With 2 new rail lines opening last year and 3 more under construction now — 4 if you count the Expo extension to Santa Monica — LA really is on the verge of being transit-oriented, and efforts to accelerate construction (the "30-10 plan") are ongoing. This Measure-R-sales-tax-funded build-out of the transit system will reorient life in the city much in the same way as construction of the freeway system did a half century ago and will have a dramatic impact on transit-corridor neighborhoods. MAYBE IT'S TIME TO ORGANIZE a TOD (Transit-Oriented Development) University with your neighbors so you are in a well-informed position to negotiate changes in your neighborhood. More information on the TOD University's downloadable curriculum — a partnership of Move LA, Enterprise Community Partners, Reconnecting America, and Strategic Actions for a Just Economy (SAJE), with funding from HUD (the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development — is available HERE and the curriculum can be downloaded HERE.

Move LA just got back from three hot days in Midtown Atlanta at APTA’s (American Public Transportation Association) Center for Transportation Excellence Conference, where cities and regions from around the U.S. gathered to discuss mounting sales tax initiatives and finding other new sources of revenue for transit.

Detroit, Seattle, St. Louis, Denver, Charlotte, Salt Lake City, Atlanta, Phoenix, Philadelphia and Baton Rouge were among the several dozen cities and regions in attendance. The success of Measure R in Los Angeles has boosted interest in sales tax initiatives in part because the amount of money raised ($40 billion) is so impressive, and because former LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer succeeded in convincing Congress to expand the TIFIA low-interest loan program -- revenue streams from sales taxes can be used to secure TIFIA loans. (TIFIA = the Transportation Infrastructure and Financing Innovation Act.)

Researcher (and conference presenter) Stephanie Pollack, associate director of the Dukakis Center for Urban and Regional Policy at Northeastern University in Boston, analyzes the Measure R campaign and Move LA's role in it in a new study available soon.

APTA, T4AMERICA SAY FINANCING IS THE FUTURE

Both APTA and the national nonprofit Transportation for America agreed that federal financing -- as distinct from federal funding -- is the future, whether through the TIFIA loan program or a new America Fast Forward bond program that has been proposed by Villaraigosa and LA Metro. T4America Policy Director Nick Donohue said that the TIFIA loan program may be the only new source of money for transportation in the next federal reauthorization. “Why take out a loan when you could get a grant?” Donohue asked rhetorically. “Because when it comes to providing free money for transit, the feds are pulling back. Financing is here to stay.”

The TIFIA low-interest loan program was bumped up from $122 million per year to $750 million last year because of the efforts of Villaraigosa and Boxer. TIFIA will be bumped up again this year to $1 billion, an amount that will allow the U.S. Department of Transportation to provide $10 billion in loans.

Donohue noted that TIFIA loans provide transportation agencies with significant advantages over traditional financing programs because: 1) The interest rates are very low (about 3.44%) and can be locked in before an agency starts to build and then accessed later on. 2) Payments can be deferred for up to five years, by which time the project may be producing farebox returns or other revenues. 3) The low interest rate is available regardless of the agency’s credit rating and regardless of whether the loan is subordinate to other debt — a situation faced by many agencies.

Donohue cited T4America’s 2012 report “Thinking Outside the Farebox” as a good source of information on creative approaches to financing transit projects.

LAST YEAR TIFIA, THIS YEAR THE AFF BOND PROGRAM?

LA Metro, which has applied for a $1 billion TIFIA loan, is working hard to build support for the America Fast Forward bond program, which would create a new class of tax credit bonds that would allow local governments and transit agencies to bond against a secure revenue stream such as a sales tax. Private investors would buy the bonds, the city or agency would pay back the principle over time, and the federal government would pay the interest, providing investors with federal income tax credits in lieu of interest payments.  Mayor Villaraigosa’s 30-10 plan (to build 30 years of Measure R-funded transit projects in 10 years) was built upon these two financing mechanisms — TIFIA and the bond program — but Congress only adopted TIFIA last year.  The AFF bond program could be adopted by Congress this year.

Both Democrats and Republicans in Congress have expressed interest in the bond program this year.

MORE REGIONS, CITIES EXPLORING CREATIVE FINANCING

A growing number of regions are mounting sales tax initiatives to provide revenue streams that can be used to secure TIFIA loans or bond sales, while others are increasing property tax rates or even using tax increment financing (TIF):  Charlotte, North Carolina, for example, is investigating using TIF to build five new transit lines — by developing mixed-use neighborhoods along them in order to boost property values and raise the tax increment. Similarly, the notoriously auto-oriented and traffic-congested Tysons Corner commercial center in Fairfax County, Virginia, has increased property taxes by 25% in order to provide a revenue stream that will help finance construction of the Silver Line.

APTA Policy and Research Director Darnell Grisby points out that these creative approaches to financing transit are being explored in part because of an increasing body of evidence showing that property in walkable neighborhoods near transit has increased or held its value across the country despite the recession. He cited APTA’s new study, “The New Real Estate Mantra: Location Near Public Transportation,” which showed impressive gains in property values near transit from 2006 to 2011 in six case study regions — ranging from a 37% increase in Phoenix, which has a small system, to 129% in Boston, which has an extensive system.

