After six years of campaigning, the Wilshire Boulevard Bus-Only Lanes
project took an important step forward, with the Los Angeles City
Council voting to approve the project and move it forward.

After six years of campaigning, the BRU scored a major environmental victory today: the Wilshire Boulevard Bus-Only Lanes won the resounding approval from the LA City Council and cleared the last major political hurdle for it to become reality

Planners from UCLA, USC and across the city weigh in on Bus-Only Lanes debate with a clear message: the complete 8.7 mile project is clearly the best choice.

Tomorrow, our six-year campaign for Bus-Only Lanes on Wilshire Boulevard will finally face a vote at the Los Angeles City Council. We are close to sealing the deal on this important project, but not before overcoming continued efforts to cut down the project at the behest of wealthy West Side homeowner groups.

With the battle lines drawn, the 5-member committee could not agree on any option and ended the meeting taking no action at all.

We need a strong showing from the broad coalition we have built for this project to come out tomorrow, Wednesday, June 8th at 2PM at the City Council Room 1010.

While the Bus Riders Union believes that the full 8.7 mile alternative is the best project and should be adopted by the city council, we see yesterday’s vote at the MTA board as a key advance in defeating the worst case alternative 5.4 mile option that the Brentwood homeowners have been pushing for and in moving the Wilshire Bus Only-Lanes project one step forward to reality.

Missed the April MTA board meeting? Get the update and watch the highlights on video here. Watch BRU member Crystal McMillan tell the board, "empty seats on a train to Antelope Valley don't replace lost buses in Koreatown!" 

We've been gaining a lot of momentum pushing back against the MTA's staff claims that the 305,000 hours of service cuts that they have proposed for June 2011, are to address service duplications, and that these cuts will make the system more "efficient".

The fate of the Wilshire Bus-Only Lanes Project will be determined this May at the Los Angeles City Council and the Metro Board. We need you all to raise hell that LA should not compromise this decade long transportation project and the federal funding that w

LA Times columnist David Lazarus fights against bus cuts and advocates for designated bus lanes, commuter routes, and a commitment to public transit in order to ease street congestion.

LA Times columnist David Lazarus fights against bus cuts and advocates for designated bus lanes, commuter routes, and a commitment to public transit in order to ease street congestion.

On Thursday, March 24th 2011, the MTA Board met to vote on the first
part of the proposal to cut 600,000 hours of bus service. The meeting
and its decision brought on a slew of press coverage.

"It is time for MTA’s bureaucrats to realize that higher efficiency in transportation does not mean for the passengers to have to wait longer, ride the bus packed like cattle or have a route that takes longer."

The BRU was in the news in the wake of Thursday's announcement of the Federal Transit Administration's upcoming investigation of the Los Angeles MTA. Los Angeles, along with Atlanta, Georgia will be investigated for compliance with Federal Civil Rights statutes.

When Univision reporter asked BRU Lead organizer Esperanza Martinez "So what are you protesting today?" Martinez responded, "Primarily we are here today not in protest, but to celebrate an important tactical victory in the fight against the MTA's proposed Bus Service Cuts. This signficant move was triggered by an administrative complaint submitted last fall by the BRU, LACAN, and KIWA to the Federal Transit Administration who will now be conducting a comprehensive on-site civil rights review of the MTA."

Breaking News - (Los Angeles, CA, March 14, 2011) - The Federal Transit Administration specified, in a letter in response to the Bus Riders Union (BRU) Administrative Complaint submitted in the fall of 2010, that it "plans on conducting an on-site compliance review of LA MTA this year. The decision to perform this compliance review was based, in part, on your (BRU) complaint submitted to the FTA Office of Civil Rights."

Today the BRU Street Theater presented a piece on the impacts of two sets of MTA Bus Service Cuts on bus riders. The piece 'Francisca y la muerte/Death
Searching Francisca' invites you, the spectator to become an actor and call
Sup. Mark-Ridley Thomas asking him to take a stand to stop the
cuts.

See video here and learn how to take action here

 

MTA is proposing to cut 355,000 bus service hours, including eliminating 11 lines, and truncating or reducing 16 others. If adopted by MTA's Board, these reductions will be implemented in June. The maps below show all the routes that will be impacted under this proposal.

A new study by UCLA economist Paul Ong, commissioned by the BRU, finds that MTA policies are squeezing transit riders at both ends. The study reveals that two years after the federal stimulus, fare increases place a burden on transit-dependent people already hit by high unemployment and declining wages.