MTA Clarifies New Option for Century City Subway Stop

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority is considering moving one of the potential locations for the Century City stop of the Westside Subway Extension, the MTA said Friday.

Recent media reports that the MTA was considering a third potential location for its Century City stop were incorrect, MTA spokesman David Sotero said in a blog post. He cited the “February 18 Beverly Hills Courier front page story in particular” as containing “several factual errors” about the alternative station location and the process for evaluating and making decisions about the subway.

“There are still only two options under study for the Century City station. But this new location is an alternate site for the Santa Monica Boulevard Station option that shifts the station approximately 900 feet to the east in efforts to evaluate whether the new location would avoid the Santa Monica fault line,” he said.

The Santa Monica Boulevard station route would require tunneling underneath that street through Beverly Hills. Metro is also considering a Century City stop at Constellation Boulevard that would entail tunneling under Beverly Hills High School and the Beverly Hills Unified School District office on Lasky Drive. The MTA has said that it was weighing the Constellation option because of an earthquake fault line under Santa Monica Boulevard.

“The location announced last week as being along Santa Monica Boulevard with a portal likely at Century Park East is an alternative to the location already being studied along Santa Monica Boulevard with a portal at Avenue of the Stars,” Sotero said.

“Metro staff must and will continue to study both alternatives” for the Santa Monica Boulevard station as well as continuing to consider Constellation, he added. The MTA board of directors will make the final decision on the location later this year.

The environmental impact of building any of the potential stations must be studied in accordance with the California Environmental Quality Act and the National Environmental Policy Act, MTA and Beverly Hills officials have said.

Sotero also clarified why the MTA’s concerns about the Santa Monica fault have increased since the organization began planning for the subway extension.

“When the alternatives analysis for the Westside Subway Extension began in 2007, the best information available about the Santa Monica fault in the vicinity of Century City came from a 2005 study using a method known as ‘surface topography’ which gathers information based on visual examination. More detailed tests conducted during 2009 and 2010 have provided more information about the fault,” he said.

The BHUSD Board of Education recently voted to allocate another potential to fight any Metro effort to tunnel under BHHS. In addition, Vice Mayor Barry Brucker and other city officials continue to have discussions about the route “at an extremely high level” with MTA officials, Brucker told Patch in an e-mail.