Follow-Up to the Burbank BRT Meeting
A semi-organized recounting of what went down May 20th at the Burbank City Council Meeting
In Last Week’s Episode…
A week ago, I wrote about a then-upcoming Burbank City Council Meeting on May 20th. The meeting was set up to discuss the North Hollywood to Pasadena Bus Rapid Transit Line and how it is intertwined with California State Bill 79 which will bring much needed density around rapid transit stops. There has been much hubbub about a specific stretch of the project on Olive between Lake and Buena Vista. Go read my previous piece if you’d like further context, but here’s what went down:
What Actually Happened at the Burbank BRT Meeting
I was nervous about speaking. I knew a lot of people in that room felt strongly in opposition to me and I was afraid of the confrontation. I’m passionate about this issue and I know folks on the other side of it are as well.
But I’m glad I went. My partner pushed me to do it, and my sister came with me and spoke before I did, which helped a lot. We had a real conversation about the project on the way in, and I got to talk through some of the concerns she had too.
The Room
I went back and counted the public comments. There were 43 in support of the BRT and 66 against. Of the phone comments, 11 were for and 8 were against. This meeting was at 3pm on a Wednesday. This timing was favorable towards those who are older, retired, and have the luxury of taking time out of their day to come speak at a council meeting. I believe, demonstrated by the balance of phone calls that this created an unfair advantage against folks who actually need the project to succeed. My opponents were louder, more organized, and showed up in force.
Here’s what I said when I got up to speak (I stumbled on the last sentence when I delivered it, but this is what I meant to say):
My name is Ben Hillman, I support SB 79 and full dedicated bus lanes. I live in Burbank — home of the largest AMC Theater, the largest IKEA in the US, home to Disney, Warner Brothers, 3 heavy rail stations, 2 major freeways, and the best-kept secret airport in the country. Plus numerous small businesses that everyone here today patronizes or helps to run. We move about this city of 100,000 people to work and play. As a member of the LA metropolis, we intermingle with neighboring cities with far greater populations than our own. This is not a sleepy bedroom community. Doing nothing to cater to the influx of people we need to keep the city running is not a neutral choice. If we don’t plan for the growth around us, traffic on Olive and all streets in Burbank will get worse. Dedicated bus lanes make transit reliable. More housing lowers rent for the people who work and support the businesses we all love. I urge the Council to support SB 79 and dedicated BRT lanes. Thank you.
The Lawsuit Nobody Saw Coming… Except They Did?
The big news of the night came from the city attorney, who informed the council mid-meeting that Burbank is being sued by LA Metro. The council only found out halfway through a six-hour meeting, which probably tells you something about how prepared everyone was for what followed.
Per the LAist article by Kavish Harjai published May 21:
“Metro argues that Burbank doesn’t have the authority to refuse the construction permits under the California Environmental Quality Act and an agreement forged between the countywide transportation agency and the city. Metro is asking the court to direct Burbank to “cease conditioning issuance, approval, or processing” of project permits on any of the city’s issues with the design of the bus route.”
The lawsuit was filed May 19 in LA County Superior Court — case number 26STCP01904, if you want to look it up yourself.
Also from LAist:
“Metro has spent nearly $44 million so far on design and preconstruction, and says every day of delay threatens the project’s ability to be ready for the 2028 Games.”
Worth noting: this wasn’t entirely out of nowhere. According to LAist, Metro’s outside counsel had sent the city a draft of the complaint back on May 8 (two weeks before the meeting). So while the council may have been caught off guard, the city’s legal team was not.
What Were We Actually Arguing About?
To understand what’s at stake, it helps to know what a BRT is and what the fight is specifically over.
Bus rapid transit is essentially a light rail on wheels: dedicated lanes, signal priority, and enhanced stations. The idea is that by giving buses their own lane, you make them fast and reliable enough that people will actually choose to ride them. The BRT in question is a 19-mile route from North Hollywood to Pasadena, with 22 stops through Burbank, Glendale, and Eagle Rock, funded in part by nearly $270 million in Measure M sales tax revenue that county voters approved overwhelmingly with 71.5% support in 2016. Metro wants to break ground in July 2026 to have it running for the 2028 Olympics.
