Today’s urban resident is seeking a more flexible, sustainable environment — representing a unique, diverse, vibrant and responsible way of living — as an alternative to the typical development patterns of suburban and semi-urban sprawl. Can urban design help create…
19 Streetcar Models From Los Angeles Railway: Rarely Seen 1940s Photography And Construction Specifications
by Metro Digital Resources Librarian •
Archives are anything but static warehouses of historic resources — the are dynamic, organic things. New items are added, while the collection is sometimes reorganized to maximize research potential. And sometimes, you come across something that may have been there all…
Hollywood Bowl Transit, Part II: So What Did Those People Mover & Elevated Moving Sidewalk Proposals Say?
by Metro Digital Resources Librarian •
Last week, we took a look at one of Los Angeles’ proposed “future stations of the past”: the history behind the never-realized plans for a Metro Red Line station at the Hollywood Bowl. As we noted, once the station idea…
Future Stations Of The Past: Whatever Happened To Early Plans For A Metro Rail Stop At The Hollywood Bowl?
by Metro Digital Resources Librarian •
After exploring the fate of transit stations previously planned for Wilshire & La Brea and a downtown “Metroport,” we now turn our attention to early designs for a Red Line station next to the Hollywood Bowl. With various aspects of…
L.A. Under The Influence: The Hidden Logic Of Urban Property
by Metro Digital Resources Librarian •
In the American city, property rights involve not one but numerous stakeholders, some connected to the parcel by title and others through less formal arrangements, whether political, economic, or cultural. Negotiations between these stakeholders over the use of property are…
From Fuel Taxes To Mileage-Based User Fees: Rationale, Technology & Transitional Issues
by Metro Digital Resources Librarian •
This week, the University of Minnesota’s Intelligent Transportation Systems Institute has released a final report which looks at the viability and implications of shifting from fuel taxes to mileage-based user fees. Two national commissions established by the U.S. Congress recommend…
A Look Back At 1880s Cable Car Service In Los Angeles
by Metro Digital Resources Librarian •
If you asked anyone to put the notion of “cable cars” and “California” together, they would undoubtedly imagine San Francisco and its long history of cabled transit. But Los Angeles enjoyed its own cable car era, roughly between 1880 and 1890. When Andrew…
6 Years, 2,000 Posts & 1 Million Emails Later: The Top 5 Reasons You Should Be Following The Los Angeles Transportation Headlines
by Metro Digital Resources Librarian •
Our social media outreach consists of numerous online properties ranging from resource sharing to social networking, but five years ago, it all began with our Los Angeles Transportation Headlines Blog. In late 2005, taking a cue from the transportation…
How We Travel: A Sustainable National Program For Travel Data
by Metro Digital Resources Librarian •
The U.S. transportation system serves hundreds of millions of travelers and handles millions of tons of freight each day to help ensure the efficient movement of peopl eand goods in support of personal goals and domestic and international commerce. A…
A Closer Look At Failure To Act: The Economic Impact Of Current Investment Trends In Surface Transportation Infrastructure
by Metro Digital Resources Librarian •
The nation’s surface transportation infrastructure includes the critical highways, bridges, railroads, and transit systems that enable people and goods to access the markets, services, and inputs of production essential to America’s economic vitality. For many years, the nation’s surface transportation…
Movin’ On Up To Incomplete Streets: “Ultimate Traffic Relief” Through The 1946 Elevated Sidewalks Proposal For Los Angeles
by Metro Digital Resources Librarian •
How do you solve traffic congestion downtown? By removing pedestrians, of course! In our never-ending quest to collect, organize and provide access to Los Angeles’ historic traffic proposals, we have repeatedly run into some eye-popping proposals worthy of a…
How Local Politics Shape Federal Policy: Business, Power, And The Environment In Twentieth-Century Los Angeles
by Metro Digital Resources Librarian •
A notable new title about Los Angeles’ struggles with oil drilling, air pollution, flooding, and water and power supplies exposes the clout business has had over government. In How Local Politics Shape Federal Policy: Business, Power, And The Environment In…
Streetcar In The Sea Update: More About The 1950s “Transit Reefs” Of Los Angeles
by Metro Digital Resources Librarian •
Back in May, we wrote about old Los Angeles Transit Lines streetcars being dumped off the coast of Redondo Beach to create artificial reefs. That post was inspired by photo essays in the New York Times and other publications published…
60 Years Ago This Week: Los Angeles Gets Its First Publicly-Governed Transportation Planning Agency
by Metro Digital Resources Librarian •
A few days ago, we marked an important milestone in Los Angeles’ transit and transportation history. The Los Angeles Metropolitan Transit Authority (LAMTA) was formed as the city’s first publicly-run transit planning agency by the State of California on July 24, 1951. Sometimes referred…
Follow Me: Tweeting Transit News Builds Community, Knowledge & New Information Tools
by Metro Digital Resources Librarian •
We hit a milestone today: we acquired our 2,000th follower on the Metro Transportation Library & Archive Twitter account. Earlier today, Thousand Oaks Transit followed us on Twitter, pushing us past the 2,000 mark for the first time. Launched just…