The reason the elected officials are choosing Union Station over 7th/8th street terminus; even with the higher ridership numbers, is because of the decades of advocating for the Eco-Rapid Transit/Orangeline plan. Their main goal is to have one line from the gateway cities to Burbank Airport and eventually up to Santa Clarita. It was never going to go to 7th street, but I'm glad it at least appeared as an option, because now we know what's possible. As stated in a previous post, their main focus was on a magnetic levitation and propelled train system... a Siemens built Transrapid train image is still in their logo, but Metro dont know nuthin' bout that... so appears the tried and (not always) true light rail system in the current studies. Just look at the list of member cities on the eco-rapid transit board.
http://eco-rapid.org