Los Angeles approves billion-dollar subway linking Valley and Westside, but funding remains uncertain

LOS ANGELES — A Metro transportation committee approved a proposal Thursday for an underground heavy rail subway designed to connect the San Fernando Valley and the Westside.

The Sepulveda Transit Corridor project aims to provide a high-capacity alternative to the Interstate 405 freeway, one of the most congested travel arteries in the United States. The proposed route would run from Van Nuys, tunnel beneath the Santa Monica Mountains and Bel Air, include a stop at UCLA, and terminate at the E Line/Expo Sepulveda station.

The committee’s recommendation effectively eliminates a controversial monorail alternative that had faced significant public pushback. The full Metro board of directors is scheduled to hold a final vote on the plan next Thursday.

Officials adjusted the current route after receiving thousands of public comments. Many residents expressed concerns regarding the risks of drilling near a high-pressure water pipeline in the area.

Funding remains the project's most significant hurdle. Estimated costs have skyrocketed since an initial 2016 projection of $6 billion.

Metro has currently secured only $3.5 billion in funding. Officials have not yet detailed a specific plan to bridge the massive budget gap, which would require a combination of federal, state, and local tax dollars.

LOS ANGELES — The Metro committee’s greenlighting of the Sepulveda Transit Corridor marks a milestone that is more symbolic than substantive. For decades, bridging the San Fernando Valley and the Westside through the notorious Sepulveda Pass has been Los Angeles’ most intractable transit puzzle. Yet, this procedural progress masks a harsh fiscal reality: the project faces a cavernous funding gap.

The $3.5 billion currently earmarked covers only a fraction of the total projected capital outlays. While Metro has yet to provide a definitive price tag, internal estimates suggest the project could swell into the tens of billions of dollars. Reliance on state and federal grants, alongside potential public-private partnerships (P3s), remains a familiar—albeit tenuous—strategy. This trajectory mirrors the California High-Speed Rail project, which has become a cautionary tale of stalled progress and ballooning expenditures due to insufficient upfront capital and shifting cost baselines.

A rare bright spot in the process is Metro’s willingness to adjust alignments based on community feedback, signaling a shift in how the agency manages large-scale infrastructure. However, this responsiveness also underscores a perennial risk: susceptibility to local political pressure, which historically correlates with protracted timelines and higher implementation costs.

Ultimately, while civic leaders champion a vision of a Los Angeles less dependent on the automobile, the current plan remains an ambitious concept underpinned by uncertain financing. As the city looks toward the 2028 Olympics, the Sepulveda project appears less a sprint to the finish line and more a grueling fiscal and political marathon.

This project directly impacts the Vietnamese community in Los Angeles, particularly in the San Fernando Valley, which is home to a significant Vietnamese-American population. A direct transit connection to major employment and educational hubs on the Westside, such as UCLA, will drastically reduce commute times and expenses for the many Vietnamese workers and students who currently struggle with daily traffic on the 405. Additionally, Vietnamese small businesses along the Van Nuys corridor—including local phở restaurants and shops—stand to benefit from the increased foot traffic once the project is complete.