RAISING STATE GAS TAXES

State constitutions have different rules governing who can put initiatives on the ballot and what kind: In Massachusetts, for example, there can be no ballot measures regarding money — only policy. For this reason transit advocates can’t put a sales tax measure on the ballot and are pushing for a state gas tax increase instead. In Seattle, in contrast, there have been two successful sales tax campaigns for transit, but because there is no state income tax in Washington sales taxes are already quite high, so advocates there are also discussing a state gas tax increase.

Other states considering raising state gas taxes include New Hampshire, New York, Texas, Michigan and Minnesota.

MAKING THE BUSINESS CASE FOR TRANSIT

Speakers at the conference emphasized the importance of making the business case for transit — whether for a sales tax initiative or a gas tax increase —because it is so compelling. “The cost of congestion is like a tax but worse because at least a tax provides revenues while congestion is pure waste," joked conference presenter Richard Voith of Philadelphia.

Greg Leroy of Good Jobs First noted that an increasing number of employers are become transit advocates because they recognize that one prerequisite for a prosperous business climate is a robust transportation system, and because it’s important to provide employees with affordable transportation options. He referred conference attendees to the new Good Jobs First report “Bosses for Buses.”

Voith added that only transit — not highways — allows for the density of jobs, employees and residents that create so-called “agglomeration economies,” which are the most diverse and rich.
THE REASON ALL THIS MATTERS SO MUCH

Congress will begin consideration of the next big transportation reauthorization bill this summer, but concerns about the budget, the federal deficit, and the pending insolvency of the Highway Trust Fund will stand in the way of a robust transportation funding program. The Trust Fund, which is funded by the national gas tax and is the major source of federal transportation funding, has been depleted due to the greater fuel efficiency of cars, the fact that Americans are driving less, and because the gas tax was set at 18.4 cents per gallon in 1993 and does not rise with gas prices, and because it was not indexed to inflation. Whereas the gas tax represented 17 percent of the price of a gallon of gas in 1993, today it represents just 5 percent. The Trust Fund is projected to be running on empty in 2014 and has required transfusions of about $10 billion a year from the General Fund. This is not sustainable but neither does this Congress appear willing to increase the gas tax.

Congressional Quarterly: Highway Funding Fix Should be Part of Tax Overhaul, Administration Says

By Nathan Hurst, CQ Roll Call

The Transportation Department’s top policy official said Thursday that the White House has a number of long-term transportation financing ideas under discussion and is hoping they will be part of any tax overhaul discussions on Capitol Hill.

“I can say the White House and the administration, we have some other ideas potentially about different ways we can fund transportation,” said Polly Trottenberg, the department’s undersecretary for policy. “But clearly it’s going to need to be part of a bipartisan discussion that we have in the context of a budget and tax overhaul that’s done here on the Hill.”

Trottenberg was among several Transportation Department officials on hand Thursday for a hearing by the Senate Appropriations Transportation Subcommittee to explore options for repairing and improving the nation’s infrastructure.

Subcommittee Chairwoman Patty Murray, D-Wash., has been a longtime champion of boosting infrastructure investments. But the catastrophic collapse last month of a bridge on Interstate 5 north of Seattle brought new urgency to the cause.

Trottenberg wouldn’t elaborate much on specific proposals to replace or supplement the current 18.4-cents-per-gallon retail tax on gasoline, though she did hint that the administration was warm to the idea of an “upstream” petroleum tax. Similar to a state-level plan moving forward in Virginia, it would tax gasoline at the wholesale level rather than at the filling pump.

It could also represent a rare piece of common ground for the divided Congress. A five-year transportation proposal approved last year by the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee but never brought to the floor for a vote would have expanded domestic oil and gas drilling and devoted the new revenue to infrastructure investments.

In its fiscal 2014 budget proposal, the White House reiterated calls to invest some of the money saved by winding down wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to infrastructure, including $214 billion in new funds for a revamped Highway Trust Fund that would also cover high-speed rail projects. Trottenberg said there was little expectation that Congress would act on the proposal.

“We wanted to make the priority that we were going to engage in some nation-building here at home,” Trottenberg said. “But we recognize that many on the Hill have different ideas about how those funds should be spent.”

Still, she said it was critical to devise a solution before the current surface transportation authorization (PL 112-141) expires in September 2014. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the fund will be insolvent shortly after that deadline without new revenue sources.

“There have been a number of good ideas that the states have been looking at,” Trottenberg said in response to repeated questions from Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, on what solutions the White House was considering. “My administration hasn’t come out publicly for any of those.”

Options that states are trying include a vehicle mileage tax, which Oregon has been testing in recent months. Drivers pay 1.6 cents per mile driven to cover their share of road maintenance instead of a per-gallon tax on fuel.

Proponents like the tax because it would capture revenue from all drivers, not just those burning conventional gas or diesel. Critics worry that gathering the data needed to collect the tax could infringe on privacy.

 

The success of Measure R in 2008, the interest in the “30-10” plan to accelerate implementation of our transit revolution, and the 66 percent “yes” vote on Measure J demonstrate that Los Angeles voters are ready to invest in a transportation transformation. There is an opportunity now and a coalition partnership available that’s too good to waste. Together with Mayor Eric Garcetti we must continue cultivating the trust of the voters and this partnership of labor, business, environmental, community groups and elected officials who share a common vision — of a Los Angeles with a clean public transportation system that is both robust and financially sound, and a vigorous economy with prosperity that is widely shared.

As Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has demonstrated so clearly, we can think big about solutions to our challenges as a region — and we can expect to succeed. We can’t let this momentum evaporate. We are a city that wants to continue to grow and prosper, and we are building the transportation infrastructure that ensures that our growth and prosperity will be sustainable. And thanks to our mayor we have a path forward, we have the coalition, and we have the tools.

Here is Move LA’s take on the Top 10 transportation priorities for our new mayor going forward:

• Continue working with our coalition to urge Congress to adopt the America Fast Forward bond program, which will provide LA Metro with the financing tools needed to build the 30-year transit program in 10 years.


• Help build a statewide coalition to champion a California constitutional amendment that lowers the local voter threshold to 55% and restores democracy to the voting process. Why should every “no” vote count twice as much as a “yes” vote? Reducing the local voter threshold will enable voters to step up and provide local governments with the revenue that’s needed to build the projects that voters have shown they truly want.


• Dream big again, as we did in 2008, and begin planning what we could accomplish with another countywide ballot measure — 2016 could be the biggest opportunity to fund completion of the transit system:  Extend the Crenshaw Line to Wilshire Boulevard and connect it with a new line from Hollywood and Highland, forming a continuous system from North Hollywood to LAX. Build the vision of a light rail connection from the San Fernando Valley to LAX. Extend the Foothill Goldline to San Bernardino County and on to Ontario Airport. Extend the Eastside Gold Line to both Whittier and El Monte. Complete the Greenline/Crenshaw connection into LAX and extend the Green Line to Torrance. Complete the West Santa Ana Line from downtown LA to Cerritos. Connect the San Fernando Valley from Burbank Airport to the San Gabriel Valley. Finish the “Subway to the Sea” along Wilshire Boulevard.


• Pursue public private partnerships (P3s) like the one being talked about to provide relief for the 405 — where congestion pricing and a toll road tunnel could help pay for a light rail line under the Sepulveda Pass — and provide an enormous opportunity to leverage private investment.


• Invest with other counties to upgrade the Metrolink regional commuter rail system to provide cleaner, stronger transportation links between Los Angeles County and the Inland Empire, Ventura and Orange counties.


• Create a truly regional airport system by connecting the regional commuter rail system to airports including Ontario, Burbank and Palmdale. This would provide enormous congestion relief as well as economic development benefit.


• Continue greening the ports and the regional goods movement system — an enormous resource that provides hundreds of thousands of jobs and can do so with clean technology. There are plans for clean freight.  We need to create an investment program to build it.


• Collaborate with LA Metro on building out the new strategic plan that’s underway for first mile/last mile bicycle, pedestrian and shuttle improvements so riders can walk and bike and easily access stations.


• Continue Mayor Villaraigosa’s Transit Corridors Cabinet to coordinate policy and focus public investments along transit lines.  Moderate and strategic increases in residential densities in mixed use developments will increase transit ridership while protecting neighborhood character and by honoring — rather than sacrificing — public trust and support.


• Finally, the mayor must champion, protect and increase the supply of affordable housing, especially in neighborhoods with strong transit service. Affordable housing is an equity imperative and an environmental imperative. Only when working families can live with easy access to jobs and services can we have a truly sustainable community.

 

 

After eight years as mayor of Los Angeles, during the worst recession of our lifetimes, LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's accomplishments for LA County's transportation system clearly stand out as his most significant legacy. In fact, he may go down in history as LA's transportation mayor.

Below is a summary of what we believe to be his Top 12 Transportation Achievements, with a link to why we think this is true and an acknowledgement that while he was clearly responsible for most of the 12 there are a few where others took the lead but his strong support was essential for success. And the upshot is that LA will have transit lines from the valleys to the beaches within our lifetimes! The impact of Measure R and the 30-10 plan alone may end up being as important to our city's future as William Mulholland's water project -- only this time the initiative was democratic because the voters had their say! (And voted for Measure by 67.83%.)

1) LA’S GOT NEW MOJO!
The success of Measure R and nationwide interest in the 30-10 Plan have yielded more than money for transportation and jobs for LA workers. It has given Los Angeles real momentum, and the confidence to think big and expect to succeed. We like to say that “LA’s got new mojo!” This could be LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s most important legacy, and the world has noticed. His efforts to expand LA’s transit system have been applauded far and wide, pushing Los Angeles into the national spotlight as an innovator after several years as the poster child for urban dystopia. The mayor’s “30-10 plan” has played in newspapers and on blog sites across the nation, with photos of the mayor and President Obama striding together across the tarmac to Air Force One, of the mayor at press conferences with U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, and with Democratic and Republican Congressional leaders in Washington DC. The mayor’s renown in transportation circles eventually earned him a top spot on of the list of favorites to succeed the extremely popular LaHood – in Governing magazine as well as on Streetsblog – though he declined consideration. “Los Angeles is the future . . . NYC watch your back,” enthused the New York Post in a story that raved about downtown LA, the city’s many walkable neighborhoods, “a decade of building real transit,” and a subway stop in Beverly Hills. Matthew Yglesias wrote on Slate — in a post entitled “How a Ballot Initiative, Visionary Mayor and a Quest for Growth are Turning LA Into America’s Next Great Transit City” — that “The usual response to too much traffic in the U.S. is to strangle growth. LA has chosen the bolder path of investing in the kind of infrastructure than can support continued population growth.” Author Taras Gresco wrote in an LA Times op-ed that “Many people are surprised to learn that their city’s reputation is at an all-time high among international transit scholars.” And international transit consultant Jarrett Walker noted, on his Human Transit blog, that “When I talk about public transit I don’t talk much about New York or Boston . . . When I really want to shift [the audience’s] thinking I talk about Los Angeles.”

