A vehicle crashed into a bridge support pillar on the westbound 10 near the Arlington Ave. exit around 8:15 this morning, killing five. Eyewitness calls to 911 reported that a red Lexus sedan crashed into the pillar and overturned, bursting into flames and trapping the vehicle's occupants. All westbound traffic was being diverted at Arlington. As of 9:15 a.m. the three left lanes were reopened. An investigation is ongoing.......

The Southbound 110 at Sepulveda Boulevard in Carson was shut down last night due to an oil spill that created a "slippery mess" on the lanes. After the CHP shut down the lanes, clean up crews cleaned up the mess, and the 110 reopened early this morning. It is unclear what caused the oil spill.......

iPhone photo of people walking around the streets of LAX Update: View updated story and photo gallery here. Original post below.Traffic has been blocked and gridlocked at LAX at the upper and lower levels of the airport after a man, reportedly between the ages of 20 and 25, went up to police in front of the Tom Bradley International Terminal and claimed he was a terrorist with a bomb in his bag, according to......

All southbound lanes will be closed at Burbank Boulevard until at least 1 p.m. due to an multi-car accident, including a private ambulance near the junction of the 405 and the 101 around 11 a.m., according to SigAlert.com. "Seven patients were transported to area hospitals suffering from a range of injuries from minor to critical," according to the LAFD, one child was among the injured, and one person had to be extricated from a vehicle.......

Presumptive Democratic Presidential nominee Barack Obama will be in town this afternoon. And while the man has a plan to move people (not just cars), his visit does come with traffic impacts, however minor: At approximately 2:00 pm the Los Angeles Department at 2:00 of Transportation (LADOT) will begin posting traffic officers at the intersections around the Music Center. They will then close one lane of north bound Hope Street from First Street to Temple......

Metro's Chair and City of Santa Monica Councilwoman Pam O'Connor held one of her monthly online chats with residents yesterday. StreetsblogLA was there and noted that she personally thinks transit planning needs to stop just counting cars and start counting people. You know, bicycles, walkers, people on busses -- all those aspects that make up street use. The current mainstream models mainly focus on cars, cars, cars. Ever notice in Downtown LA when walking around......

UCLA Professor Donald Shoup has been saying it for years: "inexpensive parking fosters urban decay, contributes to sprawl and motivates people to drive alone." How? It's that circling around effect, you know, when looking for spaces, avoiding valet. "Low meter rates can further congest city streets as motorists search for cheap parking spaces," the LA Times writes. "Studies in New York indicate that motorists on the hunt represent about 28% of all traffic on Manhattan......

Photo taken on 6/6/08 in Santa Monica | © Copyright 2008 by Jonathan Alcorn (Sundogg) via LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr When it comes to the cost of a gallon of gas these days, it certainly doesn't seem to be the case that "it can't get any worse." We grumbled when it got to $3, winced when it hit $3.40, cringed when it hovered at the $4 mark, and now we're seeing prices......

It's not going to stop, Los Angeles. The price to drive your horseless carriage will continue to rise as we approach the summer and demand increases. You might want to rethink that weekend trip to Vegas. The tank may take more out of your pocket than the craps table. The real loss is in the day-to-day hump otherwise known as your commute. You may have noticed a slight decrease in the amount of traffic on......

Photo by manmadepants via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr Los Angeles is not short of ideas for the how-to-do and where-to-do public transportation. The problem is always money. Ironically enough, the very thing that needs funding is one that causes the region to lose out on $12 billion a year, says one study. LA City Councilwoman Wendy Greuel writes in CityWatch: The average Angeleno spends 93 hours per year stuck in traffic.......

One of Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's traffic fixes has been these anti-gridlocked zones. But do people actually listen to signs? No. But with a threat, more will. So then came the Tiger Team, a specialized team that would patrol a heavy rush hour traffic artery to enforce the no parking signs by ticketing and towing away any vehicle parked there. Today, the fourth such team was deployed on Sunset Blvd. Five traffic control officers and seven......

Photo by manmadepants via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr Atlanta may have received top honors this time around, but Los Angeles and San Francisco linger at the back of the top ten list for worst commutes in the country, according to a report released by Forbes. And to that, they compare some LA vs. SF statistics: Commuting Efficiency: "Los Angeles checks in at 20%. In San Francisco, an extremely efficient city, 28%......

Since billionaire philanthropist Eli Broad has funded Los Angeles institutions such as LACMA's BCAM and UCLA's Stem Cell Institute, Curbed LA asked its readers what he should spend his money on next if it were to be a civic project. The "Subway to the Sea" won with overwhelming results....

Downtown Los Angeles maven and blogger Eric Richardson posted an observation today about street construction and its lack of impact on traffic. Specifically, he speaks of a transformer that's been sitting in the northbound curb lane on 6th street for several weeks. This very lane is designated for traffic during peak hours and parking otherwise, but during rush hour, traffic seems to be been fine. Richardson ponders... "if the city's content to let the lane......

Photo by pink_fish13 via LAist Featured Photos on Flickr For over a year now, the plan to make both Olympic and Pico one-way(ish) streets has been thought and fought, presented and resented. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and City Councilman Jack Weiss, the major city backers of the project, were set to go forth with the project this week. That is, until Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge John Torribio said "not so fast." In his......

Today is a big day in Los Angeles. Hundreds of thousands of people will walk in four separate marches downtown and converge at one location near City Hall. Needless to say, whether one is participating or not, downtown will be quite a scene and something different to traverse. Yesterday, we published the May Day Logistics Guide: Marches, Rallies, Traffic, Transit to help understand what is going on. Rail public transit will probably be the best......

