Letters: A transit fallacy in West L.A.

Re “Growing pains,” June 10

Transit-oriented development is one thing when you have a clean slate to work on; it is another when you are inserting a light-rail line into an existing (and thriving) community like West Los Angeles. You can’t just plop a huge development like the proposed 638-unit Casden West L.A. next to the rail station, call it transit-oriented development and ignore the surrounding conditions.

Casden uses its adjacency to a future Expo Line station as an excuse to overbuild. Rather than enhancing connectivity to the Sepulveda Station, the congestion created by this project would make the station more difficult to access. And it would further slow the already glacial traffic flow at rush hour.

This is not transit-oriented development; it is a recipe for worsening the current traffic nightmares on the Westside — and this impacts not only those of us who live here but also commuters from other parts of the region who have to travel here everyday.

Sarah Hays

Los Angeles

The completion of the Expo Line to Santa Monica will change the Westside for the better, as the area becomes a more urban, more walkable area with a wider variety of housing options.

The Casden project is a model of transit-oriented development, and it should be welcomed. Situating a high-density project with a mix of housing units and retail is sound urban planning.

We live in the second-most populous city in the country. Mixed-use projects adjacent to mass transit encourage the use of that transit system and will, in the long run, get cars off the streets. Isn’t this the future we all want?

Aaron Luber

Los Angeles

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