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
It was a long week of research, this. In the end, a couple of us weary BusBenchers elected to sit down, down some drinks and watch a video of a Los Angeles-based illustrator whose work I have long admired. (I was unaware of the video until I found it at the main branch of the public library.) Titled "In Smog and Thunder: The Great War of The Californias," it is a low-budget albeit sharply produced documentary—replete with brilliant narrative that mocks most every aspect of California life in L.A. and 'Frisco—exhibiting Sandow Birk's voluminous cache of paintings of the same name.
Continue reading "What Will It Take To Get Folk To Take Mass Transit?" »
Sunday, I was out shooting film of the water-dropping helicopters, as well as watching all the TeeVee channels' footage of the fires.
Yesterday, I got some late-afternoon shots of the encroaching armies of smoke. The sun was behind the squall-line-like advance, but there was that distinct glow of fire from below. The firetrucks were screaming up and down the boulevard outside, and all four scanners throughout the building in which I worked were non-stop with chatter among the emergency personnel.
Today, the yellow colour of the heavily filtered sun offers no opportunity for photography. And after all the footage and photos that have filled the broadcast, print and Internet accounts over the last two-and-a-half days, there is no reason to render my somewhat less dramatic shots, let alone publish them here. Suffice to state that over the hill from me, from where I type in my wee newsroom, is the remnants of Canyon Country, Stevenson Ranch, et al. (This morning I had watched the infrequent plumes of gray erupt from the semi-steamy white of smouldering inferno. I suppose it has gotten much worse since then.)
And I am confident that, like New York six years ago, everyone in the present catastrophe's area-meaning southern California from Santa Barbara, out to San Bernadino and down to San Diego-knows someone who has been directly affected. I know a few folk, and I have done all I can to try and get done that which I am doing, that I can start hearing today's horror stories as well as be ready to offer what assistance I can to friends and colleagues.
-BusTard
LATER: As the evening feel early, owing to the smoke pouring in round 2:30 (the yellow sky and finely ground dirt and ash settling on everything outside was akin to tornado weather), I decided to get a few shots after here. One is looking east, one north and one west. (The flag at half-mast is a POW flag stifled by the heavy, hot air.) The last one is straight into the sun with no retina burn, at approximately 3:30 p.m.
North:
West:
Sun:
The Bus Bench’s roots are in Social Ecology.
The Bus Bench takes a satirical and editorial approach to dealing with the issue of mobility in Los Angeles. The emphasis of The Bus Bench is public transportation, but we also discuss class, race, gender and Downtown Los Angeles.
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The Bus Bench is doing an art project on January 10th in collaboration with The Loft Gallery's Post-Post Apocalypse exhibit in San Pedro and we need a car to murder.
Are you ready to release yourself from the chain of car ownership? Do you want it documented?
(LA Bus) Metro Trip Planner. This would include directions on how to get anywhere using any bus or rail line in LA Country.
Big Blue BusWestside!!
Montebello Bus Eastside!!
Gardena Muni Southside!!
Foothills Transit The SGV!!
Did you know there was an official where to go and how to do fun stuff in L.A.? Well now you do: Experience L.A.
L.A. is a special place, so we have lots of events. Your public transit ride could be impacted check here. Special Events Street Closures.
RANDALL (BusTard) FLEMING has spent two decades working in most every facet of publishing. A former magazine publisher (Angry Thoreauan, 1987-2001), he has also contributed to a great many books, periodicals and newspapers in Los Angeles and New York: New York Post, Brooklyn Spectator, Discover Hollywood!, Ben Is Dead, Flipside, Los Feliz Ledger, Sabotage in The American Workplace (Pressure Drop Press), Notes From the Underground: Zines and the Politics of Alternative Culture (Verso), and several of the Unreinforced Masonry Studio books about Los Angeles.
Art Gonzo was raised in Los Angeles. He is a visual artist. He has seen a bus. When not at The Bus Bench he is a contributor at LA Eastside.
A Valley-born Los Angeleno, Simon Ganz only recently returned from the liberal enclaves of Northern California where he, to his surprise, found himself more than happy living without a car. Now back in his hometown with only a political science major to show for his journey, he is of course constantly unemployed and hoping to join/start/follow a movement to create better transit for everyone in Los Angeles.
Rogelio Gomez is a public transit rider and an avid cyclist. He blogs at My Daily Ride when he's not sharing his adventures on The Bus Bench.
Sirinya Tritipeskul is a graduate student studying to become a transportation planner at UCLA. She writes on The Bus Bench about living car-free on the Westside. Her own blog, The Valley Girl Planner (in training), is a tribute to her Valley Girl roots and her travels around the Los Angeles area.
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