The Bus Bench

Former LA transit guy says: The Barbie Dream House of Public Transit is not real.

Rhetoric always seems to trump reality in the headline department. This has been evident as a fawning press and commentators have made the most of the decline in driving from high gas prices and the related increase in transit ridership. As gas prices rose to their above $4.00 peak, driving in the nation’s urban areas had declined 2.0 percent over a year. At the same time, transit ridership rose 3.3 percent, leading to the impression that transit ridership increases had accounted for most, if not more than the loss in driving.

Now, as gas prices dip below $2.00 nationally, $1.50 in some places and to their lowest point since well before Hurricane Katrina in 2005, there are indications that the new riders are returning to their cars. Here in the St. Louis area, where I live, prices are now $1.39, the lowest in the nation.

Wendell Cox,"From Rhetoric to Reality on Transit" New Geography

So according to Mr. Cox the reason that people were taking transit were not for green reasons or mother earth or for the reasons of global warming. Apparently public transit rise was directly connected to gas prices being high.

Oh my god!!!

Edith Abeyta. Street Wear.

I was the shelf for artist’s Edith Abeyta’s interpretation of a walking alter at Tropico de Nopal’s Calavera Fashion Show.

 

The art was called: Street Wear

Street Wear is the representation of homeless woman. There are lots of them in downtown LA.

She made a kimono out of a mattress, which I’m going to steal from her house. All of the materials for the outfit were “found” materials that Edith then created something new with. She hand makes everything, which is rare nowadays.

Edith's Street Wear with in the background with me as the hanger, stolen from a photos taken by Robert Gauthier at the Los Angeles Times.

Dueling Chainsaws on 5th Street

Earlier this week, a cacophony of nearby chainsaws prompted a run to the roof of a nearby building, then a walk round the machines from which the arboreal assault was launched.

-BusTard

Wrong Way Main Street

Earlier in the week, while dining at the wonderful Pete's Cafe, we watched yet another driver go the wrong way on Main Street. While this such a scenario is often quickly rectified, this driver insisted on continuing the wrong way. For once, it were a damn good thing that a couple of otherwise annoying off-duty cops were on hand (for a small film project) to make the driver stop (no small feat, as the cops' comments make clear) and eventually turn round.

-BusTard

If He Is Alive, Will He Vote to Renew Metro's Contract with Sheriff?

Just over a week ago, a man was beaten and left for dead on the Blue Line's Pacific platform. The downtown Long Beach platform, which is supposedly overseen by the L.A. County Sheriff, is one of many Blue Line platforms obviously neglected by the deputies.

Bible Thumpers Save Souls at "Unsafe Location" Bus Stop

Repent! lest one be consumed by the eternal damnation of the DASH!

Or so one might surmise from the religious crackpots packing up their signs at this DASH stop on 7th between Broadway and Spring. Even LADOT has formally implied the evil of this particular bus stop: "Unsafe Location" is hand-lettered at the top of the sign.

-BusTard

Late Night Video Runs All Day on Metro!

Metro's social experiment—funded by many private (and at least one not so privately funded) enterprises is set to start next weekend. The Bus Bench is excited, and will be announcing a Red Line Bar-hopping party later this weekend. (No sheriffs allowed, natch!) We will be starting in Hollywood and making our way downtown to Redwood Bar & Grill with stops along the way.

This morning, we noticed that Metro appears to be equally excited—so much so as to repeatedly announce the wonderful new development in L.A. mass transit. To wit:

-BusTard

L.A. Sheriff deputy allows ADA violation (Pershing Square)

This summer, my interest in the significant presence of L.A. County Sheriff's deputies at pershing Square was piqued when I observed a terse conversation between a deputy and a frustrated, wheel-chair bound Metro patron. The deputy appeared to be annoyed that he had to answer to a person regarding the blocked passageway—the vehicle blocking it being a Metro contractor's vehicle.

Metro Sheriffs to Transit Advocate: "Your First Amendment Rights Are Not in Service"

What happens when a well-recognised transit advocate waiting to buy a newspaper is physically threatened by Metro sheriffs that gather daily at Pershing Square Red Line station? Libelous and unfounded accusations of terrorism as well as intimidation, unwarranted arrest and all manner of implicit threats to one's future liberties and life, followed by constant accusations of creating scandal for scandal's sake. My protests of being unlawfully detained were met with the phrase, "Tell it to the judge." The day's motif is sure to be best appreciated in the final video of this post's Twin Towers/County Jail misadventure, which satirically addresses a few of the very topics that the hired guns of Metro's Transit Security Bureau alleges in a fashion too serious to forget.

Obama wins. A bittersweet win for California.

Picture from yahoo.

Obama wins, so stop asking me if something bad is going to happen.

I was in downtown LA and several white people asked me if I thought something bad would happen to Obama and I say to people who don’t have faith in Americans that, no nothing bad is going to happen to Obama.