Nearly Half Of LA's Sidewalks Get Failing Grades: City Leaders

LOS ANGELES, CA — The city of Los Angeles' streets and sidewalks are in such disrepair they may not be ready to handle the expected influx of 500,000 visitors that the 2028 Olympics will bring, according to a motion introduced Wednesday by two City Council members.

Nearly 40 percent of the city's streets have a D or F rating, more than 8,700 lane miles are in need of rehabilitation, and the city only recently passed a $1.4 billion plan to fix its broken sidewalks over the next three decades, the motion from Councilmen Mitchell Englander and Joe Buscaino says.

Improvements to the city's streets will cost millions of dollars the city does not currently have, and the city continues to pay out millions in lawsuit settlements for injuries caused by poor streets and sidewalks, the motion says.

Englander and Buscaino were also behind a 2013-14 campaign called Save Our Streets that proposed a half-cent sales-tax hike to fix the city's streets, but ultimately abandoned the proposal. The motion says new revenue funds are potentially available that were not available in 2014, which could allow the city to "expedite massive infrastructure projects in a more efficient and cost saving manner."

The new revenue options the motion points to are Measure M, a 2016 ballot initiative estimated to raise $120 billion over the next 40 years for transportation projects, and Senate Bill 1, a state gas tax expected to raise $54 billion over the next decade to fix transportation infrastructure.

The motion, if approved by the full council, would instruct city staff to report back with various options to fund sidewalk and street repair improvements in advance of the 2028 Olympic Games.

City News Service; File Photo: (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)