2) MEASURE R DOUBLES THE SIZE OF LA COUNTY'S TRANSIT NETWORK:
It all began with the mayor talking about an iconic “subway to the sea” and then working with Congressman Henry Waxman to lift the ban on the use of federal funding for tunneling along the Wilshire Corridor so work on the subway extension could begin. A coalition of community leaders and Move LA saw the opportunity and were inspired to join the mayor in the effort. When the Measure R half cent sales tax for transportation was placed on the ballot in 2008, the mayor campaigned and fundraised vigorously to win the landslide support of 67.8% of LA County voters. Measure R helps fund a total of 12 transit projects over 30 years, ranging from the Westside Subway to the downtown LA Regional Connector to — finally! — a connection to LAX, and puts a downpayment on a real solution for the impossibly congested 405. Here’s the project list with completion dates that assume no acceleration from the 30-10 plan:
*  Extension of the Orange Line Busway from Canoga Park to Chatsworth (opened last summer).
*  Extension of the Expo Line from Culver City to 4th and Colorado in downtown Santa Monica in 2016.
*  Extension of the Gold Line through the San Gabriel Valley foothills from East Pasadena/Sierra Madre to Azusa (opening 2015).
*  A new Crenshaw/LAX corridor from Exposition Boulevard to the Green Line (to be completed in 2018).
*  The Regional Connector, a 1.9-mile underground light rail line in downtown LA that will link the Blue, Expo and Gold Lines via a central corridor from Little Tokyo to 7th Street (by 2019).
*  The Westside Subway (erstwhile the subway to the sea) extension of the Purple Line from Wilshire/Western to La Cienega (2023), Century City (2029), Westwood and the VA Hospital (2036 or sooner if 30-10 works!).
*  A Metrorail connection with LAX airport terminals — alternatives being considered include bus rapid transit, light rail, and a people mover (by 2028).
*  Extension of the Eastside Gold Line to either South El Monte or Whittier (2035).
*  An extension of the Green Line into Torrance (2035).
*  North-south transit improvements in the East San Fernando Valley Transit Corridor between Ventura Boulevard and the Sylmar/San Fernando Metrolink station — either bus rapid transit or light rail (by 2018).
*  A study of transit and highway “concepts” connecting the San Fernando Valley (at the Sylmar Metrolink station) to the Westside of Los Angeles (the LAX station) via the Sepulveda Pass. The most exciting prospect is a public-private partnership that would use toll lanes to fund a rail tunnel under the pass (by 2039).
*  A new bus rapid transit or light rail corridor connecting downtown LA and the Gateway Cities, and eventually Orange County.

3) BUSINESS, LABOR, ENVIRONMENTALISTS, DEMOCRATS AND REPUBLICANS STAND TOGETHER FOR INFRASTRUCTURE INVESTMENT -- A COALITION THAT SEEMS LIKELY TO LAST:
The mayor is a consummate coalition builder who helped create a bipartisan business-labor-environmental coalition of leaders willing to stand together — even though they’re usually at odds — on the need for job-creating business-boosting transportation infrastructure investments. He did it in Los Angeles around passage of Measure R, and then did it again around the America Fast Forward proposal in Washington DC., where amidst the bipartisan strife there was a remarkable kumbaya moment caught on video: with the mayor, Democratic U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer — the Congressional champion of LA’s cause — as well as Republican John Mica, then chair of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka, U.S Chamber of Commerce CEO Tom Donohue, and Republican leaders including Mayor Scott Smith of Mesa, Arizona, who told the press: “We have Democrats, Republicans, House, Senate, Labor, business, lambs, lions, cats and dogs lying down together. But there’s no apocalypse on the horizon. There’s a new dawn.” The mayor’s coalition-building skills were earlier evidenced when he helped broker unanimous agreement at LA Metro on the 2009 Long Range Transportation Plan, which was based on the Measure R project list. And he worked with Assemblyman Mike Feuer and the state Legislature to get both Measure R and Measure J, which would have extended the Measure R sales tax to leverage additional financing, authorized to be placed on the ballots in 2008 and 2012.

4) THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT HAS BECOME A SMART LENDER AND NOT JUST A BIG SPENDER:
The mayor has been widely acknowledged for his visionary “30-10 Plan,” now termed the “America Fast Forward” program, to build out 30 years of transit projects in just 10 years. Mayor Villaraigosa is still working with Congress to find new ways to leverage investment for transportation infrastructure by adding financing strategies to the federal government’s portfolio of grant programs. No less august a think tank than the Washington DC-based Brookings Institution has cited the mayor’s “bottoms up federalist approach” as one of the “Top 10 Metropolitan Innovations to Watch.” It’s “bottoms up” because it encourages the federal government to provide incentives for local governments, voters, corporate, civic, labor and environmental leaders to step up and help themselves — as LA County voters did in 2008 by voting for the Measure R sales tax, which can be used to secure financing from the private sector as well as the federal government. The mayor’s “America Fast Forward” proposal to provide flexible, low-cost credit assistance consisted of 1) a low-interest loan program, which was adopted by the federal government in 2012, and 2) a bond program that provides federal tax credits to investors in lieu of interest payments, which the mayor is urging Congress to adopt now. Together these programs would enable the accelerated construction of all Measure R projects. “Policymakers in DC didn’t know how to respond to a local politician who came asking for money that would be paid back, as opposed to the other kind,” wrote Jake Blumgart on the Next American City Blog. As Villaraigosa told Washington Post columnist Harold Meyerson in 2010, “They laughed. They said they didn’t have a program that could do this.”

5) LA'S PORT HAS GONE GREEN, REDUCING TOXIC EMISSIONS BY HALF:
The neighboring ports of LA and Long Beach make up the world’s fifth busiest port complex, handle 44% of all container goods entering the U.S., and support hundreds of thousands of jobs in Southern California's massive goods movement system. These ports are also responsible for more than 20% of toxic air emissions in the South Coast Air Basin — contributing more smog and particulate-forming emissions than all of the region's 6 million cars combined. In order to address this enormous problem the mayor championed a Clean Trucks Program that required operators to replace or retrofit all 16,000 dirty diesel trucks that serve the port so that they meet US EPA emissions standards, and included a $35 fee on every container entering or leaving the port to help pay for the retrofitting. The mayor's Clean Air Action Plan outlines detailed strategies to reduce emissions from ships, trucks, trains, cargo-handling equipment and harbor craft. As part of the plan ship terminals are being equipped with shore-side electricity so vessels can shut down their diesel-powered engines while at berth. The Clean Trucks program is estimated to have reduced harmful emissions from trucks entering the port by 98%. The clean air plan requires ships to reduce emissions 80 percent by 2020.

6) LA METRO'S BUS FLEET HAS EXPANDED FASTER THAN ANY OTHER IN THE U.S., IS THE CLEANEST IN THE WORLD, AND METRO'S FARES ARE THE LOWEST IN THE U.S.:
LA Metro’s bus fleet, this country’s second-largest, is the largest “clean air fleet” in the world, with every one of the agency’s 2,227 buses running on alternative fuels, all but a few of them on CNG. The mayor, working with the Coalition for Clean Air, started the clean bus program in 1994 while representing LA County Supervisor Gloria Molina on Metro committees. And while Speaker of the California State Assembly he convinced Senate Minority Leader Jim Brulte, a Republican, to co-author legislation creating the Carl Moyer Program, which still provides grants for replacing dirty diesel fleets with clean alternative fueled vehicles. The mayor also, during his tenure on the Metro board, worked under the Consent Decree with the Bus Riders’ Union to add 500 buses during peak service hours, and he championed, with other board members, the addition of nine Metro Rapid lines — which speed riders to their destinations in 23% less time than local bus service (because traffic signals hold green lights longer or shorten red lights). The mayor has also helped keep transit fares low by using the 20% of Measure R revenues that are dedicated to bus operations to subsidize fares at a time when other agencies across the U.S. have raised fares and cut back service due to economic difficulties following the 2008 recession. Metro’s fares are the lowest when compared to big city transit systems in New York, San Francisco, Chicago, Philadelphia, Portland and Atlanta. (It’s hard to make comparisons to all cities since some, such as Washington DC, calculate fares depending on the distance traveled.) Both LA Metro’s base $1.50/trip transit fares and discounted fares for seniors and the disabled (55 cents) are the lowest. Metro also has one of the largest discounted student transit pass programs, and among the lowest daily, weekly and monthly passes.

7) METRO'S PROJECT LABOR AGREEMENT AND CONSTRUCTION CAREERS PPOLICY MAKE TENS OF THOUSANDS OF GOOD JOBS AVAILABLE IN LOW-INCOME COMMUNITIES:
Last year LA Metro became the first transit agency in the nation to adopt both a Project Labor Agreement as well as a Construction Careers Policy applicable to all Measure R projects — policies that ensure there will be a union workforce and union working conditions as well as employment and training opportunities for people who live in local low-income communities. While Supervisor Mark Ridley Thomas deserves credit for taking the lead on this issue, Mayor Villaraigosa’s strong support was essential to its success. These remarkable victories by the Los Angeles-Orange Counties Building Trades Council, which championed the PLA, and the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy (LAANE) and the LA County Federation of Labor, which championed the CCP — both were championed by the mayor — won a unanimous vote by the Metro board across political lines as hundreds of workers looked on. The upshot is that all Measure R projects costing more than $2.5 million will be built using skilled labor trained in joint labor-management apprenticeship programs, and the contracts will be subject to all the protections and benefits associated with a middle-class livelihood. Forty percent of the work hours must be completed by workers living in neighborhoods where the annual median income is less than $40,000. Ten percent of the 40 percent must be struggling with poverty, chronic unemployment, homelessness or other challenges, and 20 percent must be apprentices. The PLA could cover contracts totaling as much as $70 billion if Metro fully implements its long-range transportation plan, which would translate into an estimated 270,000 union jobs. Projects that include federal funding must be open to economically disadvantaged communities nationwide. The PLA includes a no-strike provision and bars Metro contractors from locking employees out. 

