was like an obstacle course on the TV show, “Survivor.” Except that show is scripted, this is reality.
Instead, with not so good knees, and sometimes pulling a rolling briefcase, I now exit the west side of the station, lower myself from the high curb onto Hope Street to head north and then east. There is no sidewalk here, and it is a precarious walk on Hope Street to the street and sidewalk behind Disney Concert Hall. I get to the station the same way, in reverse direction.
In other words, I, like many others find the prescribed alternative a no-go from the start and find our own ways to get to Grand Avenue. This is wrong.
It seems obvious that the bare minimum of thought, planning and effort went into finding alternatives to the construction blockade.
It seems those in authority of transit; promoting reducing carbon gases by riding transit; and boosters for the Grand Avenue Arts Corridor know little to nothing about the needs and comforts of transit riders.
In the planning it seems the riders are reduced to units of measurements on the number who use this station, with no thought given to how they use this station.
If the county and city of Los Angeles are to be taken seriously as a place of growing transit, growing culture, the not-working alternative to the Grand Avenue Arts/Bunker Hill Station lowers the rankings.
The construction runs through some unnamed date in May 2026. The greatly exalted B/Red Line subway extension opens May 8.
What happens when the Red Line Extension opens and transit riders, especially new riders, get the idea to go the the Grand Avenue Arts Corridor via the Red Line to the Expo Line and exit at the Grand Avenue Arts Station and are confronted with this construction blockade and non-starter alternative? Metro will lose new riders and turn off current riders. Everyone suffers.
Since I am complaining so much, I do offer another way. For those willing to climb the hills, riders exit the west side of the station. Then build a temporary, raised ramp over now trampled xeriscaped median. Close 2nd Street below the parking entrances to Disney Concert Hall and Broad Museum, close the right turn lane-the left turn lanes are already closed-and have the ramp end on the sidewalk behind Disney Concert Hall. Metal ramps are easily rented. Make sure it is ADA compliant, and maybe this current disaster can be rectified and allow transit riders to be treated as humans.
(Matthew Hetz is a Los Angeles native and composer whose works have been performed nationally. He is the former President of the Culver City Symphony Orchestra and Marina del Rey Symphony. A passionate transit advocate, Matthew is dedicated to improving the rider experience and encouraging drivers to embrace public transportation as a solution to air pollution and climate change. He teaches at Emeritus/Santa Monica College and is a regular contributor to CityWatchLA.com.)
