Have you ever noticed that Google Maps displays Metro Subway and Light Rail stations but not Orange Line ones, even though the buway pretty much acts like train on rubber wheels (yeah, cheesy description). We posed that question to Google and a spokesperson quickly responded saying those stations would be marked on the map if Metro joined the Google Transit program. "The icons you're seeing for LA Metro stations are actually from a separate source......

If you're talking about the Orange Line, over a year. Not too long after the 2005 grand opening of the busway that travels 14 miles across the San Fernando Valley, some pavement was found to be already rutting. Metro said the contractor did a subpar job, the contractor said Metro was running more buses than estimated, therefore damaging the pavement earlier than expected. But in the end, they came to an agreement to split the......

Photo by KingoftheHill via LAist Featured Photos on Flickr As the gas prices fell last month, so did ridership on public transit. Metro documents show that people are riding less on a daily basis, but numbers are still a lot higher than usual when compared to 12 months ago or even earlier this year. The Red Line, which averaged almost 150,000 weekday boardings, suffered a near 10,000 boardings less than last in July with......

San Fernando Business Journal writer Jason Schaff is a fan of the Orange Line, but with the gas prices and higher ridership, the "Valley's Shortcut" is no longer that desirable he says. "At the end of summer 2008 the buses are crowded all hours of the day. I will go to the office sometimes at 7 a.m. – they’re crowded. I’ll come home sometimes at 8 p.m. or later – they’re crowded. I stand up......

'Metro bus variety pack, Koreatown/Wilshire' | Photo by LA Wad via LAist Featured Photos on Flickr Metro released July's ridership numbers this morning. It's up even while gas prices in July plateaued and then began to drop towards the current $4.090/gallon average. Here's how it breaks down via their statement: The Metro Red and Purple subway lines and the Metro Gold, Blue, Green and Orange Lines all set weekday ridership records in July 2008......

A fight on an Orange Line bus yesterday evening continued on after six involved people got off at the Valley College station at Burbank Blvd. and Fulton Ave. One person was shot, another was beaten and three others were taken into custody. The two injured men were reported to be in fair condition according to the Daily News.......

What? So, Metro is set to vote this week on a mixed-use residential/commercial development that will literally be feet from the Orange Line Sepulveda station in Van Nuys (you know, in that huge parking lot no one uses). "When they first came to me about it, it was supposed to be all residential," Councilman Tony Cardenas, who represents the area, is quoted saying in the Daily News. "Now they are talking about having commercial development."......

An empty Metro station is a thing of the past | Photo by Simon Shek via Flickr Yesterday, all the buzz was about the Orange Line's record ridership last month. Today, Metro released the June 2008 numbers for all their rail lines, which had an increase in daily ridership, up 12.8 percent. Around 309,000 people rode the rails, most of them, 153,928, on the subway system. Steve Hymon at the LA Times broke down......

What was originally expected for ridership on the Valley's "shortcut" busway when it started is now a weekend number as weekday average ridership last month soared to 26,596 daily bus trips, a 63% increase since the first days of the line. Now officials are looking to add more buses and are considering adding express lines. There's one problem, though: the high ridership has made it uncomfortable for at least one longtime rider. "I now take......

In the Venn diagram of "foodies" and "public transit users" all those who fall in the intersected areas, this one's for you. It comes from a post that went up today on the Chowhound LA boards, from someone who has noticed a bit of a gap in good eats that can be got to from the Orange Line. It's pretty simple; they're looking for "good chow walking distance or a short bus ride from the......

SuggestionBoxLA to Metro - No Idling on Layover! Rising fuel costs is impacting everybody, even mass transit customers, according to the Daily News. Transit Agencies use a variety of fuels ranging from diesel to CNG to electricity to Propane to gasoline. The situation is so dire that the State of California has a mechanism in place to set aside money from the State budget to send to transportation when fuel prices spike.......

Photo by Fred Camino via Flickr As gas prices rise, so does public transit ridership. It was announced today that the Orange Line had a small 1.3% increase in boardings from this time last year, but also that Metro staff has decided that the agency should extend the busway north towards Chatsworth. Legally, when looking for a solution to a transit corridor (in this case, Canoga Blvd.), Metro has to vet through all alternatives......

In January, Los Angeles City Councilman Eric Garcetti announced that City Hall and other downtown facilities would provide bicycle lockers, more racks, access to showers and a subsidy to City Hall staffers who ride a bike to work. Yesterday, Garcetti blogged that they have already won an award, the Rideshare Diamond Award, for their efforts. In other bike facility news, the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition is hosting a bike/walk tour that is open to......

Photo by phogel via Flickr After a one year hiatus, one of the best green festivals, Worldfest, is back. Two years ago, the solar-powered festival scheduled near Earth Day was a gem among the numerous green events around the city. Located at Woodley Park in Encino, steps away from the eponymous Metro Orange Line station, a slew of eco-friendly vendors showed off their wares, vegan chefs shared their creations and music and recognizable faces......

Red marks the NoHo Streetcar path. Blue marks an idea for a Moorpark Streetcar idea. After a September 2007 LAist post about an idea of putting a streetcar in the NoHo Arts District, it grabbed first-year UCLA student Nguyen Doan's attention. "It really got me to thinking about how useful a streetcar system would be and motivated me to do research on the subject." When Doan was presented with a class assignment instructing students......

