L.A.'s New Subway Not A Huge Traffic Solution

"[T]he subway's draft environmental impact report states that the project will give transit users more options and allow them to travel across town much faster than the municipal buses that serve the densely populated Wilshire corridor.

Transit officials estimate that a one-way subway trip from downtown Los Angeles to Westwood would take about 25 minutes, something that is now difficult to do in a car at rush hour. Buses make the trip in at least 50 minutes, a time that will only lengthen as Wilshire Boulevard and parallel thoroughfares become increasingly choked with traffic."

The study shows that by 2035, automobile use will be reduced by just 1%. Reduction in car use had been one of the proposed line's selling points.