8) LA IS BECOMING A BETTER CITY FOR WALKING AND BIKING:
The mayor began seriously campaigning to make streets safer for bicyclists after a taxi cut him off while he was riding his bike in 2010, and he fell and shattered his elbow. It prompted him to convene a bike summit and begin talking about the need for a 3-foot safe passing law, and he championed CicLAvia and helped fund it, meanwhile accelerating passage of the city’s long-awaited bike plan to build 1680 lane miles over 30 years. He’s remained committed, building 123 miles of bike lanes in 2 years for a total of 431 miles citywide, and he fought for the funding to increase CicLAvia to three times annually, also extending the route 15 miles to the beach. He reached agreement with the company named Bike Nation to install 400 bike-sharing kiosks in downtown LA, Hollywood, Westwood, and Venice Beach that will be stocked with 4,000 bikes – and requiring no subsidy from the city -- which would make LA’s bike-sharing program the nation’s largest. The mayor is also credited with presiding over a paradigm shift at the city’s Department of Transportation, which has taken new interest in non-motorized transportation. He oversaw the hiring of two LADOT pedestrian coordinators, spearheaded the adoption of “continental crosswalks” that are much more visible than conventional striped crosswalks, and launched a Safe Routes to School master plan. It should also be noted that while Speaker of the Assembly, Villaraigosa co-authored a Safe Routes to School bill that became the model for the national program that funds projects that make it easier and safer for kids to walk and bike to school.

9) SMARTLY NEGOTIATED PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS CAN CREATE NEW RESOURCES FOR TRANSIT:
The mayor has encouraged LA Metro to investigate public-private partnerships (P3s) as a way to encourage private sector investment in LA County’s transportation system. Upfront investments from the private sector could shave decades off project delivery time and save public agencies money on construction in today’s highly competitive bidding environment because construction costs are low, and/or save money on financing because interest rates are low – though as with any negotiation it will be critical that public officials know a good deal from a bad deal. P3s are being investigated for several LA County projects including the Sepulveda Pass Corridor, which will cost billions of dollars and could include a light rail line. That P3 partnership could involve a consortium of private firms that would design, build, finance, operate and maintain the project. The facilities would be privately operated so that the concession -- probably tolls -- could generate sufficient revenue to repay the investment. This project could be a game-changer for the intractable problem of 405 traffic  congestion, and would link the San Fernando Valley with West LA, from the Orange Line to the Wilshire Subway and, potentially, on to LAX.

10) NEW HIGH-OCCUPANCY TOLL LANE DEMONSTRATION PROGRAM WILL HELP REDUCE CONGESTION:
Mayor Villaraigosa succeeded where both New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsome failed: Bloomberg and Newsome won congestion pricing demonstration project funding from the federal government but couldn’t win the political support locally that they needed to implement their proposed programs. So Mayor Villaraigosa asked then U.S. Transportation Secretary Mary Peters to give the funding to LA instead, and he encouraged the LA Metro Board to open high-occupancy toll lanes on 11 miles of the 110 freeway from Adams Boulevard in LA to the Harbor Gateway Transit Center in the South Bay, and on 14 miles of the 10 freeway from downtown LA to the 605 in El Monte. The intent is to better manage traffic by allowing solo drivers to also use carpool lanes if they pay tolls; the carpool lanes are still free for carpoolers. The tolls are set to maintain speeds of at least 45 mph. The grant also funded other improvements to transit and rail stations, 59 new clean-fuel buses, and paid for El Monte’s new bus station — the largest bus west of Chicago, with service by Metro, Foothill Transit, El Monte Transit, the Metrolink shuttle, and Greyhound. Foothill Transit’s Silver Streak and Metro’s Silver Line — both very popular with commuters — travel on the ExpressLanes.

11) THE SYNCHRONIZATION OF 4,398 TRAFFIC SIGNALS PROMISE TO HELP RELIEVE TRAFFIC:
One of Mayor Villaraigosa’s first campaign promises was to finish synchronizing all the city's traffic signals — making LA the first city in the world to do so — in an effort to make traffic run more smoothly. The LA Department of Transportation, which developed the software to do this (and is selling it to other cities), says synchronization has increased traffic speeds by 16%, decreased travel times by 12%, and reduced carbon emissions by 1 metric ton per year. And it raises, The New York Times speculated, “the almost fantastical prospect, in theory, of driving Western Avenue from the Hollywood Hills to the San Pedro waterfront without stopping once.” The system uses magnetic sensors in the road to detect the flow of vehicles, extending green lights, for example, for buses running behind schedule. It’s harder for the system to sense bikes and pedestrians, but it does allow extending walk lights near the Staples Center during events, for example, or on Saturdays in Jewish neighborhoods. The mayor negotiated with the state legislature to get $150 million from the Proposition 1B bond measure in 2006 to complete synchronization.

