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ChineseRide Report: Metro Line 632, the Gold Line emulator
All photos for this Ride Report are available in the MetroRiderLA Flickr pool.
We like to complain, and justifyably so, at the glacial pace of making progress on public transit in L.A. It takes decades for a rail line to go from concept to completion. Even something as simple as a bus route change takes about a year of prep work before they are even implemented. Things ought to go faster.
For once, Metro did do something fast. And guess what happened? Nothing. Actually, something did happen. Nothing is a close approximation of the ridership of its seat-of-the-pants planning and operations.
L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa wanted Metro to dream with him. His dream was to have the Gold Line extension up and running by the time he celebrated his second inauguration. This left Metro a window of opportunity to tie an opening in with its normal semi-annual bus service shake-ups, which was this weekend. Just one problem: the Gold Line wasn’t going to be ready — even though several lines were rerouted and had scheduled changed as though the trains were operating.
So instead, we have Line 632. Move over Orange Line, because 632 is the bus that acts like a train. Literally. This is a bus line that nudged its way in at the last minute — even bus drivers were caught by surprise, not to mention the flustered riders on East First and Third streets. So, what happens when service is implemented quick and dirty?
This.
Here’s a sampling of the ridership of Line 632 on its second day, taken in the early afternoon just before rush hour. It’s not an out of service bus, or even a typical trip along the Harbor Transitway. Normally, there would be a breakdown of ridership, what buses were used and the times.
Here it is in a nutshell: There were about 10 people in total, both ways, on two separate trips taken between 2 and 3 p.m. All the buses on Tuesday were Neoplans. There were dozens more angry and confused riders who had thought a 30/31 had passed them by. A few had asked for 632 schedules. Neither bus had them, though it did have schedules for other lines out of Division 10, the yard selected to do this assignment.
The comments by one 632 driver cast some interesting light on how this Gold Line emulator was something scrambled together swiftly. Most of the drivers weren’t even aware of this line until the weekend, with the arrival of the pink sheets (run times and instructions for temporary added service). Also, only “extra board” drivers will be driving the line. “Extra board”, from Metro-ese to English, is the equivalent of a substitute teacher pool for bus drivers.
This also means that the drivers may not become familiar enough with the routes to help out riders or build a loyal base before it vanishes.
It’s a shame, too. Metro runs this bus at a time it can ill afford to expend money on unproductive services. It also comes as some lines had reduced service, notably Line 711 losing weekend coverage.
I also noticed the flaws that will also hamper the Gold Line train when it will run. The Eastside really needs to beef up north-south bus service beyond what’s available on Soto Street and Atlantic Boulevard. And the Atlantic/Pomona station is a sorry excuse for an anchor station. This should be the focal point for Eastside bus transfers, but there is nothing visible to suggest the area can handle a huge volume of buses. Also, it will be quite a far walk to East L.A. College, which is nearby at least on a map but adds 15 minutes to students’ commutes without walking.
Does this serve as a harbinger that empty buses will equal empty trains once the Eastside gets rail service again? Hardly. Line 632 was hastily crafted, and had the line been running for at least a year, it might have built anticipation for the rail line when it opens.
Besides, if you ever seen how L.A. introduces rail service, you know we turn it into an orgiastic carnival of long lines, free rides and trainloads of swag. When the first segment of the Gold Line was introduced, so many riders turned out that there was a four-hour wait for rides by midday. Expect it to happen again, and for ridership to build itself slowly but steadily.
What would the future hold for East L.A. after the train starts running? It’s hard to say now. Transit-oriented development, just like the other kind, will be in a deep freeze even after the economy begins to recover. Real estate may drag for much longer, possibly at least another generation, because of how much was overbuilt and capital lost during the real estate bubble.
East L.A. is also a special case. It is predominantly Latino and mostly dense individual tract homes that usually stays within a family for generations. It has not become overbuilt and will likely stay the way it is for the forseeable future. Boyle Heights, though, has the markings of a potential Echo Park-like gentrification. The rail line will tie it to downtown, and unlike East L.A., the neighborhood sees more residential transience. There is also a stock of old housing that is prime for restoration.
What the Gold Line will also have going for it is the “gourmet/gourmand factor.” East First Street is almost wall-to-wall eating establishments. Nearly all are Mexican food, naturally, but there is tremendous variation on the styles of food by state (Oaxacan, Michoacan, D.F.-style, etc.). There is also a small pocket of Japanese businesses in Boyle Heights, clear outside Little Tokyo — which of course has its own treasures.
Regardless of whether you go see the Eastside by bus or train, either mode is fine to get a feel for the latest addition to our growing Metro network. If you want to help boost ridership, Socata‘s Dana Gabbard says in a Streetsblog L.A. post that the group plans an informal ride of its own July 10.
