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ChineseEast Hollywood on the Move
Contributed by Fred Camino on March 14th, 2008 at 10:43 pm
Before moving Downtown, East Hollywood was my ‘hood. To me, it’s the original transit oriented ‘hood because of its proximity to the Metro Red Line and ample bus service, along with its lack of ample parking which led me to dump my car and birth MetroRiderLA in its place. The East Hollywood Neighborhood Council has put together an informative video listing the various transit modes that serve the neighborhood and outlines suggestions on how to improve mobility in East Hollywood. I think every neighborhood should do the same.
Discussion
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This is great.
What would really help is if we could get all the businesses along the rail lines to include that in their directions of “how to get here”.
My church is 2 blocks from Wilshire/Vermont, and they’ve just added the fact that they are accessible to both the Red and Purple Lines.
In any other city, this information would be included as a matter of course. In NYC, all local train lines are listed. In London, the nearest Tube stop is mentioned with the same regularity as Thomas Guide coordinates.
Part of why it’s important to end this near conspiracy-of-silence is that as long as the automobile-entitlement folks don’t have to hear about rail and bus routes to get places, it never has to occur to them to use it. No one in NYC or London could get away with saying, “I can’t get there because I don’t have a car.”
I have a friend who lives at Burbank-Woodman who was going to Highland-Santa Monica and said he had to take his car because he was coming from the valley. He had no idea that the 156 bus was available. The MTA doesn’t promote its own service. The business we were traveling to doesn’t not say in its directions that people can take the 4-704-156 buses to get to their location either.
As long as automobile drivers never have to hear about the bus/rail alternatives to get to where they think they HAVE to have a car to get to, they can continue to stigmatize transit riders and/or see them as less than people and/or poor misfortunates who would only drive a car if they could afford one. As long as businesses and other organizations see transit riders as poor or marginal undesirables, then they don’t have an incentive to include transit directions, as they would surely do in every other metropolis.
That’s why “coming out of the closet” about being a transit rider is so important. Businesses or other organizations just might think, “Oh, I would like to attract more people like Dan W., so I guess I will include transit information in my directions. That also gets businesses involved in supporting transit improvements instead of just additional parking spaces.
People can only make the case that “people who use transit only do so because they cannot afford car” if we don’t speak up — to our businesses we patronize, through our organizations that we participate in, and to our elected leaders.
The Southern California establishment, from the L.A. Times, to elected officials, to many of the rich and powerful, would really like to pretend that we just don’t exist. Let’s not let them.
Hi Dan W:
The East Hollywood Neighborhood Council has always mentioned how to get to its events and meeting locations via transit or other modes as equally as it gives parking instructions. If you go to our website, we have our monthly meeting on Monday and it even tells you where to park your bicycle. If other neighborhood councils fail to do this, then that’s their problem
Thanks Metro Rider for the props and coverage!
Elson Trinidad, President
East Hollywood Neighborhood Council
easthollywood.net