Ask the Bottleneck Blog: Shuttle service

Why is it so easy to jump on a shuttle to a concert at the Hollywood Bowl -- but not at the Music Center or Disney Hall?Would Westside art patrons be willing to take a bus downtown on a Friday night for the opera or ballet? Would sports fans from the San Fernando Valley consider leaving their cars at home when they head to a Lakers game?

Los Angeles city officials are exploring the idea of creating "specially tailored public transit service for cultural events."On Tuesday, the city’s Transportation Committee plans to create a task force of transit officials and representatives of downtown entertainment venues to advise them on how to proceed. The motion mentions "world-class music and theater" and Staples Center events. But don’t forget the Dodgers. With higher parking prices and a new parking plan, more baseball fans might be willing to get on the bus.

Comments

[Richard H]

Jean Guccione,

You are missed.

Bottleneck Blog hasn't been the same since you took the buyout and left the L.A. Times.

So who's left on the L.A. TImes Metro Staff? Anybody?

[Daniel OC]

As for the discussion about the trains not running into the wee hours of the morning, there's a reason for it. The tracks and tunnels need to be closed so that maintenance crews can work on them without getting hit by a train. The way they deal with it here in the Bay Area is that they have all-nighter bus service routes that run along the BART and MUNI while those systems are offline... so in the end, it really does boil down to having to achieve a cooperating SYSTEM!!!

[Manue]

Hey David,

I had the same experience. But I was coming from Pasadena to NoHo. I was not left without a way home, I just had to leave Pasadena early, which sucked.

There is a lot of entertainment locations near a lot of the MTA rail stops (e.g. Hollywood, Citywalk and Pasadena) and more to come. So the MTA needs to run their service through the night. At least a train every half hour from midnight to 5 a.m. I plan to attend one of the MTA public hearings so that I can express this issue to them. If you have had this experience or you would take the train on party nights if it ran through the night, express it on this blog. I will maybe print them and show the MTA board.

P.S. We can always do what party goers do in Japan. Stay at the club till 6.00 a.m. until the subway starts running again. I forgot, we get kicked out of the clubs at two a.m. here in L.A.

[Darren]

The only thing stopping a real train system is excuses and too many rich people with oil investments ..cmon a train system is long long overdue. The buses are useless ..they get stuck in traffic like evryone else

[Raul Garcia]

David T your experience speaks volumes. The whole L.A. County Transit System needs to be rethought. In order to use the current system one must live to close to a main line or be subject to being left stranded if you don't make the last connection.

Great system. LOL!!!

[Pablo Olive]

Moving here from New York has taught me one thing. The subway sucks. I'd rather sit in my car in traffic for an hour than take the subway. And you can forget about the bus. Why even bother. Angelinos love their cars and rightfully so. The only way to ease congestion in this city is to make getting a liscense more difficult. Traffic isn't bad. It that this city is full of bad drivers.

[Stuart]

Either Los Angeles builds a comprehensive rail system or else it will lose in terms of economics and global business opportunities. The automobile will be the death of us.
This isn't just about the complaints of Westside residents who bought homes along railroad tracks (what were you thinking? You thought those tracks were decorative?!!!). It is about survival and the prosperity of our children.

If Los Angeles and Southern California are to compete in the 21st century, we all better swallow hard and build a system that is state-of-the-art and connects San Bernardino to the Sea. This isn't a game anymore. We either move forward into a mass transit future or prepare for a economic meltdown.

[Jon]

Why do people think buses are the answer. People who commute in cars are more likely to take a train then to take bus. That is a fact.

Buses still have to battle traffic and traffic signals and accidents and road closures.

To just say that buses are cheaper then trains and subways is ignorant. If buses don't get people out of their cars, then what good are they?

[tom]

...they are going to have to get people out of their cars and into buses in this city. It's either buses now or wait another 50 years for some pipe dream rail system.