In the meantime, here are some more shots from Tuesday’s Ride Report, all on Flickr.
Discussion
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Please keep discussions civil: exercise Troll Controll.
Not sure why you’re picking on the Harbor Transitway, everytime I use it there are plenty of riders…
Anyway, it’s only the second day of service. It’s not easy to have a full bus in that short amount of time.
[...] In-Depth Ride Report on the "Gold Line Bus" (Metro Rider) [...]
Wad, how is it that even when you are posting about something positive Metro did — literally at the last minute — without still creating an overall negative tone?
I’m beginning to think MetroRiderLA is better when it is dead.
Kym, glad to know you’re still reading and you haven’t lost any of the people skills that make you so beloved the world over.
If there is some lesson to be learned, it’s that even quick thinking can be as aggravating and the months- or years-long slog that it takes to get a bus rolling in L.A.
Now, especially now, we cannot afford to operate barren buses. Hell, every other transit agency has had to agonize over what service cuts to make as California screwed them over and their tax receipts fell. Maintaining service in light of rising costs and falling revenues in L.A. is either a miracle, or a dangerous streak of luck that’s bound to bite us in the ass later.
What does it say to everyone else that L.A. found some way to cobble together money to run a bus line, emulating a yet-to-run train line, that runs empty? And at 10-15 minute frequencies, no less! In a part of town that already has that much service on parallel lines!
Eastside residents know the Gold Line is coming. They use the buses on parallel routes heavily. Yet many riders were bewildered when they had seen an empty bus, with people aboard, passing them by. They saw the 632 bus stop signs and knew that it went to Atlantic, but did not know where. Also, this change was not added into the June service announcements folder that had come out 2-3 weeks before the changes.
Even most of the drivers in the division that operates this line had been surprised by the sudden addition. There was virtually no effort to get the word out to riders, and when riders were interested, the buses didn’t have the schedules. The driver on one trip had to give away the duty sheet to a passenger.
I would at least like to see the emulator service match a close approximation to what the train service would be. I just don’t think there’s enough time for that to happen, and even a few months of empty buses is still a few months of wasted resources.
I liked it Wad, thanks for taking the time to post you thoughts and opinions as usual. Surprised anyone still checks here enough to get offended!
BBB has made changes to #10 routing in Downtown LA so Eastside Gold line riders can go to Santa Monica with only 1 transfer. Now if only the Gold line was running…
http://www.bigbluebus.com/home/index.asp?noticeid=147
The reason for 632 is that service levels on 30-31 were reduced as of this week because of the Gold Line’s pending operation. In fact, up until about two weeks ago the plan was to run the old 30-31 schedule on “change letters” to restore the previous service levels. So 632 is an attempt to both maintain the service level along the 30-31 route and run something that emulates the rail line that was supposed to be running now.
As for my “people skills”, you’ve known me for well over a decade and you know that what always sets me off is negativity based upon posting something without knowing all of the facts. I don’t see anything in your original article or any of the comments that shows an attempt to find out the simple facts I posted in the paragraph above. And my contact at Metro on this is someone you know, and have the phone number for.
Therefore comes my observation that you can’t ever post anything about Metro without being negative.
Both of you… MTA has declared that Line 632 is a failure, and is now only running it to Indiana station, where passengers (according to the running boards) are to receive free Metro to Muni transfers for travel on Montebello Line 40 from the operator. (That, and Aurora Jackson, Montebello’s transit manager, complained very loudly to the MTA that the buses would be occupying their stop zones and causing havoc with their riders.) Never have I seen an agency put up bus stop signs (yes, Line 632 has its own signs) only to pull them off the route so quickly.
Why they didn’t just extend Line 30 on pink letters, or run a shuttle Line 30, beats the heck out of me. After all, in the 2003 shakeup, Line 401 kept running all through the month of July, until the Pasadena Gold Line opened.
I don’t see how you could mistype The Bus Bench or LA Metro Mole into your URL line and mistakenly come here, Kym. MetroRiderLA is neither editorially invested nor hard-wired into being a hater.
I’m not going to argue over Line 632 per se, as per Calwatch, even Metro has come to a conclusion similar to this article. And MetroRiderLA in no way poured water on what was in theory a good solution to a problem. I say that last sentence because I don’t want you playing a gotcha game next week when you will very likely pan the Expo Line Phase I Open Source Transit series.
I did in fact make it clear that 632 was an emulator of the rail line. I could not discern where the hours for the line came from, as it’s not readily apparent that they were pulled from the reduced 30/31 service. So adding back buses on First Street did not help the riders, as they needed or expected a local service and could not use this service.
