LA Study shows Light Rail is luring away drivers

[spuwho]

Per Trains News Wire:

Study: Light rail line luring riders from cars

LOS ANGELES – A new study by the University of Southern California of the new Expo light rail line near Los Angeles found that people living near stations significantly reduced their driving.



USC researchers tracked the travel behavior of 103 subjects living in neighborhoods within one-half mile of a station. The results were compared against another set of people with similar demographic characteristics who live more than a half-mile from a station. Both groups had the same travel habits before the light rail line opened, and no one in either group was told they were participating in a study of the Expo Line.

The Expo Line opened in two stages in April and June 2012, running 8.7 miles from downtown Los Angeles to Culver City, Calif.



Researchers called the changes in travel behavior among residents near the new transit line "striking." After the line opened, households within half a mile of an Expo station drove 10 to 12 fewer miles each day relative to the control group – a reduction of about 40 percent. Those households also reduced their vehicle carbon emissions about 30 percent.



According to the study, the affect on society of the Expo Line and rail ridership was larger near stations with more bus lines and near stations that have streets with fewer traffic lanes, suggesting that bus service increases the affect of rail transit and that wide streets (which can be barriers to pedestrian access) reduce the affect of rail transit, at least in the Expo Line corridor.

More information on the study and its results can be found here.

https://priceschool.usc.edu/expo-line-study

[SightseerLounge]

Nice!

[JayBird]

Sometimes these studies are just plain common sense, and the people actually get money for it. Still great news, but nothing shocking. Any one of us could've said same thing and charged much less, or much more depending upon our own ego

[ProjectMaximus]

Awesome, but not in the least bit surprising.

I've still never taken public transit in LA. Hopefully one of these days that I'm out there I'll have a chance to try it out.

[simms3]

The Expo extension literally bisects an office campus we just bought in west LA (2 buildings on one side and 2 on the other with the new maint. facility and sound walls right in the easement that separates the two sides), and we have found that due to the insane car culture in LA and the nature of how things are laid out that required parking ratios for tenants are still the same.

We will have to spend well over $1M to add stackers just to get a ratio for one of the buildings back up to market, which is 3.0/1,000 SF, when a certain tenant leaves in 2015.  Other similar deals getting done at competitive properties along Olympic (the road from Santa Monica to DTLA that the Expo Line follows) are also requiring the 3/1000 ratio, still, despite the rail line going in.

Just something to consider for anyone in real estate in Jax - will likely be the same situation.  i.e. "just because LRT or streetcar abuts the property with station adjacent doesn't mean standard parking will not be part of the equation"


However, to me the most interesting thing we have learned is that one of our campus's most prominent employers is one of the premier sound editors in Hollywood (IMAX production studios is at our campus as well, and most tenants are production studios...short term and long term production space), and they were initially concerned about noise and vibrations from the trains, understandably.  They were going to leave - however we commissioned a formal study that found that standard buses traveling along Olympic actually produced more vibrations than the new LRT trains will.  End result?  Renewal, expansion, AND increased rent.

[thelakelander]

Just something to consider for anyone in real estate in Jax - will likely be the same situation.  i.e. "just because LRT or streetcar abuts the property with station adjacent doesn't mean standard parking will not be part of the equation"

Yes, many overlook the importance of integrating land use policy with transit infrastructure investments. 

Awesome, but not in the least bit surprising.

I've still never taken public transit in LA. Hopefully one of these days that I'm out there I'll have a chance to try it out.

The Expo Line wasn't open my last time in LA but I did use the Green (LRT), Silver (BRT), Red/Purple (Heavy Rail Subway),  Blue (LRT) lines, and Amtrak's Pacific Surfliner. They've developed a pretty extensive system since the 1990s. I was impressed.

[ProjectMaximus]

Yeah, I've heard it's great and when I'm there I do see metrorail stations and metrolink trains at a lot of places I go. But it's still not generally possible for me to use exclusively for my purposes. I'm usually traveling to irvine and Rancho Cucamonga so I've got to have a car. As I said, someday ill have time to purposefully ride the train.