---I'm sick and tired of this attitude. If we would just get off our fat asses and get behind a real rail system, we could have it. Paris , London, and New York would be unlivable without their rail systems. L.A. is a world class city on par with those cities, but its like we're trying to become Mexico city out of stubbornness. And don't give me that crap about not being able to afford it! Does anyone have any conception how many billions is spent on gas annually in L.A. just between the hours of 6-9 a.m. and 4-7 p.m. Mon. thru Fri.? If done right, an L.A. rail system
would be used by millions, employ thousands, and could sustain itself financially.
This area is growing. BUSSES ARE NOT THE ANSWER.

[investorguy]

It's never going to happen. Mass tranist is the first choice in New York because it's always been that way -- it's too much trouble to take a car into the city.

But LA isn't one main city. It's a bunch of little cities, and there's not a logical flow into and around one main area like Manhattan. The workforce flows all over the place, especially with the entertainment industry.

LA has never been habituated generationally to use public transportation.

The only way it might ever begin to shift is if the city could get its act together and invest in a trillion-dollar transit infrastructure that actually goes anywhere, in any direction -- like the system in New York, Boston, and even San Francisco. You can't stop trains a half mile from the airport if you want any credibility.

That'll happen right after the schools actually start performing, the city gets sensible about desalination to cure the water shortage... in other words, shortly after hell freezes over.

[John Lammi Ph.D.]

We are saying we do not care about traffic or our ecological footprint if we keep growing our population. Take, for example, allowing all 15-20 million illegal aliens to stay and bring their relatives and bringing in an additional 400 thousand "temporary workers" and their families per year. And all the babies they produce. We just do not care about the environment, certainly not about traffic.

[CC]

Both posts so far use the same idea: free enterprise.

Right now, MTA has a monopoly on transit. I'd be somewhat OK with that if they did an outstanding job- but we all know they are sub-par.

Let's tear down the barrier and let entrepreneurship fix our traffic problems in LA!

[David T]

A couple of months ago, I went to a great concert at the Universal Amphitheatre on a Friday night. A large group of us (many riding the metro for the first time!!) took the Goldline from Pasadena to the Redline and exited the Universal Studios station. Beautiful trip, and all this for a $3 day pass. We even saved money on parking.

When the concert ended at 12 midnight, guess what? We took the Redline back to Union Station, arriving around 12:45 am. The last Goldline train left Union Station at 11:54pm!!!! Do we live in Cinderella-land when the clock strikes midnight?

We were so, so, so disappointed. What a let down, especially for the first-time riders. In our ride from Pasadena to the Universal Amphitheatre, first-time riders were giving public transportation a serious consideration, but it all went out the window with the lack of late night Goldline service. We took expensive cab rides home instead. If this is supposed to be a Metro SYSTEM, then the entire system has to work.

Isn't it reasonable to assume that Angelenos will go out late on Fridays and Saturday nights? Wouldn't it be great to have the Metro as a late night option for responsible partiers? Imagine the lives saved, and family grief relieved, from drunk drivers. I guess not.

[Manuel]

Lets start with Dodger Stadium. I paid 15 bucks to park on Saturday and still had to walk almost the same distance as if I would have parked right outside the parking lot.

[Richard H]

LACMTA should be willing to allow more private contractors and charters for specialized transportation services. Not all bus services provided or contracted out by LACMTA in this city should need the approval of the transit uniions and/or the BRU to operate. Maybe if the BRU thinks they can run a bus system better than LACMTA they should start their own.

One way or another they are going to have to get people out of their cars and into buses in this city. It's either buses now or wait another 50 years for some pipe dream rail system.

[Mark E. Capron]

We need to rethink transit, because we can apply consumer electronics to transform cars into more efficient and way more convenient transit than the traditional buses and trains!

Here's a sketch of one example:

Easy Ride Sharing – Use cellphones to match regular and on-the-fly ride sharing requests. Optimally, you tell your cellphone that you want a ride home as you leave a movie. A few minutes later, your phone starts offering carpool matches from your pre-approved circle of Motorola Driver AdvocateTM equipped carpool buddies who happen to be driving by. This is more convenient ride matching than the Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) RideNow, Robin Chase’s GoLoco, and Logan Green’s Zimride. A “ride bank” would remove the awkwardness of the rider compensating the driver, and collect a small fee to pay for the program.