LA Metro Board Approves 2009 Long Range Transportation Plan

The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority Board of Directors has approved the 2009 Long Range Transportation Plan that will guide transportation development in the county through the year 2040, a period in which the county is expected to experience unprecedented growth.

The population of Los
Angeles County is projected to grow by almost 3 million people over the next 30
years. The Long Range Transportation Plan examines the impacts this growth will
have on the mobility of the county, which includes increasing demand on
streets, highways, buses and trains, and it recommends what can be done to
address those impacts within anticipated revenues.

The LRTP also includes
new funding resources that include monies generated by the passage of Measure
R, a new half-cent sales tax for LA County as well as federal stimulus dollars
that will flow to the region under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act
of 2009. The LRTP anticipates the collection and distribution of $298 billion
countywide through FY2040 from all local, state, and federal transportation
funding sources. The funds will be used for transit services, highway maintenance,
and for the development of numerous transit and highway transportation
improvement projects all over Los Angeles County.

Countywide bus and rail
operations account for $106.5 billion (36%) of the uses forecasted by the plan
and bus and rail capital uses account for $57.6 billion (19%) of the plan.
Highway maintenance and improvements make up $94.4 billion (32%). Debt
service accounts for $26.9 billion (9%) of the plan and other uses $12.6
billion (4%).

Some components of the
recommended plan’s transportation program include:

•Completion of the
Eastside light rail project

• Completion of the
Exposition Light Rail project to Culver City

• Phase II
Exposition light rail to Santa Monica

• Wilshire Boulevard
Bus Rapid transit

• Downtown Regional
Connector (Blue & Gold Line connection)

• The Crenshaw
Corridor Transit project

• Eastside Light
Rail Access (Pedestrian & Bicycle link)

• Gold Line Foothill
Light Rail Extension (Segment including vehicles & yard)

• Green Line
Extension to LAX

• Westside Subway
extension to Fairfax/Century City/Westwood

• Gold Line Eastside
Extension

• Green Line
Extension Redondo Beach Station to South Bay Corridor

• California High
Speed Rail (Los Angeles County).

The LRTP also encourages
more ridesharing, walking and bike riding, telecommuting and improved
management of truck traffic and goods movement.

The LRTP is built on
strategic financial projections of revenues from federal, state and local taxes
and subsidies, as well as revenues from passenger fares, advertising, real
estate rentals and other sources.

The approval of the 2009
LRTP does not constitute final Board action on individual projects. Projects
will return to the Board for further action at key milestones in the planning,
environmental and project development process. The LRTP document itself will be
made available for public distribution in Fall 2009.

Metro Board approval of
the Long Range Transportation Plan means the plan will now be submitted to the
Southern California Association of Governments, the designated planning
organization for a six-county region, for inclusion in SCAG’s Regional
Transportation Plan.

The RTP demonstrates how
Los Angeles, Orange, Ventura, Riverside, San Bernardino and Imperial counties
will meet federal mandates, particularly air quality requirements. Only
projects and programs included in the RTP are eligible for federal funding.