The fight over Burbank’s stretch of the route comes down to one thing: dedicated lanes on Olive Avenue between Lake and Buena Vista. Metro wants them. Some folks in Burbank do not.
Burbank City Council’s position (outlined in their 2022 letter) is that dedicated bus lanes would leave only one driving lane in each direction on Olive, causing congestion and spillover onto smaller streets. What the city has asked for instead is “mixed flow” (meaning the bus runs alongside regular car traffic) preserving all the driving lanes. Specifically, Burbank requested in their 2022 letter that the stretch of Olive between Lake and Buena Vista run mixed flow for three years until ridership goals were met. Metro didn’t respond. That silence is essentially what the lawsuit is about.
Metro’s position, according to the lawsuit, is that removing dedicated lanes would undermine the reliability and ridership that justified the public investment in the first place. In other words: a bus stuck in traffic isn’t a BRT, it’s just a bus.
Enter SB 79
Layered on top of all this is Senate Bill 79, which Governor Newsom signed in 2025. The law allows for denser, taller housing development around certain kinds of transit stops than local zoning would otherwise permit. Burbank City Council has concerns that if the BRT gets built with full-time dedicated lanes, five of the six stops in the city could qualify under SB 79, effectively triggering upzoning along Olive Avenue whether the city wants it or not.
At the meeting, the city displayed a poster board showing the areas around planned bus stops that could potentially be affected. People were being dramatic, describing the circles in which more housing can be built as “blast zones.” I get that housing density is a charged issue, but the hyperbole made it hard to take the concerns seriously.
Councilmember Konstantine Anthony posted about SB 79 concerns on Reddit after the meeting:
The Council Meeting
This is where things got interesting… and a little depressing.
Councilmember Rizzotti wants to scrap the BRT entirely, claiming Metro is acting in bad faith. Mayor Takahashi pushed back, suggesting it’s more of a bureaucratic capacity problem than intentional obstruction, proposing that Metro staff didn’t respond to the letters because doing so goes beyond the scope of their job, not because they were trying to steamroll Burbank. The city attorney shut down further speculation since it’s now pending litigation.
Councilmember Konstantine Anthony cited studies showing that improved transit improves safety, a direct response to the safety concerns many commenters raised. He also talked about induced demand: the idea that building more road capacity doesn’t reduce congestion, it just generates more driving to fill it. BRT, by contrast, moves more people more efficiently. He also said, at one point: “We are not losing a lane, we are gaining a bus lane.” Which I thought was the clearest thing said all night.
Councilmember Mullins said Metro is always over budget and behind schedule. Which is a remarkable thing to say when there is currently an active lawsuit accusing Burbank of being the party causing the delays. She also said she’s not willing to compromise and wants to countersue Metro, which would delay things even further, potentially past the 2028 deadline entirely.
Councilmember Perez asked a genuinely important question: if Burbank goes to court and wins the right to mixed flow, does that actually mean mixed flow gets built? The city attorney said it was speculative. Which is worth sitting with, even the council members pushing hardest for litigation weren’t sure what winning would actually get them.
Rizzotti, who is a real estate agent, also noted that 5-story buildings don’t go up overnight anyway, and raised the concern about how drivers would know they can only use the bus lane at certain times. I found that last one hard to take seriously. I personally have to move my car for street cleaning, and there are signs posted that tell people exactly when it happens. We seem to trust drivers to read those just fine. Maybe give them the option to ride the bus while we’re at it.
(Shoutout to Jonathan from Strong Towns Burbank for the meeting notes.)
So what actually happened?
Honestly? Kind of a nothing burger.
METRO Sues the City of Burbank Over the Bus Rapid Transit Corridor on Olive Ave.
Finding out about the lawsuit mid-meeting was genuinely significant, that’s real news. But the council wasn’t in a position to act on anything with active litigation pending, and nothing got decided. Half the council wants to fight, the other half seems to recognize that fighting just means more delay, and nobody was really prepared to reckon with the fact that the clock is ticking toward 2028 whether they act or not.
Thanks for reading along. Let me know: do you want more transit talk like this? Would love to hear about it from y’all directly.