Hope and Disappointment on the Metro Gold Line

The prospect of taking light rail transportation for my daily commute has long been my pipe dream. Ever since my father told great stories of riding the Pacific Electric Red Cars from his Boyle Heights home to Venice Beach, for a nickel, I had advocated its return. I supported every mass transit bond measure since I became able to vote. I wept as a UCLA freshman when I read of Rep. Henry Waxman blocking Wilshire subway project funding to satiate constituents – an obstacle that remained for 40 years. Watching widely separated light rail segments slowly emerge since then, I held out little hope of realizing my dream. Then suddenly, the planets aligned.

As I watched the Gold Line extension being built from my Monrovia office window last year, my employer announced a work location move to Irwindale; a three-block walk from the new Gold Line Station nearly completed there. I was elated. This solved the second part of the "first and last mile" problem with light rail in L.A.

The "first mile" problem required that I drive from my Playa Vista home to the Culver City Expo Line Station, 7 miles one way, 15 minutes duration. I made the sacrifice. The Expo train waited as I arrived and departed within minutes. A good sign. A half hour later I stepped off at the 7th Street Station downtown and jumped on the Red Line train for a 6 minute trip to Union Station, where I took a welcomed leg-stretching walk to the Gold Line platform. Along the way, signposts warned that the Gold Line stopped in Sierra Madre, even though I had watched the line extension opening ceremony on the weekend TV news. I ignored this obvious oversight and proceeded. Again, the train was there waiting, and departed within minutes. I was getting optimistic.

Once on the Gold Line train, the recorded message reinforced the signpost warning – that the end of the line was Sierra Madre. I waited for the driver to announce over the P.A. that it was an old message to be disregarded, but that communication to passengers never came.

Sierra Madre came and went and proved the warning false. The sometimes pokey run from Union Station to Irwindale station took 44 minutes, as advertised. I gazed at the San Gabriel Mountains and pondered the cars on the 210, moving slightly faster than my train, but their pilots clearly more stressed out than I. From the Irwindale station I made the 3-block walk to my office, on nice sidewalk newly constructed and landscaped as part of the station project.

I had left my Playa Vista house at 6 AM and walked through my office door exactly two hours later. By car, my morning commute is one hour, punctuated by 405 and downtown traffic. My return car trip is a miserable 1.5-2 hours, and everyone on the road is in a foul mood, from downtown all the way home. So, I was feeling pretty good about Metro.

The return trip started out as nicely as the morning leg ended, as I arrived at Union Station relaxed and on time. The short transfer to 7th Street Station via the Red/Purple Line was easy, too. Then the hassle began.

The Expo and Long Beach Blue Lines share the same track and debarkation platform at 7th Street Station, and the Blue Line is heavily used, particularly during the 5 o’clock hour. Combined with some Blue Line maintenance down-track, I waited 20 minutes as two overflowing Blue Line trains carried people toward Long Beach. Electronic signs designed to forecast train arrivals were blank and useless. Finally, the Expo Line train (erroneously signed as bound for Long Beach) pulled up on the same track - with only four cars! In the twenty minutes it had taken that train to arrive, the Expo passenger queue had grown enormously. Many were left behind for the subsequent train, and those of us who successfully boarded had to squeeze our bodies, roller bags and bicycles together. Not happy. I eventually arrived in Culver City and drove my uncrowded, quiet, private car the last 7 miles home, with relief.

Were it not for the dated signage, false recorded announcements, blank information signs, erroneous destination placards, and too few trains with too few cars during the peak usage period, I would be crowing Metro’s benefits and looking forward to my next commute by rail. Sadly, I can only report that Metro is still a second-rate transit operation. Hopefully, it will up its game. I will be watching