The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority board voted Thursday to dedicate the Wilshire/La Brea station on the Purple Line extension to former Metro director and Los Angeles City Councilman Tom LaBonge, who died on Jan. 7.
The station, which is scheduled to open in 2023, will still have signs marking it as “Wilshire/La Brea,” so that people know where they are when they arrive, but there will be additional signage marking the dedication to LaBonge, according to Los Angeles Mayor and Metro board Chair Eric Garcetti.
MTA board member and Los Angeles County Supervisor Janice Hahn said the tribute was fitting for LaBonge, whose enthusiasm for the city and seemingly endless knowledge of its history earned him the nickname “Mr. Los Angeles.”
“Nobody was more excited about transportation, about showing up for work, and it wasn’t just for residents of Los Angeles,” she said of LaBonge. “He was a big believer that all the international visitors that came to Los Angeles, he wanted them to have the exact same experience, he wanted them to love Los Angeles, he wanted them to show up at LAX and be able to navigate our public transportation system,”
Councilman Mike Bonin, who is also on the MTA board, agreed.
“Tom’s enthusiasm for transportation was absolutely unbridled, and I know because as chair of our transportation committee with him as a member on it, I often tried to bridle it,” he quipped.
“The only thing that could make (the dedication) more appropriate for Tom LaBonge is if you decided instead of Wilshire/La Brea, you actually put an underground stop at Griffith Park itself, that would be the ultimate Tom LaBonge move,” Bonin said.
On Tuesday, the city announced that Mount Hollywood Summit in Griffith Park, where LaBonge often hiked, will be renamed the “Tom LaBonge Summit.”
LaBonge died at his home in Silver Lake, one of neighborhoods he represented from 2001-15 as Los Angeles’ Fourth District councilman. He was 67.