12) THE TRANSIT CORRIDORS CABINET IS REORIENTING THE CITY AROUND PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION, WITH A REVAMPED UNION STATION AT THE TRANSIT SYSTEM'S EPICENTER:
If LA’s freeway system divided communities with wide roads and fast-moving traffic, the mayor and the Transit Corridors Cabinet intend to knit them back together again. The city's new 6th Street Bridge, for example, will cross the 5 freeway and the LA River to reunite downtown LA with the East Side, and can be traveled by transit, bicycle, car, or on foot — providing neighbors with the best Stairmaster in the city (check out the multiple staircases on the bridge supports!) and greening the river with paths and parks. The mayor created the Transit Corridors Cabinet partnership to facilitate projects like this by improving communication and cooperation among eight key city departments that have authority over planning, policy, design and infrastructure investment around LA's expanding transit system. The goal is to help ensure high transit ridership by providing people with more transportation and housing choices, by making it easier and more pleasant to walk or bike to stations, by ensuring there is housing for people of all incomes, and by enlivening local business districts — and in the meantime preserving nearby single-family neighborhoods. A revamped Union Station will be at the epicenter of LA’s expanded transit system, with an improved passenger concourse, consolidated bus activity, the future high-speed rail line, improved bike and pedestrian connections, and the parking lots in front of the station may be replaced with open space.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Eighty people from Minneapolis-St. Paul came to Los Angeles last year to attend the national Railvolution conference, and they were impressed, according to Dave Van Hatten, senior policy advocate for the Twin Cities' Transit for Livable Communities, who wrote this: "In the transportation and land use realm, Los Angeles has earned an infamous reputation as a car-dependent metropolitan region with major air quality problems. Today, however, a historic shift is underway and politicians, planners, and citizens are rallying around a long-term vision of greatly expanded transportation options and reinvigorated communities."

He also noted that most of the sessions at Rail~Volution were a discussion of the importance of a "multi-dimensional approach—i.e. transit and housing, and community development, and school access—that simply wasn’t taught to or practiced by transportation planners and engineers who designed most of the roads, parking structures, and transit systems in place today. This new, integrated approach is leading to significant institutional changes.

"L.A. Metro, for example, has a new definition for the 'highest and best use' of land it owns near transit stations. The new definition considers the long-term importance of affordable housing (which translates into more future transit customers), not just the highest short-term monetary return. And across the country, realtors, housing developers, and home buyers can easily assess the combined cost of housing and transportation at any precise location." (He is referring to, and links to, the H+T Affordability Index, which points out that with rising transportation costs the true cost of affordability needs to measure the combined cost of housing plus transportation.)

Van Hatten concluded that the conference "reinforced my sense that while good ideas often take time, they prevail through the committed efforts of visionary leaders and engaged citizens. Transportation is both access to opportunity and a major shaper of the places we call home."

Read his post here.

We won the award for our transportation advocacy. Congresswoman Brownley congratulated Denny for his "positive contributions to the Los Angeles region over a period spanning more than three decades." She also noted that (this is the text of her remarks):

This award's namesake, John Leighton Chase, passed in 2010. He had 
been a renowned West Hollywood urban designer, writer and advocate of 
civic spaces and vernacular architecture (which is focused on local 
needs, reflects local traditions and is constructed with local 
materials). The Westside Urban Forum, that bestowed this deserved award 
on Mr. Zane and Move LA, has for over twenty years been a prominent 
organization dedicated to land-use issues impacting the west side of 
Los Angeles.
   Mr. Zane has been a persistent advocate in the Los Angeles region 
for ``smart growth'' in local development and for bringing best 
practices to local communities, with a focus on soliciting broad input 
from varied constituencies, protecting local jobs, generating local 
revenue and limiting adverse traffic impacts. In 2007, seeking to 
support development of a robust Los Angeles regional transit system--a 
goal that had been announced already by Los Angeles Mayor Antonio 
Villaragosa--Mr. Zane, a former Mayor of Santa Monica, succeeded, with 
the help of the Annenberg Foundation, in bringing together a powerful 
coalition of major local stakeholders, including business, labor, 
environmental, and political leaders and in forming Move LA. In 2008, 
Mr. Zane and Move LA impressively led a successful effort to achieve 
the required two-thirds majority vote favoring a local tax measure that 
is expected to generate for regional transportation development in 
excess of $40 billion over 30 years.
   Mr. Zane served the public in many ways as Mayor, as a City 
Councilmember, as the director of the local Coalition for Clean Air, as 
a local teacher and now in his role with Move LA. His resolute 
commitment to public service has strengthened our community and for 
that we owe him our heartfelt gratitude.
   I have personally known Mr. Zane for many years and am most pleased 
to join the Westside Urban Forum in honoring Move LA for its 
contributions to regional transportation and Mr. Zane for his legacy of 
successful community activism.

