Or Long Beach Transit Aquabus/Aqualink?
http://www.lbtransit.com/services/aquabus.aspx
http://www.lbtransit.com/services/aqualink.aspx

We need buses. We need cars and trucks. We need trains. And we need planes. I don’t think we need ferries through.

We have the Catalina Island ferries, which are priced for recreational rides but are vital links to the mainland. But, you’re right, ferries with moorings on the Pacific Ocean wouldn’t work here.

As for the BRU, I find it a bit of bull. I had tried to work with them in the 1990s, but I found that they were more interested in recruiting people for their cause than attempting to make the MTA accountable as well as more than barely functional. I do not know if the group is communist or what, but they move like a beached whale or a multi-national corporation: slowly, inefficiently and with great waste. (Yes, waste with a “w.”) And I am not appreciate of the guy who heads it up, whose name, I believe, is Chris.

Are you thinking of Eric Mann?

He founded the Labor/Community Strategy Center, and the Bus Riders Union was its most successful sub-movement.

Eric Mann, not a group of disaffected bus riders, founded the Bus Riders Union. He’s a lifelong scholar of leftist politics, and has been in a variety of movements.

Kymberleigh Richards — all recent unpleasantness aside — has maintained a Bus Riders Union truth site. It doesn’t directly paint him as a communist, but it does poke holes in it being a people’s movement.

We need buses. We need cars and trucks. We need trains. And we need planes. I don’t think we need ferries through.

In any case, buses, freeways, and airports are buckling under the pressure. Trains need to be invested in to inject some equilibrium into LA’s transit nightmare.

Some people cling to one method over the other as the end-all be-all method of transportation. BRU is batshit insane about buses. Some will never give up their cars, or ever shut up about how cars are evil, selfish, blah blah blah. And yes, some of us are frothing at the mouth over trains.

In any case, rail is the underdog, and that’s what I root for. But buses, cars, and planes all have a place.

Back to the meetings: This giving the BRU an extra 10 minutes is bull. Hey, MTA, the Consent Decree is over, so you don’t have to kiss their behinds anymore. They get 1 minute like everybody else from here on out, ‘k?

In regards to opposing opinions to the BRU the two aforementioned groups are what I would go to. If the RRU is trying to be satirical or artful ok, but if they plan on being an advocacy group their tactics are ridiculous. If you think what the BRU does and how they go about things is silly, why would you copy them in a half ass way.

Also the same mindset that brings about things like the people who founded RRU are the same reason there is no rail on the Westside in the first place.

Let us not forget the reason the rails stop where they do, it was because certain people didn’t want certain people in “their” neighborhoods.

Racism is the reason the rails don’t go to the sea. I was raised in LA I remember even if everyone else tries to forget that big glaring fact.

Browne

As for putting so much into rail rather than buses, as someone above implied, I remain rather hesitant. the ever-shifting ways of L.A. might make a single rail line obsolete by the time it is finished, which would not be good.

This happened once, as you know: The Green Line. The aerospace industry collapsed before the service started in 1995. Yet, as ridership statistics show, it went from a dreadful low of 10,000 boardings in 1995 to coming close to 40,000 boardings now.

The Green Line is an interesting case, and defies almost any convention you can think of. First off, let us know why we even have a Green Line in the first place: It was to get the Century Freeway built. Everything else — the airport, aerospace, an extension to Orange County — is merely a footnote. Yes, how L.A. to build a rail line just to get a freeway.

The Green Line should have been fortunate even to get that 10,000 boardings. Yet it has tripled and may quadruple soon.

The other rail lines have seen similar results. They have all shown ridership growth throughout their years of service.

When you hear arguments for rail, you’ll often hear the purpose is to provide car drivers an end run around traffic or to promote a development that leads to compact. Some reasons are better than others, but all of these presuppose that public transportation in L.A. is a blank slate.

A big reason of the L.A. rail lines to capture such high ridership has to do with their proximity to parallel high-frequency bus lines. The Blue Line parallels busy lines on Avalon Boulevard, Central Avenue and Pacific/Long Beach Boulevards. To say that all the Blue Line did was “force” bus riders on to the train, well, the lines still have the same routing and mostly the same schedules as they did in 1990 when the Blue Line opened. Plus, all of these lines now have limited-stop service, and the Blue Line is even flanked by two Rapid lines as of Monday.

The subway is a collection of several of the busiest bus lines in L.A.: Wilshire Boulevard, Vermont Avenue and Hollywood Boulevard. The tunnel through the Cahuenga Pass has actually resulted in better bus service for the San Fernando Valley. Before the subway, the busiest Valley lines all had to run to downtown L.A. in some way: 94, 420 and 424. A lot of the run time was consumed serving central L.A. Line 420 became Line 156, and has been rendered a relic by the subway and Orange Line. Line 424 became Line 150 and Rapid Line 750. Line 94 has undergone several transformations, but it allows riders in the northeast Valley who cannot use Metrolink to take Line 224 to North Hollywood and get to the subway. Before the subway, these lines consumed tremendous resources and hampered reliability of service in the Valley. A decade ago, the Valley was demanding secession and a new Foothill-like transit agency. Now, the turnaround has been amazing.

So, consider a “remedial” rail network an equally compelling case for improving L.A.’s public transportation. We need rail lines to relieve pressure from the bus system. You don’t improve the bus service by plying more service on an already overtaxed system.

I’m not a fan of the BRU, but I’m also no fan of petty childishness.

I think the RRU should change it’s name to something that does not comes off as automatically adversarial.

Browne, you are right about the Rail Riders Union being a childish name.

It comes off more as a joke with such a derivative nickname. Also, it cannot just take positions to zag while the BRU zigs.

The RRU, if it tries to evolve, ends up traveling a well-traveled road. As far as transportation advocacy goes, there are the Southern California Transit Advocates and The Transit Coalition. They’re both very sharp on all aspects of public transit: operations, finance, politics. They’re also well-established and well-known among local officials. There are also transportation committees of other established organizations: The Sierra Club, The Auto Club (it is concerned about public transit as well, and not adversarially) and numerous chambers of commerce and other civic organizations.

What kind of niche does the RRU try to fill? And how could it differentiate itself among other groups, especially considering that there is significant overlap of membership?

I sincerely hope it doesn’t try to be the un-BRU and promote civic psychodrama through t-shirt wearing and making the appearance of a movement. The BRU’s overuse of those devices has poisoned the well for the nonsense.