Is LA the next great mass-transit city?

Photo by LA Wad/CC via Flickr

You may have heard, but the 405 freeway will be shutting down for a whole weekend later this month. Carmageddon II, as its being dubbed, will likely cause some horrific traffic jams.

But city and county leaders are hoping economic incentives will get people out of the Westside. Transportation officials are hoping drivers give up their cars and use their modes of transit for the weekend. But LA hasn’t in the past gotten the highest marks for transit.

Matt Yglesias disagrees. The business and economics reporter for Slate Magazine has a new piece out this week on how LA may be making bigger strides on mass transit than most other cities, and spoke to KCRW’s Steve Chiotakis about it.