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ChineseDaily-ish Transit Links Roundup For 6/17/08
Contributed by Fred Camino on June 17th, 2008 at 10:05 am
Image courtesy of Marco Siguenza.
- Average white guy goes Metro, doesn’t like it, shares some ideas on how to improve the system.
- A new report shows that Los Angeles has the worst traffic congestion. Woot.
- It’s Dump the Pump Week, or, Save a Whole Buncha Money Week.
- Gas prices get peeps onto public transit, even in places like Durham, North Carolina.
- Anecdotal evidence proves that high gas prices are thinning out traffic in L.A.
Discussion
Both comments and pings are currently closed.
Please keep discussions civil: exercise Troll Controll.
Unfortunately, Mr. Times Reporter didn’t do his research before writing his column. (On the other hand, wasn’t Lazarus the Biblical character who slept for 100 years?)
He claims non-Metro services are not included in the Trip Planner, when in fact they are. I e-mailed him several trip itineraries that include LADOT, Big Blue Bus, and Culver CityBus so he could check them himself, and all I got was a one-word “thanks” in reply.
How much do you want to bet that there is no correction to his misconceptions in a future column?
(If any of you want to check the Trip Planner yourself, try these: Van Nuys/Roscoe to National/Overland, Washington/Overland to LAX, and Victory/Reseda to Sepulveda/Century. Use 7:00am weekday start times.)
Lazarus was the guy who was dead for a few days when Jesus resurrected him.
Kym, this guy has written on transit in the past and proved himself clueless. Why should we expect improvement? I mean. he writes for the Times. Other than Hymon, it is now a wasteland.
Dana, I have a good rule of thumb for transportation journalists:
Unless your name is Alan Mittelstaedt, don’t cover transportation.
The Times article does demonstrate one truth: transit is not a viable option for people with stupidly long commutes. The problem of course, is that he won’t come out and say that. He implies that long commutes are not the problem, but that transit is. That’s ass backwards.
Kymberleigh, I e-mailed that guy about it as soon as I read the article, and he responded with a one-word e-mail - “thanks.” No correction, no acknowledgment.
Personally, I believe that this guy is the LA Times’ Official Village Idiot.
Even more fitting, in context.
By the way, there was a correction in yesterday’s Times saying that the Trip Planner does include other agencies but that “users have to be specific about travel times to get complete results.”
Bert,
What you’re talking about seems to be a bias with just about all “reporting” on long commutes. Traditional media seems to be unwilling or unable to say that a horrendous commute is part of the cost of living in a suburb. If you don’t want to a horrid commute, you may have to give up the lawn/picket fence. That’s a choice people have to make in the real world, but the media (and the government) want to pretend that it is people’s right to live in the house they want, where they want and have an easy trip to work.
Damien Newton:
Great observation Damien. It seems long gridlocked commutes are always a product of “not enough lanes” and “not enough trains”, never the fact that living 20+ miles away from a place you go to daily is absurd. Modern people just feel entitled to convenience, even if it’s not realistic or logical. And there’s always someone to blame for the failings of reality.