MTA receives $47M federal grant

"I am thrilled that the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) announced that the Los Angeles Country Metropolitan Transportation Authority (Metro) is the recipient of $47.75 million from the Federal Department of Transportation for the State of Good Repair Bus Initiative," Rep. Lucille Roybal-Allard said on Tuesday."Metro operates the second largest bus fleet in the nation, and this project will enable Metro to build a critical state-of-the-art facility to maintain its growing fleet of clean air buses. This new facility will replace two aging properties and will bring important new jobs in construction and bus operations to our community," added Roybal-Allard. "From my position on the House Appropriations Committee, I will continue to work hard to ensure our Los Angeles communities receive the necessary funding to keep the buses rolling. A good working fleet keeps people moving efficiently, affordably and comfortably to work, to school, to the doctor and to shop," Roybal-Allard said. Metro plans to use the funding to construct a new three-story bus operations and maintenance facility in Downtown Los Angeles to meet the agency's demand for bus service. The new Division 13 facility is located adjacent to Metro headquarters near Union Station and is planned to accommodate and provide service for up to 200 compressed natural gas (CNG) buses and will include up to a 16,300 square-foot bus operations administration building and up to a 500,000 square-foot bus maintenance building. Total cost of the project is $95 million. The facility has been designed to achieve Gold certification in accordance with the USGBC Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) guidelines and will provide a platform to perform modernization and upgrades to other aging bus maintenance facilities across Los Angeles County. Design and entitlement work for the project have already been completed and the project is expected to go out to bid for contractors in January 2011. Construction could start as soon as June 2011 and the project will be completed in spring 2013. Contributed by the office of Rep. Lucille Roybal-Allard.

********** Published: October 7, 2010 - Volume 9 - Issue 25