What are possible traffic solutions for Los Angeles (Orange, Santa Monica: real estate, home)

[MuffinCups]

I'm sure this has been discussed ad nausem. But what are everyone's thoughts on traffic solutions for our wonderful cities in Los Angeles & Orange county? There are so many large employment centers (Santa Monica, Downtown L.A., Century City, etc.), that finding a job close to home is not always possible.

A few solutions:

1) Staggered work hours: I have worked in LA since the late 70's and most jobs (office type), require start time between 8:00 AM -9:00 PM. Why can't this we widened to as early as 5:00 AM & as late as 10:00 AM.

Of course, employers would need someone to allow employers in to the building, and each employee could choose a start time.
As long as the requirements of the job are being met, and it is not a job that requires customer/co-worker interaction.

2) Carpools and vanpools: Great except for a few details.
Many workers have other obligations after work, during lunch, etc. Picking the kids up, taking them to soccer practice, ballet school, the dentist, etc.
A second job, attending college after work, working out, etc.

Carpools assume that the riders & drivers and going from point A to point B and return to point A at the same time every work day. This may have worked in the 50's with one parent working, walking to the local lunchette and returning to work. Most errands were performed by the stay at home parent who kept the car or drove the employee to the train station.

3) Bus: This is a method of transportation that often takes longer or as long as commute by car.

4) Work from home: Many computer based jobs, such as accounting, financial reporting, IT based, marketing jobs could be performed at home. The employee can report to work for a few hours 2 days a week to meet with management or pick up necessary paperwork.

When I asked my manager if I could work from home, he said no. He was concerned about the safety and security of the financial information I was working on. I told him it was just me and the dog, and my dog never learned to read, I got that look and a no answer.

What are your solutions?

[Charles]

Originally Posted by MuffinCups

There are so many large employment centers (Santa Monica, Downtown L.A., Century City, etc.), that finding a job close to home is not always possible.

But finding a home close to a job is possible.

Working 6-230 solves all but the worst commuting situations.

Become familiar with the traffic patterns by studying www.sigalert.com for potential routes before you consider a home location or a work location. Google maps now has street traffic for LA. It also has historical or predicted traffic on the freeways.

[ehcsrop]

Years ago, I belonged to a trade union. I would be driving to a job 30 miles away and some joker would be driving to a job in my local area. I often wondered why there wasn't a job exchange program to trade one worker for another. Shoot, union workers are all usually qualified somewhat equal.

Well, fast forward. A lot less union workers. Still, a job exchange could be a viable concept.

[Snort]

"Clunkers for Helicopters Program". Cash incentive rebates for those who trade their cars for helicopters. This will take cars off the crowded freeways and take advantage of unused airspace. L.A. needs to move into the third dimension!

[Charles]

Originally Posted by Snort

"Clunkers for Helicopters Program". Cash incentive rebates for those who trade their cars for helicopters. This will take cars off the crowded freeways and take advantage of unused airspace. L.A. needs to move into the third dimension!

There you go..That's good.

Now, if we could only get Cal Worthington to open a dealership.

[Snort]

Now, if we could only get Cal Worthington to open a dealership.

I'm glad someone else is thinking like me! They could teach Cal's tiger to do a simple take-off maneuver, put it in a commercial, and that would have them coming in to helicopter dealerships in droves.

[matt345]

IMO, LA's traffic problems have a lot to do with the fact that it chose to be car city, opting for freeways instead of mass transit, yet it built an incomplete freeway system. Century City was built in anticipation of the Beverly Hills freeway, yet it was never built due to resident opposition. Then decades later they try to build a subway through that area and residents oppose that too.

You want to be a car city? Fine. But let the planners construct the freeways necessary to be a car city. You don't want that freeway built through your neighborhood? Then let them build a subway. You can't have it both ways.

[uptown_urbanist]

Don't forget that LA's public transporation options are not limited to the bus. It doesn't work for everyone, of course, but the system of buses, light rail, subway, and commuter rail, (and bikes for the brave, and walking for the lucky) is fairly extensive and is expanding. I commuted to work by public transportation, as well as worked some hours at home. Not everyone is able to use public transportation, and not everyone is going to use it all the time, but if more people used it some of the time we'd start to see a difference. Companies could encourage this by offering discount transit passes and not paying for employee parking.

[NickelDime]

Two points:
1) Bus systems are by far the most economical to create and modify. As long as we continue to respect the MSRP and nameplate on a car, busing will be a badge of ridicule. That's unfortunate but true.

2) Opportunities to work from home will continue to shrink as the economy has soured and employers believe there is more visibility/productivity/accountability from their office-based employees. Yeah, I know you are more productive without being interrupted and have everything you need blah blah blah, but the rest of the slugs in the office have to constantly bring you up to speed on the issues at the office that aren't in memos and emails. So there's a missing context element. In the last three companies I have worked, every single C-level executive without exception frowned upon working from home, save for very specific and narrow jobs that a) required it (sales; space issues, etc) or b) had people that had highly specialized knowledge and it was used as a carrot to keep them connected to the company. In the case of (b), the situations are not generally long term.

[bhcompy]

I've worked from home for a Fortune 500 doing software support and installations for the past few years. Lost my job during the reception, but it's a growing industry as businesses try to cut costs by getting rid of excess real estate.