What a Rush - July 2006

 

For my first two entires in the What a Rush series, I used Commuter Express service in the San Fernando Valley. One is a hard-working line very familiar to thousands of commuters on US-101; the other is a fading relic of mid-to-late 20th century transportation planning.

There are a few more commuter routes in the Valley that I did not try but plan to in the future. Meanwhile, come along on a fantastic voyage. Exact change required.

July 17, 2006 -  Valley straight up with an Orange chaser

 

My first exploration of L.A.’s commuter bus services was a road — and route — well traveled. Commuter Express Line 423, operated by the Los Angeles Department of Transportation, is a ubiquitous sight along US-101 and downtown L.A., and a rush-hour respite for thousands of commuters in the Conejo Valley.

The Thousand Oaks-to-downtown runs are LADOT’s busiest commuter routes. Newspaper articles have said 423 and its reverse-commute sister, Line 422, carry about 4,000 riders each. Considering that the routes run only during rush hours, and must contend with traffic on the 101, that number is quite impressive.

I ended up not taking the bus all the way to its end stop in Newbury Park, but only going as far as Topanga Canyon and Ventura boulevards. I think I needed to see only this much, as there is likely very few boardings outside of downtown L.A.

I also did not get a trip that captures the most representative ridership. Had I taken a trip that left downtown at around 4 or 5 p.m., I am sure I would have seen some very crowded buses on the two-hour trek to Ventura County. I am sure I also would have sat in 101 traffic that would have made me stir crazy enough to break open a window and walk on top of cars to find the nearest Orange Line station and remnants of my sanity.

My trip was the first bus of the afternoon that goes to Thousand Oaks. It leaves USC at 3:40 p.m. I boarded bus #92040 at Figueroa and 7^th streets at close to 4 p.m.

An interesting aside about this particular bus. These buses, built by Stewart & Stevenson, are not found anywhere else in Southern California and equally rare everywhere else in the country. There was no visible builder’s plate, making the buses hard to ID.

For now, enough trivia. Back to the trip.

Only one passenger was aboard the bus, and only one other passenger boarded at Figueroa and 7^th. The bus snakes through downtown L.A.’s financial district and the Civic Center. Most of the riders got on along 1^st Street. There would be 15 commuters on this early trip, not counting myself.

A gentleman named Steve (I did not get his surname) sat across from me and helpfully briefed me about the bus. Steve, a Caltrans employee who speaks with an Eastern European accent, lives in Agoura and drives to a park & ride lot near the 101. He has been riding 423 for over a year, switching from a vanpool and before that, driving solo.

Steve likes 423, but he’s experienced major service problems. He said in the week before, the air conditioner on 92040 failed and the passengers were sweltering in 90-plus degree temperatures. He also said he had to take Line 161 to Warner Center when the Commuter Express buses broke down or no-showed.

That’s rough, but Steve is hanging in there and still enjoys the ride.

A few minutes after 4, we depart downtown. On the maps, there’s a section of missing route between downtown L.A. and the Encino Park & Ride, only mentioning that buses run non-stop between these points. Steve, the veteran 423 rider, says that drivers can improvise their routes between these points. This driver chose to drive through Chinatown and take I-5 and SR-134 to the 101. A good choice.

Traffic on the 5 was light enough for the bus to go at full speed, and the 134 has a carpool lane and the bus darted past stop-and-go traffic in the mixed-flow lanes. Everyone slowed near the 101/134/170 junction, but amazingly, the 101 was not terribly crowded in mid-afternoon. Things most likely get worse about a half hour later.

The 423 commuters might not mind. The most popular pastime on the bus: sleeping. The only ones awake on this trip were me and hopefully the driver. Reading a novel is a close second. There was very little conversation going on, in stark contrast to the fraternal atmosphere of Metrolink trains.

 

I measured the time it took to cross the San Fernando Valley in a 423 from Lankershim Boulevard to Warner Center, paralleling the Orange Line. It took only 20 minutes, twice as fast as the Orange Line.

I arrived at Topanga Canyon and Ventura at 4:40 p.m. and thanked Steve for all his help. One other passenger got out here and one boarded.

The service is great for what it does. As commuter buses go, these Stewart & Stevenson jobs are behind the curve. Most other commuter buses have reclining individual seats, working individual reading lights, and nowadays laptop tray tables. They look and feel more like local buses with soft seats, and the rattling panels mean they don’t show their age well. The air conditioner, while it did work on the bus, made a noisy whine that made the ears ring after disembarking.

