Following the release of a statement by Senator Inouye at the last Little Tokyo Community Council meeting that reflected the multiple community concerns over the potential impact of Metro’s regional connector, and on the suggestion of the mangrove property developers, the LTCC members overwhelmingly approved a motion for Metro to consider adding a fifth option that would establish an underground station under the Gold Line at the Nikkei Center property.
The following statement was approved by the full council (amended wording is in italics) at today’s monthly meeting:
The Community Council is in favor of continuing the Underground Emphasis Option, which currently tunnels underground at 2nd Street, by continuing tunneling under 1st & Alameda and providing Little Tokyo with a station under the present Gold Line Little Tokyo / Arts District Station, subject to the approval of the Nikkei Center, LLC and respecting the property and integrity of Nishi Hongwanji Buddhist Temple. This would also save merchants and property owners adjacent to 2nd and Central (Office Depot block) from years of construction disruption.Among the few concerns raised included questions about the actual feasibility of building such a station, and whether or not the underground option would actually function as a terminal station that would require passengers from other rail cars to transfer to Gold Line trains. Other members were worried of the impact of this new option would have on 2nd Street businesses and the Nishi Hongwanji Temple.
LTCC Chair Bill Watanabe, however, made it clear that the board’s motion was drafted to urge Metro investigate a fifth alternative, and did not represent an endorsement nor a preclusion of any of other proposals thus far presented by Metro.
4 comments:
Another bit of wordcrafting at LTCC: "...in favor of further exploration of the Underground..." replaces "continuing".
This is good to hear. Metro may have dismissed this option prematurely. Let it be studied and costed-out, along with the other options.
(I would have responded earlier, but I've been out of town in a place without [cheap] internet access)
It seems to me like there's an awful lot of IFs involved in this "Fifth Option"..... whether this would affect Nishi Hongwanji, for example; whether an underground station would allow trains to head both north and east; how badly would this would affect the Nikkei Center...
I've been operating until now on the assumption that an underground station and wye would be too difficult to engineer, too expensive and/or require too large a sacrifice from Nikkei Center...
The MTA could very well say that it's not possible, or at least too expensive to build. There's a lot of reasons why this might not work.
IF the MTA could squeeze an underground wye in to that location, more power to them.
However, if the MTA says no to the Fifth Option, I hope that people will be willing to accept the crossing.
This is a 50 to 100 year decision. And this option will have short & medium term real estate savings plus long term operational cost savings - both for the system and for the neighborhood that also need to be considered.
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