By Kayt Sukel
Gymnast Simone Biles has completed her “redemption” tour with three gold medals (and a silver). Swimmer Katie Ledecky has become the most decorated American female Olympian. And Bobby Finke set a world record in the 1,500-meter freestyle. But while the world was watching the international stars compete in Paris, infrastructure experts and civil engineers had their eyes on another locale: Los Angeles, host city for the next Summer Games in 2028.
“Mayor (Karen) Bass took a trip to Paris not too long ago. And she looked at the steps they had taken, from their original planning they had done to the facilities they had put in place,” said James Elliott Moore II, Ph.D., M.ASCE, founding director of the Transportation Engineering program in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Southern California, noting that the visit brought into focus just how much more work LA faces to get Olympics-ready.
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Bass was quoted by national media outlets as saying the visit “put some fire under our feet” and calling it “eye-opening.” And, in a recent interview with Los Angeles’ ABC affiliate, the mayor spoke openly about the challenges involved with planning the promised “car-free” event. She said that the city would need 3,000 buses to provide transportation for the Games – and to reach that number, LA would have to borrow them from other cities around the country.
Josue Vaglienty, P.E., M.ASCE, senior project manager at Orange County Transportation Authority, whose jurisdiction borders Los Angeles County, said his organization had already been asked to provide buses. Los Angeles has taken a page from Salt Lake City and Atlanta, cities that have hosted Olympic Games in recent decades, by drawing up agreements with charter bus companies across the country.
“There are a lot of logistics involved in getting those buses here,” Vaglienty said. “But if it is going to truly be a car-free Olympics, we need more than just buses. We’re also going to need more train sets. The question becomes: Where do we borrow those passenger cars from? How do we get people from the buses and the trains to the venues?”
Twenty-Eight by ’28 – and beyond
Soon after Los Angeles learned it would host the 2028 Summer Olympics, the city, under then-Mayor Eric Garcetti’s leadership, published a list of 28 key transit projects to help provide connectivity between the airport, city hubs, and major sports venues, aptly named Twenty-Eight by ’28. It was an ambitious plan, said Moore – and one that was mostly focused on expanding the city’s commuter rail line, the Metrolink.
“I think the reality of the clock ticking down to 2028 has definitely hit.”
– Josue VaglientyThe plan was updated in March 2024, Moore said, taking a more practical view of how to make the rail system work for not only the Olympics but for Greater Los Angeles over the long term. It is vital, he said, to give consideration not just to investments for the two weeks that the Games will last but to improvements that will benefit the city and its inhabitants long afterward.
“The plan is still to remain transit-centric for the Olympics but to shift to buses,” he said. “It’s possible that a very substantial growth in the bus fleet and our ability to manage that fleet and deliver service on that fleet will pay off in the long run because what the city needs, in the long run, is a transportation system that supports how people live and work and play. And there’s no way to replace 25,000 bus stops with 110 rail stations and provide the service that people need.”
Welcome to LAX
While the city works out the kinks on transportation around town during the Games, it appears to already have a handle on flights in and out of the city. Targeted improvements to Los Angeles International Airport are well underway. The Automated People Mover, though hit with delays and budge overruns, is slated to open in 2026.
“These incremental improvements are making a difference.”
– James Elliott Moore II“It’s a major undertaking – but the projects are ensuring that the airport can cater to the number of people that will come to the Games and ensure they will be able to make connections to transit or get to rental car facilities with ease,” Vaglienty said. “I’ve been on a couple of tours of the Automated People Mover, which connects the airport to transit alternatives. That will really change the dynamics of how people get in and out of the airport.”
Moore agreed that these improvements would make a difference – and while LAX will still not be the airport that Los Angeles “wants or deserves,” it should have adequate capacity.
“These incremental improvements are making a difference,” he said. “And connecting the airport to the rail transit system so people arriving at LAX can easily get to a cab, to a rideshare, or to transit is a good thing.”
A test run in 2026
Bass was headed back to Paris for the closing ceremonies of the 2024 Summer Games – as well as more meetings with planning contemporaries. Vaglienty and Moore believe that these conferences will help continue to put the monumental task ahead in perspective – and prioritize projects to better ready the city to prepare for 2028.
“I think the reality of the clock ticking down to 2028 has definitely hit,” Vaglienty said. “The crunch time is now.”
But he is heartened that the city, in advance of the Olympics, will have some test runs when it hosts some World Cup matches in 2026. He said the size and timing of those matches will be a good dry run to see whether the city can pull off the intended car-free logistics.
“These are Super Bowl-level events,” he said. “We can use those to see how the plans are working – and what kind of changes might need to be made. It will help provide some guidance as we get closer to the Games.”
