To the detractors, this experiment is based off one done in Australia, and it can have good results. Some may decide they actually don't need to drive as much and start using more public transit, and others will be able to more precisely point to pain points with not using a car.
Yes, they need more transit oriented development and better transit access, but this should be able to help
That is the most backward way to reduce traffic I have ever heard of
It's really not?
Waste of fucking money. I think most people in LA already don't want to drive. Build good public infrastructure and see the results.
Does Japan offer people money not to drive? No, they make good public infrastructure and make it expensive to own a car
You need to know the pain points before you can fix them
The focus of this really is data collection, to find out what problems exist for those people and then once you have that data you can shift the focus towards fixing the problems
So just ask people to answer survey questions. Go to some college campuses where a lot of students commute to and ask why are they paying hundreds a semester to park in a parking lot instead of taking the horrifyingly slow and inconsistent public transport.
You need all kinds of people to respond, not just young people living on a handful of college campuses. There's only one way to do that in an area where the vast majority of people have a car.
"It's a waste of money" is a thought-terminating phrase that ruins a lot of attempts at progress. This is a drop in the bucket for a city as large as LA.
LA needs mass transit first
The history of transportation in LA is tragic because at one point they had not one, but two massive streetcar networks.
Really? I grew up there and didn't know that.
A lot of cities had them. But they got in the way of profits.
tl:dr for those that are interested.
Car Companies bought public transit (buses and street cars mostly), and scrapped it, to force more sales of their cars as people could no longer get around easily without public transit.
I visit a few times a year, and stayed once at LAX; getting to Santa Monica Pier took like 90 minutes by metro train. The metro system is beyond useless.
Why waste the money on paying people to not drive instead of using money to make the reasons they don’t use public transportation better?
Their paying for research data basically. When people say this shit ain't working and it's because xyz they can improve the public transit ! That's my thinking anyhow.
Maybe make your metro usable so not driving would be easier. It's kind of impossible to get where you need to go without a car in LA
More people taking transit will help put pressure on improving it.
I agree but I think it’s much easier the other way around. First improve the infrastructure, then incentivize people to use it.
I have to admit that I'm unsure how LA does it, but up in Washington the voters have to approve more funding for transit. Which is difficult if voters feel like transit doesn't work well to begin with and then it's an uphill battle.
Double-edged sword, I'll admit.
LA is a tough one for this because it's so spread out. San Francisco has a famously amazing BART system but the city is also very tiny compared to what most people think of as "LA".
Depending where you live and where you go, LA Metro can be useful. I use the Metro quite often, and I know the bus system is pretty expansive as well. They've also consistently been adding new lines and stops including a way to get to LAX via Metro. So it's not like improvements aren't being made.
Love that you're holding BART up as a shining example.
For getting to anywhere in the city it's awful. Within the city all lines share the same stops. if you want to go east-ish/west-ish either no you don't, or you have to transfer to a bus (which is an additional fare since MUNI is a different agency).
So would it be better at getting people into the city? Again, no. To go from my school (Cal State East Bay) to 16th and mission, a place that I went to basically weekly took about 58% longer than driving (I'm bad at math, so that may be off, but 40 vs 70 minutes). Additionally, I just did a fare caluclation, and now a round trip fare for that trip is $13.50. If I drove, it's 2 gallons of gas and the $8.50 bridge toll. While driving is slightly more expensive, the save time and "last mile" convenience usually outweighed it for me.
Oh, and the hours were super limiting on week nights (when I would go to the city).
These are two separate comments.
The metro is usable.
It’s still impossible to get around LA without a car. It’s a very large spreadout city.
Not impossible. Just very difficult. Source: I lived there for several years without a car, moved close to where I worked (twice), biked and walked most of the time, some public transit when the routes lined up, had very little social life. If there was a special event across town, could use some money saved from not having a car to spring for a taxi.
Maybe instead of paying to take the bus, we should pay people to take the bus. You're putting up with a lot of hassle to avoid taxing the roads with another car. Maybe you're owed a few bucks for your community service.
Is this not the basic premise for taking fees from fines and car related registration to reinforce public transit and proper city planning?
What society isn’t invited to think about is how cars are so heavily subsidized to the point where it drains communities instead of supports them. From gas, roads, lighting, these costs are downloaded to every single person without much thought about any other option.
Also roads are typically paid for by new road building subsidies... Meaning more roads and no maintenance.
Yes, but it's more a matter of scale. And most cities still charge bus fare. It costs cities 10x as much money to support one car commute as one bike commute, but you would be hard pressed to find a city that put even an equal amount of dollars into bike infrastructure as car infrastructure.
Sounds like a great way to get a free car!
Buy the car, park it in your driveway for the next six years and use the cash incentives to make your car payments!
Looks like its only a one time payment and only 2000 households. So its just a PR stunt. 2000 is enough for a news story but not enough to effect anything.
it's not a 'pr stunt', it's a research study.
This is the second phase of the program. It's already been successful.
Building on a successful pilot in Santa Monica, Metro is expanding the One Car Challenge to all of LA County in Summer 2026. This time, we’re inviting approximately 2,000 households to participate — and for the first time, one-car households are welcome.
Except those people will tell other people how it went... For better or worse.
I think they're researching how big of a congestion tax they need to get a certain percentage of people to stop driving. Giving someone $600 is very similar to not taking away $600.
$600? That's a joke.
If it gets people to try it, its good.
I don't know with $120 a week that some good grocery shopping there.
Parking your car for so long is not without risk though.
Might need a new car battery as it will slowly drain.
Parking brakes might get stuck.
Tires might develop flat spots.
The struggle is real.
You can just charge drained batteries or jump start cars and they'll charge on their own!
You also don't HAVE to use the parking brake if it's on your own property and if it's maintained at all, it won't get stuck anyway. I've seen them freeze shut in the winter, but LA isn't known for -30C winters, particularly this time of the year.
Flat spots from a few weeks of car being parked will go away in a few minutes of driving.
I've left cars stored for several months at a time and nothing bad has happened. Disconnected negative battery terminal so there's no starting issues either
No one's stopping a car owner from starting the car during those 5 weeks.
No one is stopping a car owner from doing that, but many will forget. And they will be unpleasantly surprised and might not join such a challenge again. Hence my heads up
Tell me you never went on vacation without telling me you never went on vacation.
Do I have to buy a car to get the 600? And move to LA.
Anything but subsidizing transportation directly hu?
That $120 a week for every resident should just go directly into better and free transit.
Hell I would bet most car infrastructure is subsidized at a higher amount per week per person.
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