Who Watched Roger Rabbit? The Los Angeles Metro and the Bus Riders Union
Summary
Los
Angeles,
California is known to many as the land of
cars and highways. The city, however,
has a long and rich history of public transportation, yet controversial and
contentious as well. Pacific Electric
“Red Cars” covered Los Angeles
in the first half of the 20th century, providing efficient transit
to the city. The service, however,
slowly declined and faded into the Hollywood
sunset; and despite the claims of Roger Rabbit, neither Cloverleaf Industries
nor General Motors plotted its demise.
In Hollywood fashion, however, the
transit rail sequel would prove to be even more exciting.
Much to the chagrin of Los Angeles’s minority
bus riders, expensive light rail and subway systems began dominating the
limited resources of the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transit Authority
(MTA) in the 1990s. The Bus Riders Union
(BRU) argued that rail transit was disproportionately serving white and wealthy
commuters, while their inner-city bus routes were ignored. Adding fuel to the fire, poor minority bus
riders were paying for the rail through increased sales tax and bus fares. The MTA argued, however, that rail was the
key to easing congestion, reducing pollution, and a necessity of any world
class metropolis. The two sides met in
court after BRU filed a class action lawsuit on behalf of 350,000 bus riders,
with the primary victory belonging to BRU but MTA also claiming partial
victory.
Case
Study Report
Suggested
Readings
Joe Grengs “Community-Based Planning as a Source
of Political Change”
·
This
article gives an overview of the key issues which the BRU raised in objection
to the MTA policies.
Martin Wachs “Learning from Los Angles:
transport, urban form, and air quality”
·
This
article gives an in depth analysis of the failures of the MTA’s policy from the
1980s to 1990s.
Additional
Readings
Jonathan E. D. Richmond "The Mythical
Conception of Rail Transit in Los Angeles" pg 1-7
·
This
article provides a brief overview of the history that led to the dispute
between the BRU and MTA.
University of Minnesota
CE
5212/PA5232
Jason Borah
Greg Gauer
Joe Messier