Yeah the guy has got it: There needs to be more connections to other employment hubs other than downtown.

THe biggest and most important one to connect is the Santa Monica / Westwood area (where UCLA is). I think I read somewhere that the employment density is even higher there than in downtown. This area needs to get connected to both a rail line that goes downtown, but also a rail line that runs north into the valley.

One big reason we don't have this is that any rail line running north into the San Fernando Valley has to pass through Bel Air, and the rich people oppose anything being built around them, over them, or beneath them. Even if the underground rail lines won't affect them, they still oppose it.

In Los Angeles, the fact that most train lines terminate downtown limits options for those living in more remote areas. This not only exacerbates traffic but can also impact quality of life by making people more dependent on cars.

After using the Tokyo train system, i shudder to think of what we call “mass transit”. In Tokyo you can go anywhere within a reasonable time because they have the famous Yamanote line that looks like a theta (a circle with a line through the middle). Also, almost every other private line connects with at least two of those stations, from what I remember. Where I live now, I wouldn’t think of taking mass transit anywhere unless I had a real surfeit of time.