The latest victory for opponents of a skyway gondola project that would carry fans to and from Dodger Stadium came last week in Sacramento, when an amendment to a transit bill that would expedite the project’s regulatory approval process suddenly was removed by the bill’s author.
By striking Section 3 from Senate Bill 71, carried by state Sen. Scott Weiner, D-San Francisco, the legislation no longer contains the controversial amendment speeding up resolution of court challenges and forcing quicker mediation for future attacks against the transit project backed by former Dodgers owner Frank McCourt, who owns 50% of the parking at the Dodger Stadium.
The removal of the amendment by Weiner, posted on the California Legislative Information website Sept. 2, was characterized by members of the Los Angeles City Council — along with an alliance of opponents from Chinatown, Elysian Park and other impacted communities and the Central LA Chapter of the Sierra Club — as the power of the people winning over the influence of a billionaire and his lobbyists.
It also assumes a return of the project’s normal path toward construction and operating permits — one that will require approvals by the L.A. City Council, the city’s Department of Transportation, Caltrans, the state Parks and Recreation Commission and LA Metro.
“I am grateful for Sen. Scott Weiner hearing and listening to the community and making the changes to his bill,” said City Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez, of City Council District 1 during an interview on Friday, Sept. 5. Hernandez was joined in opposition with Councilmember Ysabel Jurado, of City Council District 14, both of who represent affected communities.
An artist rendering of what a gondola would look like en route to Dodger Stadium from Los Angeles Union Station. The project has received pushback from area residents and support from clean air groups. On May 1, 2025, an appellate court ruled the EIR must be rejected, along with approvals by LA Metro, until more environmental reviews are done. (Courtesy of Los Angeles Aerial Rapid Transit )The proposed 1.2-mile aerial tramway would transport baseball fans via sky-high gondolas on cables above Chinatown, Solano Canyon, El Pueblo and Chavez Ravine gliding in overhead buckets that accommodate 30 to 40 passengers. It was estimated to transport 5,000 passengers per hour, with each ride lasting about seven minutes, according to LA Metro. The zero-emission project would include three stations with 13-story towers on Alameda Street across from L.A.’s historic Union Station, atop Chavez Ravine and at the south entrance to the Los Angeles State Historic Park at Spring Street.
The two council members joined members of the LA Parks Alliance — made up of about a dozen community groups that held a rally at the new park on Monday, Aug. 18, the day before the legislative session started. They spoke against the bill’s amendment as a sneaky deal to benefit McCourt’s $500 million project, and pointed out that the station and cables would mean removing 81 shade trees in a westerly section of the park. In total, the project would remove 304 trees.
Aerial Rapid Transit Technologies (ARTT), a limited partnership that McCourt formed, was bankrolling the environmental review and design process. Last year, McCourt Global gifted the project to a new entity, Zero Emissions Transit (ZET).
Nathan Click, spokesperson for ZET, said last month after the demonstration that the bill’s special amendment in essence means the project would be given an expedited judicial review that must be completed within 365 days, faster than two to three years as has sometimes been the case in environmental legal reviews. Click said it is just one provision of the larger bill that extends current law regarding judicial reviews of environmental planning documents for zero emission transit projects that includes the ZET gondola project.
“It doesn’t add any new exemptions,” Click said.
In the past few weeks, the mass demonstration and reports of fast-tracking the project via his bill’s amendments reached Weiner, who has a favorable environmental record. He received many letters, a visit by Hernandez, and learned of opposition to the amended bill by the entire L.A. City Council and L.A. Mayor Karen Bass, said Dean Florez, a former state senator and assemblyman who now runs Balance Public Relations focusing on helping companies work with Artificial Intelligence.
“Having that press conference on the Monday prior to the legislature reconvening was brilliant,” Florez said. “Those arguments, and the enormous amount of press generated, caused the senator to say ‘What have I been sold?’” he said.
“In 30 years when I was in the Senate or Assembly, I’ve never seen an amendment to a bill disappear so quickly,” Florez added.
The project’s environmental status took a hit in May when an appellate court ruled in favor of opponents, requiring additional environmental reviews before the project could go forward. The court overturned a lower court ruling that praised the project’s environmental attributes and public benefits.
Jon Christensen, founder of the L.A. Parks Alliance and the plaintiff in that case, has strongly opposed the project on grounds that it will damage historic neighborhoods of L.A., add blight and traffic to communities and intrude on the solitude and aesthetics of the L.A. State Historic Park.
“It is a great victory and we are celebrating now. But the fight is not over,” said Christensen, who led the Aug. 18 rally against the project and the bill’s amendment.
Christensen said Weiner recognized the coalition included multi-ethnic groups — residents who would look out and see cables and towers, and gondolas filled with people dangling 26 feet above park picnickers. “The people used their bodies to show how the gondola would pass over the heart of the park and dozens of mature shade tree would be cut down,” he said of the protest.
Protestors on Aug. 18, 2025. hold a rope to mark the areas of the Los Angeles State Historic park which would be affected by the gondola project. The gondola project would take fans from Chinatown to Dodger Stadium via an overhead aerial tramway. (Photo by David Crane, Los Angeles Daily News/SCNG)What’s next for the project without the special provision in the bill?
Christensen said the bill would expedite public transportation projects by lessening review times. These include bike paths, pedestrian infrastructure, light-rail trains, ferries and bus rapid transit projects.
Had the amendment stayed, it would have extended fast-tracking to the aerial tramway by affecting reviews from cities, L.A. County and LA Metro. “It would have extended expedited reviews to much more complicated processes,” he said.
Recently, the appellate court threw out the environmental review and asked LA Metro to do more research on how construction would affect nearby households and the El Pueblo de Los Angeles Historical Monument, the birthplace of Los Angeles. That Environmental Impact Report will have to be re-drawn and re-approved by LA Metro’s board.
The opponents say without the special amendment, even if the bill is adopted and signed into law, the project will need approval from the California State Park and Recreation Commission. Currently, a transit use is not legal, so a special exception would be needed from the commission, Christensen said.
Hernandez has ordered a traffic study of the area, something she said was missing from the EIR. The city of L.A. has recently met with a potential contractor to do the study. But that will take several months to complete, she said.
No project approval can be given by the city until the traffic study is completed.
She wants the study to look at other options for getting to Dodger Stadium on game days, such as more LA Metro buses that could include an expansion of the existing Dodger Stadium Express buses that currently run from Union Station to the stadium entrance.
Dodgers fans can catch the Dodger Stadium Express bus at Union Station in downtown Los Angeles and at the Harbor Gateway Transit Center in the South Bay along the 110 Freeway for all home games, The round-trip connection is complimentary with a Dodger game ticket. (Courtesy photo)“We need to look at other partnerships with LA Metro, such as using electric bikes and better walkways, something we call mobility hubs,” Hernandez said. “We hope we can get answers to a lot of questions we have.”
Related links
Gondola project from Union Station to Dodger Stadium gets first approval from LA Metro Dodger Stadium gondola foes lash out at bill, fear potential damage to LA State Historic Park L.A. Councilmember Hernandez seeks to halt Dodger Stadium gondola project until traffic study is done Dodger Stadium gondola project backers win round in court Appeals court puts Dodger Stadium gondola project on hold
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