MetroRiderLA

In my continued quest to make MetroRiderLA a site that popularizes a public transit lifestyle in Los Angeles I have added a Yelp! badge to the sidebar (right over there, just under the links section). The Yelp! badge is a Google Maps mash-up that will features reviews of Metro accessible restaurants, bars, shopping districts, attractions, and more. At the end of each review I will list the rapid transit options available to reach each particular destination (within a 0.5 mile radius). I probably won’t be able to list every single bus line that stops near by, but I’ll make note of any Metro Rail and Metro Rapid service in the area. Hopefully this will introduce people to the multitude of dining, entertainment, and shopping options that are easily accessible by Metro. If you have a review you’d like to add, feel free to email it to me. Include the name and address of the destination, the Metro accessibility options, and a 1-to-5 star rating in your review.

Edit: I’ve actually decided to open this up a bit more.  So if you’d like to add to the Yelp badge on a regular basis, please email me for the universal user name and password we will use for the MetroRider Yelp.  Please be respectful when writing reviews and using the Yelp account.  Thanks.

Love it or hate it, MetroRiderLA is now part of it.

This Saturday welcome in the new season with a translucent experience… literally. As reported by the Downtown News, “the second annual Autumn Lights event takes place on the Eli and Edythe Broad Plaza at the Caltrans Building on Saturday, Sept. 30 from 7 p.m. to midnight. Curated by Lilli Muller, the event showcases the work of more than 30 artists, including Richard Ankrom, Emmeric James Konrad and Kim Koga. All of the participants have used light in their work, creating neon installations, multi-media projections and sculptures that glow. There also will be performances by local bands Skin, the Tawny Ellis Band, Roland Poetx and others. 100 S. Main St., (213) 624-4847.”

And since you’ll already be downtown for the CarFree Lifestyle Festival it’ll be an easy trip from Metro Gold Line’s Chinatown station to Metro Red Line’s Civic Center station. So bring a blanket, a lawn chair and wide eyes, and enjoy the flashes of magnificent color all those people in New England can’t stop bragging about this time of the year.

This Saturday welcome in the new season with a translucent experience… literally. As reported by the Downtown News, “the second annual Autumn Lights event takes place on the Eli and Edythe Broad Plaza at the Caltrans Building on Saturday, Sept. 30 from 7 p.m. to midnight. Curated by Lilli Muller, the event showcases the work of more than 30 artists, including Richard Ankrom, Emmeric James Konrad and Kim Koga. All of the participants have used light in their work, creating neon installations, multi-media projections and sculptures that glow. There also will be performances by local bands Skin, the Tawny Ellis Band, Roland Poetx and others. 100 S. Main St., (213) 624-4847.”

And since you’ll already be downtown for the CarFree Lifestyle Festival it’ll be an easy trip from Metro Gold Line’s Chinatown station to Metro Red Line’s Civic Center station. So bring a blanket, a lawn chair and wide eyes, and enjoy the flashes of magnificent color all those people in New England can’t stop bragging about this time of the year.

As you most likely have noticed, updates have been far and few between during this month of August.  There are a number of reasons for this, the main reason being I recently moved and much of my time has been spent concentrating on the move.  Another reason though is because at the end of July we started getting spammed bad, and I had to start moderating comments and now I have about 231,421,203 unmoderated comments, 99.9% of them being spam for porn and valium.  A big part of this blog was the community aspect and the ability to discuss and argue through the comments system… that becomes a lot harder now that I have to moderate and there is an extended amount of time before the comment actually shows up for others to read.  If anyone knows of any good spam filters/defense mechanisms for WordPress that I can use and set up easily it would be greatly appreciated.  I’d like to get things rolling again in September.

About two weeks ago I had a constant desire to race things. When I was walking somewhere and saw someone on the opposite side of the street I would race them to the next light. If I saw someone get on the elevator I would go to the stairs and try and get to the lobby before them. (The latter which caused me to be locked in a stairwell for about twenty-five minutes. Turns out the new building I’m working in hasn’t got its stairwell security stuff worked out.) Another thing that I started to race were Rapids against local busses. I had faith in the Rapids and have waited many a times for the Rapid to show up even if a local was sitting right there in front of me in all its orange glory, but I was starting to doubt that faith. So, with some third grade calculations and a couple opportune situations when both the Rapid and local showed up at about the same, I set forth in the name of science.

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