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The LA Dept of Transportation (LADOT) plans to add a bike lane on Ohio Avenue between Westgate Ave. and Westwood Blvd. We can all agree that a bike lane with the goal of creating safer conditions for bikers, pedestrians and drivers is laudable.

However, LADOT’s current design bans left turns on eastbound Ohio at Barrington, Federal, Sawtelle and Veteran Avenues. There are traffic signals at only 6 out of the total 22 intersections on Ohio within the project area — this design prohibits drivers from going north at four of those six signals.

Despite claiming to have done community outreach since 2022, LADOT never contacted our neighborhood, and did not disclose the left-turn bans to the public until November 2025, more than three years into the project.

If left turns are banned at the signals, then inevitably drivers will cross over the bike lane to turn left at the next unsignalized intersection, increasing danger to bikers and adding cut-through traffic in now-quiet residential neighborhoods. In response to this observation from our community, LADOT at one time proposed blocking off all the streets on the north side of Ohio, which would prevent all turns!

The city describes Ohio Ave. as “a vital neighborhood corridor connecting Westwood, West Los Angeles, and Santa Monica.” It is indeed a vital component of the transportation infrastructure on the Westside, and serves as a critical safety valve for the heavily trafficked Santa Monica and Wilshire Blvds.

In fact, LADOT disclosed in a meeting with community leaders on June 4, 2026, that approximately 13,000 cars a day use Ohio. On the other hand, LADOT’s most recent traffic count available on its project website, showed only 233 weekday bike trips on Ohio Ave.*

  • Barrington and Federal are the major streets to reach Wilshire Blvd. from Ohio, including the western terminus of the Purple/D Line where Metro anticipates “high demand for cars picking up or dropping off transit riders” (First/Last Mile Plan for Purple Line Extension Sections 2 & 3, Attachment A, p. 2, prepared by Metro), as well as the Brentwood business districts on Wilshire and San Vicente.
  • Sawtelle at Ohio is the only southern access to the VA Hospital for patients, staff and paratransit providers, and to the western terminus of the Purple/D Line, again where there will be a high demand for cars picking up and dropping off transit riders.
  • Veteran provides access from Ohio to many important resources in Westwood, for example: Westwood Park; the Federal Building; UCLA parking lot 36 (which, in addition to university parking, contains the only full portal for the Westwood/UCLA Purple/D Line station, the Geffen Academy school, and a large planned Metro bus terminal); the UCLA Health Rehabilitation Building; Weyburn Terrace housing; North Village housing; and the entire Westwood Hills neighborhood of more than 600 homes. Veteran also provides an alternate route to UCLA Hospital and the Village; serves as a safety valve for overburdened Sepulveda and Westwood Blvds.; and is the only direct connector from Ohio Ave. to Sunset Blvd. between the 405 Freeway and Beverly Hills.

LADOT defends its decision by saying that it is preserving left turns on eastbound Ohio at Sepulveda and at Westwood Blvd, and that cars can always use Santa Monica Blvd or Wilshire Blvd (the very streets that we use Ohio as an alternative for).

And at the same time, on Sepulveda and Westwood Blvds, Metro and LADOT are planning to convert travel lanes to dedicated bus-only lanes. Their plan leaves only one traffic lane in each direction for cars, essentially cutting in half the available traffic lanes on those two heavily traveled streets.

Ohio Ave spans both Council District 5 (represented by our Councilwoman Katy Yaroslavsky) and Council District 11 (represented by Traci Park). A large coalition of established Westwood and Brentwood organizations wrote to both Councilwomen in March 2026 asking that they intervene and instruct LADOT to work with the community to come up with a plan for adding a bike lane that does not ban left turns.

Since the Councilwomen have not yet responded, an appeal was filed with the Board of Public Works on June 29, 2026 asking that this project be paused until LADOT works with the community to arrive at a plan that does not ban left turns from eastbound Ohio. The Board of Public Works must hold a public hearing and make a final determination within 60 days.

We need your support for this Appeal! You can click and send this email, or copy and paste it into your own email.

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* Interestingly, when asked the comparable number of car trips on Ohio Ave on the same day as the bike count, DOT admitted that it had counted only bikes, scooters and pedestrians, but not vehicles.

In fact, DOT’s city-wide count of bike trips (including streets with dedicated bike lanes) totaled less than 7,000 weekday bike trips throughout the entire city of Los Angeles. On the other hand, we all know that there are hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of car trips throughout the city on a typical weekday.

The City of Los Angeles encompasses 469 square miles of hilly terrain, while the greater Los Angeles County encompasses more than 4,000 square miles of hilly terrain. The development and transportation infrastructure of Los Angeles evolved in the 20th century around the motor vehicle. Bikers represent a minuscule demographic in Los Angeles, while most families rely on cars.

A smarter design to accommodate bicyclists, motorists and pedestrians on Ohio would widen a couple of key locations (such as the intersection at Veteran), and add ATSAC smart traffic signals that separate the movement of cars and bikes at all six of the signalized intersections on Ohio. Constrained streets like Ohio can be designed with a protected 2-way bike lane and still continue to function for local motorists, if LADOT would be more creative and flexible.