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Portland Report
An L.A. Resident Considers the Streetcar
by Anna Scott
Published: Friday, May 8, 2009 4:34 PM PDT
DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES - Many people in Los Angeles have a serious case of Portland envy. I recently spent four days there, and it’s easy to see why.
During my time, I couldn’t help but think about why L.A.’s leaders seem to consider Portland the Shangri-La of urban planning, particularly in terms of mass transit, and even more so when it comes to the streetcar.
Fourteenth District City Councilman José Huizar last year launched an initiative to bring a streetcar back to Downtown after a 46-year hiatus. The effort, part of Huizar’s plan to revitalize historic Broadway, is partly based on Portland’s streetcar system, which opened in 2001 and is often held up as a model for other cities.
A few user-friendly features of the Portland streetcar that L.A. would be wise to rip off struck me right away: riders can enter through several doors and use automated machines onboard to purchase tickets; it’s free within downtown; and it’s closely linked to other public transportation.
On a single $2 fare one day, I took a bus from southeast Portland to a light rail station in the northeast Hollywood District (L.A. envy?), caught a westbound train that traveled over the Willamette River to the Pearl District, where I walked around a bit before riding the streetcar up to the northwest side of town. I also noticed a plethora of bike routes throughout the city and even designated bike areas on the streetcar.
It’s hard to imagine that kind of mobility in L.A. Even if a Downtown streetcar gets built, I’m ashamed to say there is a good chance I will still drive the mere five miles to work most days because of the indirect and often unreliable bus service between home and the office. And while I love biking around town, braving clogged Glendale Boulevard on weekday mornings is more than a little scary. Still, I hope that if and when it’s time to plot a Downtown streetcar route, planners will connect it to bus and subway stops such as the Seventh Street/Metro Center Station, and make it easy for bicyclists to get on and off.
Granted, Portland is much smaller than L.A. The city’s population is about 537,000, compared to L.A.’s 3.8 million, according to 2006 Census Bureau statistics. Most of Portland’s single-family residential neighborhoods are fairly near the city center, and the streetcar’s eight-mile loop covers a lot of ground within its relatively compact downtown area.
While L.A. faces more obstacles in creating a comprehensive mass transit network, a Downtown streetcar could go a long way toward uniting the sprawling Central City. As it is, the idea of walking from South Park to Bunker Hill (the current proposed Downtown streetcar route) is daunting.
While riding the Portland streetcar I noticed how pleasant most of the stops are, with small shelters, benches and sometimes greenery. An L.A. streetcar system with similar streetscape improvements could help make all of Downtown more walkable. It could also help integrate the area in other ways.
Let’s be honest — public transportation in Los Angeles is largely a socioeconomic issue: Most people only take it if they have to. While the DASH buses that circulate through Downtown see a good mix of riders, something as inviting and novel as a streetcar might encourage more people to utilize public transportation. In a recent interview Huizar noted, “There’s a demographic of people who will ride the streetcar but won’t ride a public bus.”
To be sure, the L.A. streetcar has a long way to go. Its estimated $100 million budget is so far only 10% funded. Portland’s $112 million system was paid for through a variety of sources including city parking garage bonds (the bulk of the budget), local improvement districts, regional transportation funds, and federal and city funding, according to Patrick Sweeney, a senior planner with the Portland Bureau of Transportation.
It is worth mentioning that for all of its handy public transportation and bike-friendly design, Portland is not gridlock-free. The eastbound streets out of the city center were bumper-to-bumper in the late afternoon every weekday I was there. But there does seem to be a willingness to plan ahead and put real investment behind even risky solutions.
For example, in its 1975 Central City Plan, Portland established a cap on the amount of parking allowed in its downtown. It’s the opposite of what we currently do here in L.A., which is to impose minimum parking requirements on developers but no maximums. Even Huizar’s plan for Broadway includes not just a streetcar, but also a new $50 million parking garage. Yes, Downtown L.A. is far larger and holds many more jobs than downtown Portland, so that may not be a workable step here, but it represents the kind of bold move that L.A. will eventually have to entertain again to get most of its residents thinking of streetcars, buses and trains as real alternatives to driving.
“The whole idea was to create an artificial scarcity to drive up the price of parking and encourage more people to use transit,” Sweeney said of the 1975 plan. “People working in the city know the city has a reputation for being progressive and pushing the envelope in terms of sustainability and livability. We’re always looking at what you do next to maintain that edge.”
Contact Anna Scott at anna@downtownnews.com.
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