The Line 632 debacle also ought to tell Metro that while rolling out a line in record speed is quite admirable, the downside is that it did it so fast that it led to missteps.
And I’m glad that Metro is just as quickly recognizing its mistake and is preparing to remedy it. But Calwatch does make a good point, why not just take down the line altogether and fold the hours back into 30/31 service? Metro used to run “ghost trips” on 30 when it was out of D1. The schedules even warned of it.
[...] as quickly as Metro Line 632 came into existence, much of it is already going away … and it has only been in service for a [...]
My last words on this: Metro, like any other agency, can make mistakes. Given that it is the third-largest transit operator in the country, the possibility of it doing so are much larger than, say, Santa Monica’s Big Blue Bus or Long Beach Transit.
So Metro tried something. So it wasn’t a success. But instead of giving them credit for trying, all you can do is point out the mistake and keep bashing even when they try to retrench.
Look in the mirror and ask yourself if you are being fair. Or are you laying the foundation for someone like me — or worse, someone who knows nothing about you but what you post and the resulting comments — to come to a conclusion about your overall focus being negative?
Being an effective transit advocate does not just mean protesting the bad. It also means supporting the good and acknowledging when an agency tries something innovative, even when it misfires. However, the general impression you leave, Wad (and you too, calwatch), is that the only time you should open your mouth is when Metro misfires, and then to make the most of the negativity that you can.
Realize something that I have learned in two decades of advocacy. If you focus almost entirely on the negatives, your opinions when you decide to comment on the positives will be tainted. The decisionmakers will always consider the source.
Kymberleigh Richards, if only they made you CEO of Metro instead of putting you on elevator patrol.
The SO.CA.TA informal exploration of the 632 will start at Patsaouras Transit Plaza, bay 5 at 4 p.m. on Friday July 10th. Members of the public are welcome to join us. Be sure to have a Metro pass or bring change for the applicable fare. We lilely will stop along the way to eat at a restaurant near one of the stops.
[...] Ride Report: Metro Line 632, the Gold Line emulator | MetroRiderLA [...]
[...] Ride Report: Metro Line 632, the Gold Line emulator | MetroRiderLA [...]
Spokker, fortunately for the region, my existence and activity does not depend on whether or not you like me. The “elevator patrol” crack is a sad attempt on your part to belittle me, when the truth is that my having a key to restart escalators is only one small part of the wide variety of things I do, both as a Metro official and as a public transportation advocate.
When you are as involved with this as I am (i.e., doing things other than simply posting on a blog), then you will have a legitimate basis to comment on what I do. Until then, I politely suggest that your self-perceived cleverness only points out your own shortcomings in this arena.
Oh, like your fellow members of the Governance Council aren’t sick of you being unsufferable either. Weren’t they the ones who booted you off the chair position, not even giving you a signle second to your motion? How desperate you looked that evening. Two can play this game.
“Spokker, fortunately for the region, my existence and activity does not depend on whether or not you like me. The “elevator patrol” crack is a sad attempt on your part to belittle me, when the truth is that my having a key to restart escalators is only one small part of the wide variety of things I do, both as a Metro official and as a public transportation advocate.
When you are as involved with this as I am (i.e., doing things other than simply posting on a blog), then you will have a legitimate basis to comment on what I do. Until then, I politely suggest that your self-perceived cleverness only points out your own shortcomings in this arena.”
Blah blah blah blah blah.
@ Nomen: I openly admit that it was a mistake for me to have been Chair of my governance council. The problem was that the Chair must remain as neutral in discussions as possible and I have difficulty remaining neutral. That vote was not, as you erroneously presume, a vote of non-confidence; it was a vote to restore me to my proper role, which is that of an opinionated councilmember. And it was not the lack of a second to my motion; if you were there (which I must doubt, as your report seems to be second-hand) you would know that I never made a motion, I simply commented that I would be willing to continue as Chair if the others agreed. They did not, and I don’t consider it to be the negative that you perceive it to be. In reality, I achieve a lot more when I am not having to chair a meeting; if you go back and look at the sector history, many of the major actions are ones that started as motions on my part. Only during that ill-fated year as Chair were such motions absent. If I was as “insufferable” as you seem to think, don’t you think someone would have made moves to have me replaced?
@ Spokker: Blah blah blah blah blah. Funny, that’s how I feel when I read your “insightful” comments.
Oh, one more point … Nomen, I have openly made self-deprecating jokes about the “disaster” of my year as Chair, during council meetings since then. Does that seem to you like I resent the decision or consider it as devastating as you think I should?