A new subway canopy is being installed at the Civic Center/Grand Park metro stop
This past February, we saw the exciting newly designed canopies (renderings) that will be installed at many of our subway portals in Los Angeles, giving our fledgling subway network a stronger identity in a city still dominated by automobiles. Many people have complained about the lack of a strong visual marker for our metro stations that are easily missed if you aren’t a familiarized and regular transit user. One of the first stations to get these new canopies in Downtown LA is in the Civic Center.
The new Civic Center metro canopy is a welcome design enhancement that complements the new Grand Park — both catering to pedestrians. There are two portals for the Civic Center station, but only the one within the actual Grand Park has received this new canopy treatment so far. I assume that after this one is completed, the other portal will get the same new canopy.
Another view of the new canopy at the Civic Center station
“New canopies are now being installed at Downtown Metro Rail stations.”
The station portal is still in use during construction
A look underneath the new canopy under construction
A rendering of what the Civic Center station will look like after the canopy is installed (Photo: Behance Network)
They’re preparing the area for supports around the other portal. There’s no physical structure in yet, but construction activity has started.
Thanks for the confirmation regarding the other portal at Civic Center. It’ll be pretty cool when all the portals get this new canopy design, including the Pershing Square portals.
So that’s where the subway portal is! I never knew there was one at that location until I saw the pictures of the canopy. Adding these portal canopies really brings a higher degree of visibility to the whole system.
Isn’t the Pershing Square portal meant to accomodate a building over it? That’s what really needs to happen there IMO.
Protects the inner workings of the escalators. A good investment and also a chance to introduce the Purple Line colors to the station.
Will these stations have colors on the canopy? At the Civic Center station it would be considered Red and Purple.
Metro needs to throw away the color system and go with a Letter and Number system similar to what New York has. When the Regional Connector is built people are going to be very confused as to what train to catch. If you are going from Long Beach to Pasadena is that the Gold Line or the Blue Line? If you are going from Pasadena to Santa Monica is that the Gold Line or the Expo Line? If you are getting on the train in Pasadena and going to Long Beach that should be something like the “A Train” and if you are going from Pasadena to Santa Monica that should be the “B Train”. If you are going grom Pasadena to East LA then that should be something like the “C Train”.
Metro really needs to be thinking about this now because once people get too hung up on the color system then it will be extremely difficult for people to get used to a different system.
Tony, that’s the plan for the future… Not confirmed at any specific time, but it’s supposedly the general idea for the future.
I wrote a little bit about it here:
http://steven-white.com/2012/07/25/the-secrets-of-metro-rail-operations/
But, with the Regional Connector, it won’t be as confusing as you say… the light blue Expo will go away to become Gold Line from Santa Monica to East LA, and the Blue Line will go from Long Beach to Pasadena.
How is referencing the Gold Line any different than the A train? Did you know that Minnesota ditched their naming system and went to a colored system? Did you know that London has a random name system (i.e. Jubilee Line, Picadilly Line, Circus Line, etc..), but yet people still figure out the system? Changing the Gold Line to the A Line would do nothing. Though New York is great, it’s not like we need to make everything “like NY”. Chicago uses a colored system and nobody gets confused there.
Although in the minority, I happen to be color-blind. The combination color/name works better than color-only (i.e. London) only when there’s a fully annoted map. However, many of the Tube maps in London (particularly pocket & on brochures) were color-only and I had to ask strangers for help as to the name.
LA should have such problems —– a system is so extensive that there are two shades of blue and both gold & yellow. Hopefully, this will happen someday!
It would have been nicer if these portals were structured to accomodate more amenities (like vendors such as newstands, food carts, etc.), especially the ones with nothing around them or no retail close-by (like the one on 1st and Hill St.).
Let’s hope the canopies are better maintained than the stations. If those glass roofs are not cleaned regularly, they’ll just advertise the unfortunate conditions below. (See the glass enclosed elevators.) Most of the stations I’ve been through could use a good stream cleaning or pressure washing.
I’m glad to see progress on these canopies. I’ve often wondered if Metro really wanted people to know that the stations exist because the current signage is so poorly executed. Baby steps, I guess.