Sunday, July 13, 2008

The LA Subway of 1925

LAist covers the 1925 LA Subway and plans for a subway network that were scuttled and given pushback. Something that is still happening to this day.
As plans rolled forward, the city's charter was being revised to allow for a subway to run parallel to a street, an action prohibited at the time by the charter in place. By August, PE was on board, provided the additional capital could be located, to have the station built under the Olive side of Pershing Square, in the hopes that the subway would one day extend further to travel beneath Olive ("Subway Extension"). So it was underground at Pershing versus at-ground level at Hill Street, with citizens registering agreement and disagreement on all sides. By mid-August 1924 action on either plan was delayed until September while all concerned parties weighed their options. (To those of us looking back from where we stand now with transit expansion, the delays seem all too familiar.)

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