Beverly Hills Subway Extension Needs to Go Under 90210 High School, Metro Says: District Blasts Earthquake Report

By Dennis Romero Thu., Oct. 20 2011 at 7:08 AM

Beverly Hills vs. Metro.

Beverly Hills schools have been in a battle with Metro over its plans to tunnel under the famous 90210 high school as part of the "Westside Subway Extension."

As our Patrick Range McDonald reported in an LA Weekly cover story, the line has essentially been bent from a more straight shot down Santa Monica Boulevard to coincide with plans by a friend-of-L.A.-Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa to build a skyscraper on "sleepy" Constellation Boulevard. And that would put the subway and tunneling under Beverly Hills High.

This week Metro, where Villaraigosa holds much sway, issued a report stating that seismic activity begs it to move the subway stop to Constellation. The school district is pissed:

Beverly Hills Unified School District (BHUSD) president Lisa Korbatov accused Metro of sitting on seismic data at a time when the schools had been asking for it.

She says ...

Metro

The dot to the south is the Constellation Station.

... Metro has opened a veritable Pandora's Box that potentially impacts many dozens of existing buildings and future projects in the region, including Beverly Hills High School, future station locations for the Westside Subway Extension as well as currently entitled development projects. It is unfathomable that Metro has had this important seismic data available for such a long time without providing it to the BHUSD or other interested parties in the purported earthquake zone. Much of the data presented today has been available for almost a year. The fact that Metro held it for so long poses many questions ...

According to a summary of Metro's report, it proves ...

... that a subway station in Century City should be built under the intersection of Constellation Boulevard and Avenue of the Stars to avoid two earthquake faults in the area.

Metro says that tunneling under the high school won't threatened the buildings above. Looks like no one is stopping this train. Guess we'll see if it all holds up in the end.

[@dennisjromero/djromero@laweekly.com]

Tags:

Beverly Hills, Beverly Hills High School, Century City, Constellation, Metro, MTA, Subway to the Sea, Villaraigosa, Westside Subway Extension

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Stocktrader

The subway is a total waste of taxpayer money. It's hardly going to put a dent in the massive amount of traffic on the West Side. By the time the subway is complete, LA population will have increased by another 30%. LA is a car city, and will always be one.

westLA

LA Weekly's continued slant in coverage of the Subway to The Sea is a tremendous disservice to the community it claims to provide reliable, applicable coverage to. The Subway to The Sea should pass through Century City, then back to Westwood Village to capture the true ridership and potential convenience for its users. Beverly Hills Schools is just pissed because that is what they have time to be, to be pissed.

Ridership of the subway system will only increase with generations, causing dramatic shifts in our yet-born children's' commute patterns, which no study can predict, and desired living locations (who knows, maybe Downtown will benefit the most from this forcing Santa Monica landlords to finally make improvements to their apartments to attract renters - evening-out rents and housing prices throughout the City, and unlocking the choke-hold the 405 has on the Westside).

Opponents to this improvement are extremely short sided and have no interest in leaving the City better than how they found it for future residents - it's just about them (Me, me, me).

Dennis Romero

The facts are the facts. (And I'm not anti-subway, just pro-fact).

-The line is being "bent." One look at the map will tell you that. Santa Monica was the primary route and Constellation was a secondary consideration.

-If this is about picking up the most people along the route, so be it. Then why is Metro saying it's about earthquake safety? They're saying that, not me.

-The stop is under or almost under a proposed development by a friend of Villaraigosa. Make of that what you will, but don't kill the messenger.

-Beverly Hills isn't anti-subway. It's anti-subway-under-their-high school. The district, city and community seem to support the original Santa Monica route which, by the way, would have a few riders too being pretty much adjacent to the city's main shopping and dining district.

WestLA

1. Who cares what excuse they are giving now for it being "bent", it is obviously the better stop for the most ridership and that should be the only concern.

2. What commercial developer isn't connected or a friend of Villaraigosa, or anybody else on the City Counsel. Any other developer would be friendly with the City's political environment and if it wasn't a friend of Villaraigosa it just be a friend of someone else. The weak writers and pretend journalists love bringing these types of things up when it really doesn't matter. I guess I will have to go back through every article you have ever written to ensure that you disclosed all the connected relationships for every development you have harped on in the past just to make sure you are being consistent.

Bostjan Avsec

"WHITES AREN’T WELCOME IN AMERICA ANY LONGER" !!! OUT OF AMERICA WITH WHITES NOW !!! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v... OR http://www.youtube.com/user/Bo... <== OBAMA'S HEALTH CARE RECORDED LIVE IN 2009. These are hard facts about lunatic ZIONIST Obama/Bush's twilight zone administrations(HORROR) or genocide against white population(ask your local newspaper/media why do they KNOWINGLY keep silent about crime/genocide !!? Ask them why do they KNOWINGLY participate in crime/genocide !!! BECAUSE SILENCE = CRIME !!!). Just in case ( http://www.dailymotion.com/vid... and make sure to play one from beginning..you already know why)

LionsandTigersandTrainsOhMy

Ha Ha!

That information that MTA was supposedly sitting on has been publicly available for a long time. If Ms. Korbatov would have made an effort to get off of her behind, she would have discovered that it is readily available from the USGS. It's even available as a Google Earth overlay!

Edward

It doesn't make sense for the stop to be on Santa Monica next to a golf course when the center of Century City is Avenue of the Stars/Constellation. The line hasn't been "bent" for development. The station should be located where it will get the most ridership. I'm getting kind of sick of the L.A. Weekly's consistent anti-transit reporting.

Joelcov

Metro is right. The tunnel should go directly into the heart of Century City, where the jobs are. The irrational fears of safety problems have been neutralized by facts, logic and science.

No subway tunnel has ever caused safety problems at the surface. Subways are incredibly sturdy in earthquakes. And this tunnel, between 70 and 100 feet below the surface, has plenty of buffer earth to make any terrorist attack infeasible.

If Beverly Hills is adamantly against a subway, I could also support an elevated train through the Beverly Hills city limits. How does that grab ya?