The East Valley is finally getting its art house/indie movie theatre starting tomorrow -- at least the digging and construction part, that is. And unlike the two other Laemmle Theatres in the Valley, the new attraction in the NoHo Arts District will be more transit friendly with the confluence of the Metro Red and Orange lines nearby. The movie theater is the final phase of the NoHo Commons project, which includes the already-built HOWS Market,......

You can download the full 26-page plan here Metro’s Long Range Transportation Plan (LRTP), which was just released this morning, takes a look ahead about 20-25 years down the road to determine what the county’s residents will need in terms of transportation options to get around the county. It covers public transportation, some biking, highways and goods movement. The above map is the shows a basic highway and public transportation vision, funded and unfunded......

You might have to wait and be agonizingly teased for an additional three months until those LCD, screens telling you the arrival of the next train, start to work. Curbed LA reported it would be by May and now Streetsblog LA reports by the end of June the latest and tells us how they will work: Until the train is close to the station, the screens will update information based off the schedule. Once the......

Update, 5:05 P.M.: One of the patients is in critical condition according to ABC7 on air news. The Los Angeles Fire Department reports that the all patients are from the bus including the driver. Yesterday it was a close call with the Blue Line, but today is the real deal. An Orange Line Metroliner bus has collided with an automobile on the 12700 block of Chandler Blvd. between Coldwater Cyn. and Whitsett. No further details......

No, there was not a bank heist today in North Hollywood, as there was 11 years ago, the old bank building turned into restaurant/club on Lankershim Blvd., near the NoHo Red/Orange Line stops, is on fire. At 7:13 a.m. this morning, the fire was reported. One firefighter suffered smoke inhalation.The fire burned between floors and in the attic area, said Ron Myers of the Los Angeles Fire Department. After about 40 minutes, firefighters determined......

As reported earlier this week, on New Year's Eve, there will be all night Metro rail service. As one commenter pointed out, the news was actually broken in a press release where it was buried with not much detail given:“The Tournament of Roses parade and game is the biggest venue for Metro Gold Line service all year, with upwards of 60,000 train boardings on a single day,” said Pam O’Connor, Santa Monica City Council member......

Our trust and honor system on the subway, at the light rails and over at the Orange Line has been stripped away. Last Thursday, Metro voted to install the first phase of gates at stations, 275 to be exact (what's going to happen to those TAP Here machines that are everywhere?). The original intent behind the current honor system is "to buck East Coast practices and reduce operating costs," according to the New York......

The more we learn about the Temecula shooting that left five people dead, the sadder the story becomes: three of the victims of Sunday's shooting were a mother and her two teenage daughters; the remaining two dead were the mother's boyfriend and his son. A group of men in a Honda Civic opened fire on the driver of a truck on the 91 freeway today; road rage may be the culprit. The victim sustained......

Even Flat Stanley pays his Orange Line fare. The Daily News has an idea. We're not so much into it, but here is how it goes. While Metro contracts with LA County Sheriff's, the LAPD has a man who knows something about enforcing ticketless travelers on transit systems and he happens to be top cop Chief William Bratton. Some will remember that he became famous for his "broken windows" theory that enforced smaller crimes......

Yesterday, I was talking to a friend, who lives in the NoHo Arts District, about bars in proximity to the Red Line and she mentioned a dream that many share: "You know it was also be sweet if the subway was extended to 1 a.m. or later. We could bar hop into Hollywood and back!" Little known to many, the red line actually has one train that travels beyond 1 a.m. I explained this......

A few months ago, after reading an LAist writer's experience about CrossFit in Santa Monica, I knew I had to give it a try. Knowing it would be extremely intense, I kept on saying to myself, "I'll go in when I'm a little more in shape." But for me, my desired workout routine only comes into play when I am preparing for a race and I accidentally missed the deadline for next week's Mud Run......

It's better than winning the lottery. LAist is running three contests right now: a pair of tickets for Bright Eyes with the LA Philharmonic for this Saturday, a pair of VIP passes to LA Weekly's Detour Festival on October 6 and a pair of tickets for next The Crystal Method at The Roxy next tuesday. Speaking of Detour, the line-ups and stages were announced today Hopefully, citizens won't get cheated as much anymore: the......

I love standing at the front of the Orange Line bus looking out the front window, my eyes being massaged by the passing by landscaped medians, surrounded by Valley apartments and industrial buildings on the outside. Take a ride, here, from the NoHo Arts District station to Laurel Canyon Blvd. Video by Zach Behrens/LAist......

View Larger Map Ventura Blvd. is well served by three bus lines, the 750, 150 and 240. During the day on a weekday, you can pretty much walk to a stop and find a bus coming. To the north of the Valley's famous boulevard is the Orange Line, which during the same times of day seems to run every few seconds (it's only at 12 a.m. am I waiting longer than 10 minutes). Sandwiched between......

Today's LA City Beat's LA Sniper column focuses aim on 30th District Congressman Henry Waxman who led the banning of subway construction under Wilshire Blvd. in the mid 1980s. Could you imagine what LA would be like today? A Los Angeles with a subway down the god friggin' most congested city street in America? Instead we have the one of the nation's busiest rapid bus lines, the 720, which the Sniper suggest should be......