MetroRiderLA

Last week I asked you guys “What Should The Next Theme Be“? The people spoke, and the resounding answer was “the Gold Line”! Everyone’s favorite light rail line beat out the Blue Line by 7 votes, the Purple Line by 12, and the Green Line by 15. So, in response to popular demand, I introduce to you the MetroRiderLA Gold Line Theme! This one features a whopping 39 photos of the sights of and around the Gold Line taken by yours truly. I think the Gold Line offers some of the prettiest sights in all of L.A. - be it the majestic San Gabriel Mountains, the Main Street USA vibe of South Pasadena, or the architectural and artistic delights that each station has to offer. The Gold Line is L.A.’s best case for light rail, and this theme celebrates that fact.

Enjoy!

The transit communications blog, Permanent Campaigns, recently posted an article targeted at transit agencies about a topic very close to home here at MetroRiderLA, unofficial transit blogs. Entitled “Beware of the Blogger: A Guide to Dealing with Unofficial Transit Blogs“, the article lists some guidelines transit agencies can take to develop a positive relationship with bloggers. It has a list of different transit blogger archetypes to look out for:

• The Fanboy/Fangirl: the purest geeks of the geeky world of transit advocacy, these guys have nothing but love and passion. I don’t know if L.A. has one of these, the closest I’ve found is the Go Metro MySpace page.
• The New Urbanist Wannabe: ultra critical intellectual bloggers with a background in urban design for whom nothing is ever good enough. I might put the L.A. Metro Mole in this category.
• The Journalist: news hounds with only one beat: transit. This is the realm of Streetsblog LA and in a less traditional way, The Bus Bench.
• The Crank: nutty types who rant endlessly about nothing much in particular. Although it’s not updated any more, I’d put the What’s Wrong With L.A. Public Transportation blog in this category.
• The Hater: these people just be hatin’. Hmmm… are there any pure haters out there?

I think MetroRiderLA is a little bit of all of these. I’m probably a reluctant fanboy at heart, why else would this site exist? While I don’t have anything near formal training in urban design, I sure like to pretend I do. Every once in a while I’ll try to be a journalist, but my lack of formal training in those arts is obvious. And often, I can be a cranky hater. Luckily, I’m not the only one who writes for MetroRiderLA, and the other contributors help create a somewhat balanced blog that Permanent Campaigns kindly listed as an example of a good unofficial transit blog, and even quoted The Big Lebowski by calling the blog “very thorough”.

All of this inspired me to revamp MetroRiderLA’s links to external sites. I’ve created a new page, the Links Index, which has a fairly extensive list of some great blogs, websites, and resources relating to the transit oriented lifestyle. It’s nice to note that Los Angeles has at least 15 transit oriented blogs that are currently active, let’s hope Metro is listening to Permanent Campaigns and establishing positive relationships with all of them.

This poll will close Friday, February 29th, 2008 at 11:59 PM.

MetroRiderLA is due for a new theme. I’m sticking with rail lines for this round, so it’s either Gold, Blue, Green, or Purple. Which do you want to see next? Vote now! And let me know any other ideas you might have for themes beyond the rail lines. I have this crazy idea that a Union Station theme would be pretty cool…

The Taj Mahal gets romantic today. Photo courtesy of Metro.

Metro is celebrating the February 14th holiday by lighting up the Metro Headquarters Building  (aka the “Taj Mahal”) with a heart on all four sides. You can see the luminous ode to love today from 6pm - 10pm if you’re in the Downtown area.  MetroPhotographers, grab your sweethearts and make sure to capture this adorable architectural gesture on digital emulsion and share it with us on the MetroRiderLA Flickr Pool.

Taking your significant other to see lights on a building, no matter the shape they produce, does not a Valentine’s Day make.  However, is it even possible to have a Transit Oriented Valentine’s Day in Los Angeles without the day ending in a nasty break-up?  Does a Metro Bus really set the mood for love?  Is a 4-car Red Line train entering a dark tunnel a clear enough euphemism for the physical act of love without being so overt as to offend? Does the number of cars a train has even matter?  Or has your car-free lifestyle left you riding solo?  We all just want someone to sit with us on the bus, if only to avoid having that vagabond with personal odor issues take the seat next to you.

In the spirit of the holiday, I’d like for everyone to upload their favorite romantic Transit Oriented Picture on to the MetroRiderLA Flickr Pool so that we can prove that a car-free life isn’t a love-free life!  Plus it will be really cute… even cuter than Metro’s glowing heart building.  You can check out my contribution right here, adorable isn’t it?  So, please, if you’ve got a picture (and I know you do) of you and your significant other riding the bus, rails, or just being transit oriented in general, share it with us.  Just keep it PG please, ya freaks.  And then tell us your Transit Oriented Plans for this Valentine’s Day!

In a sign of the times, MetroRiderLA introduces its first appearance on the social networking powerhouse Facebook. MetroRiderLA has had a presence on MySpace for quite some time now, but since MySpace is old hat and Facebook is the new hotness, we’re joining the new school. The MySpace profile is somewhat clunky anways, and it looks like the Facebook group will enable further discussion and community involvement in addition to the blog itself. We’ll see. If you’re a Facebook member, join the group today, and spread the word to all your Facebook friends. Let’s let social networking help strengthen the Los Angeles Transit Oriented Lifestyle!

Links:

• MetroRiderLA on Facebook
• MetroRiderLA on MySpace
• MetroRiderLA on Flickr

This post is a big “thank you” to all who generously donated to the MetroRiderLA Hosting Pledge Drive! We raised $60 in less than a month, 23 days before the arbitrary deadline I set, and now we have another year of hosting paid for! Even the smallest of donations mean the world to this site because it’s takes a lot of time and energy, and a bit of money, to keep MetroRiderLA going. What’s more, it also gives me moral support, because people must really appreciate it to give away some of their hard earned cash. In the spirit of full disclosure, I want to assure all those who donated that their money is indeed going towards the hosting costs and not towards beer money or dollar bills for the girls at Club El Gaucho. And, because the 60 bucks covers the cost, the pledge drive is over! Don’t give us any more money! Well, at least until the next pledge drive.

Thanks again.