Photo by Tom Andrews/LAist Whether you are attending a rally or just going to work, using Metrolink or Metro Rail (Red, Blue, Gold) are your best option for entering downtown, but expect more crowded than usual trains. Below, you will find information on the Marches, Traffic/Street Closures, Metro, DASH and Commuter Express. Marches & Rallies Sources: Downtown Center BID (via e-mail), blogdowntown, LADOT Map (pdf), LADOT ASTAC The first three marches listed here will......

Surfing on the Wall, by Carlito_Brigante via LAist Featured Photos Pool on Flickr. In the wee hours of the morning, a cop driving west on Victory Boulevard in Van Nuys crashed his patrol car into a tree in order to avoid a collision with another driver who was believed to have been under the influence. The suspected DUI driver allegedly was driving away from a bar, and got away after the cop's crash. A......

Photo submitted by LAist reader Tom Godfrey Here's an interesting tidbit from Sherman Oaks. At the Valley's busiest intersection, Sepulveda and Ventura, you need to cross 17 lanes of traffic to get from one corner to its catty corner. Oy vey! Would this be one of those intersections slated for a diagonal crosswalk the Mayor spoke about last week? And for those who use public transportation and end up walking many of these large......

Those of you who rarely use your cell phones while driving need not take too much notice of the following announcement (oh, and p.s.? Thanks for being better than other people). For those of you, however, who insist on multi-tasking throughout your driving experience, watch out: that phone call you're making while wending your way down the 101 might just get you pulled over and fined, fined, fined. The CHP just released a press......

Photo by Peggy Archer via Flickr On Friday, the Los Angeles Department of Transportation (LADOT) launched their new website, which is a vast improvement to what they had before. And while the site is repackaged with a much nicer visual design and an easier to find live traffic conditions page (super useful, check it out), it's still missing two important components that should be built in the near future: A guide/FAQ to parking questions.......

*Update: The freeways have been reopened, according to KNX, after police either did not find any package or confirmed it was not a threat.For the second time in recent weeks, a major freeway is closed down because of a suspicious package. KNX1070 is reporting on air that both the 5 and 605 freeways are closed in a 2-mile radius from the epicenter of the junction. Traffic is backing up from five to twenty miles......

Photo by Callie Miller/LAist A fire starting in a one story commercial building around 5:45 p.m. this evening added to this afternoon's rush hour traffic, with both 6th and 7th Street bridges closed and traffic being diverted to side streets. The Los Angeles Fire Department responded to the building at 2285 E. Jesse St. that was engulfed in a "heavy" fire that caused one of the three arch truss roofs to fail. 90 firefighters......

Morning headlines today have not been an exemplary one for public safety, both accident and crime-wise. The big ticket item was the eastbound 10 Freeway being closed in Covina after a 4:45 a.m. accident between a van and motorcycle that left the two-wheeler dead. All lanes were closed and one was reported open at 7 a.m. Also in Norwalk, a five-car crash caused three soundbound lanes on the 605 to be closed shortly before 8......

"6th Street Bridge Skyline", by the_mule via LAist Featured Photos Pool on Flickr. Britney Spears may be on her way out of Los Angeles, but she's not going quietly. The pop star was involved in a minor collision last night on the 134 in bumper to bumper traffic where she hit the car in front of her, causing that vehicle to bump the car in front of them. No one was hurt and the......

This morning an MTA bus crashed into an SUV, sending the car off the road and both drivers to the nearest hospital. The accident took place on the eastbound 134 Freeway near the Figueroa exit, which is in Eagle Rock. Cecil Manresa of the LAFD explains: The vehicle flipped off the freeway at the Figueroa exit and the passenger was reportedly ejected approximately 20 feet. The bus driver an approximately 35 year old female and......

Earlier this year, Mayor Villaraigosa introduced his 2008 Traffic Relief Initiatives, which outlines ten proposals for improving driving conditions throughout the city (full document downloadable here). One of the initiatives is called "Pico East Olympic West" (or, alternatively "Olympic West Pico East") which was labeled a "Priority Express Corridor." The three-phase project will see a "seven-mile stretch of both streets between La Brea Boulevard and Centinela Avenue" have more "consistent rush hour parking restrictions"......

Announced and passed last Friday in a Los Angeles City Council session, a hybrid owners perk of parking free was extended to 2011. Then yesterday, they reversed the decision. If it makes you angry, blame Bill Rosendahl who brought it up. "This was a great incentive when we first did it," Councilman Bill Rosendahl as quoted in Daily News. "But hybrids don't need assistance from us. They already are getting a benefit from the savings......

Photo by striatic via Flickr Unfortunately, in a city (and country) where the motto should be "pedestrians first," things are just the opposite of that. The law states that vehicles must yield to pedestrians at marked and unmarked crossings throughout the state. But the culture is not that and one can prove that to themselves by trying to cross any busy street at an unmarked crosswalk (or even a marked one in some areas).......

View Larger Map If you've noticed northbound Hollywood Way closed in Burbank between Riverside Drive and Alameda Avenue, get used to it -- it's scheduled to reopen in October. Caltrans tells the Burbank Leader that they advise commuters to use Pass and Verdugo Avenues in the interim. A new onramp is being built on the 134 freeway to help congestion flow on the busy artery near major studios and the Los Angeles city border in......