To head back, I wanted to see how well the Orange Line was doing. Quite well, in fact. The Valley has taken to the service since it offers a reasonable 40 or so minute trek end-to-end with frequent service, something not seen on local lines. The barren parking lots are a sign that the Orange Line is not drawing car commuters as much as bus riders who rerouted their trips to the Zevway. The eastbound trip on NABI artic #9227 left Warner Center at 4:58 p.m. and arrived at North Hollywood 43 minutes later. There were 77 passengers total on this trip, for a productivity factor of 107 passengers per hour. This is very successful.

In contrast to 423, the artic offered a much smoother ride with a quieter air conditioner. The Orange Line also runs through some very scenic parts of the Valley, where you see postwar ranchettes, the Sepulveda Dam recreation area, a patch of farmland and the glass-and-steel high-rises of Warner Center.

Orange Line’s biggest weakness is stopping at every traffic light for a minute or so. This is a safety measure, along with the bus going through intersections no faster than a rolling idle. State law forbids using railroad crossings for anything but trains, and it would cost hundreds of millions of dollars to grade-separate all the major intersections. If the buses had better signal synchronization, the end-to-end trip would be close to 10 minutes shorter.

Still, both services do well in their respective markets. The commuter buses are great for bypassing the Valley, but have a small ridership potential. The Orange Line could have been light rail, but the buses have been more than up to the job and doing remarkably well.

July 31, 2006 - RetroRider 

 

Remember a time when googie architecture dominated the landscape, many of what are now inner-ring suburbs were brand new, and the vast Los Angeles bus network was only beginning to decline? You can still relive those days, at least four times daily.

Commuter Express Line 413 is more than a bus service; it’s a time machine. This line could qualify for historic preservation funding.

Line 413 was a throwback to the days when L.A. had an extensive freeway express bus network. The San Fernando Valley had a network of lines that would mirror local buses, and had used up most of the 400-, 410- and 420-line numbers. See the San Fernando Valley Transit Insider for maps and line descriptions of yore.

Line 413 was a handful of routes the Los Angeles Department of Transportation picked up from the Southern California Rapid Transit District, which had been shedding many low-productivity commuter lines in the 1980s. The routes that ended up under the control of LADOT or Foothill Transit mostly exist to this day, while the RTD/MTA routes ended up canceled and the buses reallocated to local service.

A ride on 413 shows why. It runs between Van Nuys, North Hollywood and Burbank along Sherman Way and Victory Boulevard, then goes nonstop to downtown L.A., with choice of freeway and approach left up to the driver. If people are going downtown, they now take Metrolink or the Red Line, both of which take about half an hour to go downtown. End-to-end on 413 takes over an hour, but goes across downtown for people who prefer one-seat rides.

Metrolink and the Red Line profoundly altered ridership habits, making 413 a relic of a bygone era. I took the first trip out of downtown at 4:05 p.m., and the bus was empty until Pershing Square where only one other passenger boarded.

Not only that, but it seems LADOT knew that I was going to write a retro angle, as even the bus was a throwback to the RTD operating practice of using local buses for express runs. Heck, it was a former RTD bus – #1245, a 1992 TMC RTS. It’s repainted in the Commuter Express livery but still has MTA’s hard plastic seats. No comfort here for the riders, and even less for the large Russian driver cramped behind the wheel. He complained more about the slowness of the bus, though.

The traffic on the 110 and 5 freeways was not terribly heavy, but the bus struggled to keep up with traffic. The bus arrived in Burbank, meandering through the well-kept streets of its suburban downtown. Burbank has a nice, compact downtown that’s made for strolling and has adequate housing for local workers and Metrolink commuters, yet the absence of pedestrians was haunting and sad.

Ironically, the bus intended for suburb-to-downtown commuters was salvaged by local ridership. There were a total of 16 passengers on this trip, four boarding in Burbank and the remainder getting on within L.A. city limits. Most took this bus because it showed up before the local.

The neighborhoods it serves are an interesting study in the evolution of suburbs, going from quaint to blah from east to west. Burbank maintains a mid-20^th century small town feel, where time seems to not move. The Valley, however, looks like it’s going through puberty. Single-family homes coexist uneasily among large apartment complexes, and the Valley’s small businesses are fading but duking it out with ethnic stores and major chains. The bus route and the neighborhood it serves would provide interesting material for bloggers Peter McFerrin and Andrew Hurvitz.

As a service, Line 413 is an anachronism. Its past is more useful than its future. The schedule is tailored to riders that no longer find the service useful, but the service cannot be converted to a bus more useful for the people who are using it. LADOT can reallocate money, but not buses, for DASH. And LADOT certainly won’t give the money to MTA to convert the runs to local or limited service. Maybe 413 is still around because it’s a functioning artifact, much like the last blacksmith who knows modernity won but still toils away just so people appreciate his waning craftsmanship.