Daily Transit Links Roundup - Dump The Pump Edition

Image courtesy of alburn.binkley.

• Giving up everything for gas: more and more people are cutting out “non-essential” items like coffee, dining out, and vacations so they can afford the cost of gasoline, an “essential” item. Me? I’m eating out more than ever.
• The shocking truth about exurbia in the age of $4/gallon gasoline: “My fuel costs are more than my mortgage is by a couple hundred bucks”
• The brilliance of our national transportation system exposed: as gas prices rise, people are driving a lot less, which means less gas taxes are collected, which means money for infrastructure improvements and alternate modes is scarce.  Brillz. Faulkers.
• Megabus alternative? California Shuttle Bus to offer rides from L.A. to San Fran starting at $5.
• Grade separate Malibu!  Apparently the idyllic beach city is #1 in traffic fatalities and injuries.

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california shuttle bus • car culture • dump the pump • exurbia • gas tax • gasoline • malibu

Daily Transit Links Roundup For 6/18/08

• Millennials and Baby Boomers join forces in forgoing the suburbs for the many ammenities of urban life.  Hey Gen X, you suck!
• Hey ladies, despite conventional wisdom, cars aren’t the safest way to travel.
• A journey on America’s “oddball novelty”, Amtrak, presents a compelling look at the failure of American passenger rail.
• The Gold Line Foothill extension is exactly the kind of transit Los Angeles doesn’t need.
• Lusting for cars from the seat on a bus.  Car advertisements get heavy rotation on TransitTV.
• Pam is back! Join the Metro Interactive chat today at noon to discuss “beautiful rides, such as the Metro Line 2 bus down Sunset Boulevard”.

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advertising • amtrak • baby boomers • gold line foothill extension • millennials • pam oconnor • reurbanization • safety

Daily-ish Transit Links Roundup For 6/17/08

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.

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congestion • dump the pump • improvements • north carolina • traffic • white guy

Is Wall-E Riding Metro?

Though a near impossibility to believe, it seems Metro is taking some pages from other transit agency’s playbooks across the globe. No they’re not embracing the subway to the sea or pink line or green to the airport or this or that like they should, but in advertising they’re scratching the surface.

One thing I’ve certainly noticed when visiting other cities and nations (London, Paris, Montreal, among others) they take advertising to another level. While LA is stuck back in the print age these other transit agencies are keeping with the times and digitizing their advertising for more flash, more creativity and, one must assume, more money. The closest thing Metro has is the obtrusive and annoying Transit TV, which has improved to include large corps like Wamu, Coke, and NBC, but the brunt of it is still just low yield cell phone ring tone and debt consolidation commercials.

Continue Reading…

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advertising • digi • highland • hollywood • red line • Universal City • Wall-E

Daily Transit Links Roundup for 6/13/08

• Terence Jeffery, a cartarded conservative nimrod, is my new comedy hero.  His defense of Americuz “free-market transportation” system is a laugh riot.  Terence buddy, read this and then go eat your slice of pizza and be quiet, cuz I’m not buying it.  Cartard.
• Los Angeles freeway bike rebels garner national attention.
• Orange Line to keep going… all the way to the Chatsworth Metrolink Station.
• Amtrak president Alex Kummant gets real in a great interview with Reuters.  A must read.
• Los Angeles rail ridership up from a year ago, but bus ridership is down.  Dear car-culture refugees: fear not the bus.
• Thousand Oaks bus system offers Google Transit and NextBus technology to help riders figure out where they are going and stay on schedule. Nice!
• Hey, remember when Austin’s CapMetro went up against Miss Traffic and won?  Well they’ve pwned Metro again by launching an official agency blog.  Nice!

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amtrak • bike culture • capmetro • cartarded • free market • orange line • ridership • thousand oaks

Daily Transit Links Roundup for 6/12/08

Image courtesy of mac steve.

• House passes $15 billion bill for Amtrak funding.
• New and improved Amtrak Coast Starlight beats major airlines in schedule reliability.
• Shocking. Conservative think-tank Heritage Foundation doesn’t like Amtrak subsidies, prefers oil subsidies.
• Wait, the ghettoized lowest-common denominator bus based mass transit systems in the U.S. can’t handle the surge of new car culture refugees? Really? Wait. Really?
• People in America’s heartland finding out that with rising gas prices making them forgo meat and church donations for gas money, the no-alternatives freedom of car culture is actually quite binding.
• There was a time where there was mass transit and pedestrian congestion in a lively and active downtown Los Angeles. Yuck!

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amtrak • car culture • coast starlight • rural • streetcar • subsidy