 

 

BUSINESS, LABOR, ENVIRONMENTALISTS, DEMOCRATS AND REPUBLICANS ARE STANDING TOGETHER FOR INFRASTRUCTURE INVESTMENT:
The mayor is a consummate coalition builder who helped create a bipartisan business-labor-environmental coalition of leaders willing to stand together — even though they’re usually at odds — on the need for job-creating business-boosting transportation infrastructure investments. He did it in Los Angeles around passage of Measure R, and then did it again around the America Fast Forward proposal in Washington DC. There was, amidst the bipartisan strife, a remarkable kumbaya moment caught on video, with the mayor, Democratic U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer — the Congressional champion of LA’s cause — as well as Republican John Mica, then chair of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka, U.S Chamber of Commerce CEO Tom Donohue, and Republican leaders including Mayor Scott Smith of Mesa, Arizona, who told the press: “We have Democrats, Republicans, House, Senate, Labor, business, lambs, lions, cats and dogs lying down together. But there’s no apocalypse on the horizon. There’s a new dawn.” The mayor’s coalition-building skills were earlier evidenced when he helped broker unanimous agreement at LA Metro on the 2009 Long Range Transportation Plan, which was based on the Measure R project list. And he worked with Assemblyman Mike Feuer and the state Legislature to get both Measure R and Measure J, which would have extended the Measure R sales tax to leverage additional financing, authorized to be placed on the ballots in 2008 and 2012.

4) THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT HAS BECOME A SMART LENDER AND NOT JUST A BIG SPENDER:
The mayor has been widely acknowledged for his visionary “30-10 Plan,” now termed the “America Fast Forward” program, to build out 30 years of transit projects in just 10 years. Mayor Villaraigosa is still working with Congress to find new ways to leverage investment for transportation infrastructure by adding financing strategies to the federal government’s portfolio of grant programs. No less august a think tank than the Washington DC-based Brookings Institution has cited the mayor’s “bottoms up federalist approach” as one of the “Top 10 Metropolitan Innovations to Watch.” It’s “bottoms up” because it encourages the federal government to provide incentives for local governments, voters, corporate, civic, labor and environmental leaders to step up and help themselves — as LA County voters did in 2008 by voting for the Measure R sales tax, which can be used to secure financing from the private sector as well as the federal government. The mayor’s “America Fast Forward” proposal to provide flexible, low-cost credit assistance consisted of 1) a low-interest loan program, which was adopted by the federal government in 2012, and 2) a bond program that provides federal tax credits to investors in lieu of interest payments, which the mayor is urging Congress to adopt now. Together these programs would enable the accelerated construction of all Measure R projects. “Policymakers in DC didn’t know how to respond to a local politician who came asking for money that would be paid back, as opposed to the other kind,” wrote Jake Blumgart on the Next American City Blog. As Villaraigosa told Washington Post columnist Harold Meyerson in 2010, “They laughed. They said they didn’t have a program that could do this.”

Mayor Villaraigosa's Top 10 remarkable transportation achievements:
#5: LA's port has gone green, reducing toxic emissions by half. Read more.
#6: LA Metro's bus fleet has expanded faster than any other in the U.S., is the cleanest in the world, and Metro's fares are the lowest: Read more.
#7: LA Metro's Project Labor Agreement and Construction Careers Policy make tens of thousands of jobs available in low-income communities. Read more.
#8: LA is becoming a better city for walking and biking. Read more.
#9: All 4,398 traffic signals in the city are synchronized. Read more.
#10: The Transit Corridors Cabinet is reorienting the city around public transportation, repairing the urban fabric, and preserving single family neighborhoods. Read more.

LA'S PORT HAS GONE GREEN, REDUCING TOXIC EMISSIONS BY HALF:
The neighboring ports of LA and Long Beach make up the world's fifth busiest port complex, handle 44% of all container goods entering the U.S., and together employ more than 400,000 people. These ports are also responsible for more than 20% of toxic air emissions in the South Coast Air Basin — contributing more smog and particulate-forming emissions than all of the region's 6 million cars combined. In order to address this enormous problem the mayor championed a Clean Trucks Program that required operators to replace or retrofit all 16,000 dirty diesel trucks that serve the port so that they meet US EPA emissions standards, and included a $35 fee on every container entering or leaving the port to help pay for the retrofitting. The mayor's Clean Air Action Plan outlines detailed strategies to reduce emissions from ships, trucks, trains, cargo-handling equipment and harbor craft. As part of the plan ship terminals are being equipped with shore-side electricity so vessels can shut down their diesel-powered engines while at berth. The Clean Trucks program is estimated to have reduced harmful emissions from trucks entering the port by 98%. The clean air plan requires ships to reduce emissions 80 percent by 2020.

Mayor Villaraigosa's Top 10 remarkable transportation achievements:
#6: LA Metro's bus fleet has expanded faster than any other in the U.S., is the cleanest in the world, and Metro's fares are the lowest: Read more.
#7: LA Metro's Project Labor Agreement and Construction Careers Policy make tens of thousands of jobs available in low-income communities. Read more.
#8: LA is becoming a better city for walking and biking. Read more.
#9: All 4,398 traffic signals in the city are synchronized. Read more.
#10: The Transit Corridors Cabinet is reorienting the city around public transportation, repairing the urban fabric, and preserving single family neighborhoods. Read more.