MetroRiderLA

Copyrighted image by So Cal Metro; used with permission from the MetroRiderLA Flickr pool. All rights reserved.

Halloween in August? Why not!

Continuing on a theme of busfanning and busfunning from yesterday’s Roadeo image from Fred, So Cal Metro has shared an image from his archives. The caption description lists this from 1998. And by the Halloween theme of the bus, it’s assumed this was taken circa October.

Metro held several decorate-a-bus contests. Halloween was a common occasion, Christmas was another. Buses would be decorated in the respective Halloween themes. Metro’s contests often involved each division entering a decorated bus. This contest, though, enlisted school children to decorate the buses. The bus, with its smooth, non-openable windows was one of Metro’s 1981 RTSs in the 8200-9139 batch. Metro held on to these rattling hulks for 19 years, officially retiring them on the same weekend in 2000 as the subway was completed.

MetroRiderLA founder Fred Camino could have titled this image “A Study in Contrasts.” One, for the color treatments. Don’t the oranges, greens and blues just pop? It’s a rhetorical question. Of course they do.

The second is the contrast of old and new. Metro’s oldest bus is a GM Old Look from the days of the first MTA, the predecessor to the Rapid Transit District. Parked behind it is a North American Bus Industries 60 BRT, painted in Metro local colors.

These buses appeared at last year’s Roadeo. What is a Roadeo, and why is it a big deal that Metro lionized its rail mechanics in posters for winning? Roadeo is a competition, organized at the national level by the American Public Transportation Association, for transit operators and maintenance crews to show off their skills and compete.

Maintenance crews must be able to spot problems and fix them in an alloted time. Drivers, meanwhile, must negotiate a series of stunts involving turning, stopping and tire distance from obstacles. It’s challenging enough as it is to drive in real-world conditions, but there are drivers who aspire to represent their agencies and themselves for honor in an even more challenging course. Read the APTA handbook on the things contestants are expected to know.

Before contestants can go on to the big leagues, transit agencies first hold internal competitions to determine who will be their representatives. Several Metro employees train for and participate in these prelims, and the events are quite festive. Friends and family, and a few geekier members of the L.A. transit community, will go as spectators, and there’s usually a carnival-like atmosphere about a Roadeo.

Copyrighted image by rjmcconnell; used with permission from the MetroRiderLA Flickr pool. All rights reserved.

If Ansel Adams were still alive and a busfan, he might take a shot like this one by rjmcconnell. This is a crisp, monochromatic row of North American Bus Industries 60-BRT articulated buses at Metro’s Division 8 in Chatsworth. Note the contrast of the modern Orange Line buses against the basic, natural bare mountainscape in the background.

Copyrighted image by Spill the moment; used with permission from the MetroRiderLA Flickr pool. All rights reserved.

You see these two words blast at you in rich, 600-pixel color and one of those Mac spinning pinwheels go off in your mind.

Bite. Where? The semiotic possibilities are infinite.

These are two of the words photographer Spill the moment cast her camera upon while at the Green Line‘s Douglas/Rosecrans Station. It’s in the desolate end of the Green Line’s western leg in El Segundo. Yet is has a combination art installation that is part homage to the area’s aerospace and industrial history, and part communication study.

These word segments are part of the bombardment of vocabulary along the stairs from the street to the elevated platform. These inlaid words in the risers are conversations overheard by Renee Petropolous, the artist commissioned for the Douglas Station. Her piece is untitled, and the background is provided on Metro‘s art page.

Spill the moment’s image adds another layer of artistry. It’s a photographic image, but the blur and spots of dark-contrast colors against the concrete look like they were added by paintbrush. It deceives the eye into dancing between photograph and tempera painting.

Just a couple more Green Line 15th anniversary celebration shots before bus photographs resume.

Metro Library posts a picture of a Siemens P-2000 car at Imperial/Wilmington/Rosa Parks station heading eastbound. The photo would be sometime after 2000, when the long-delayed Siemens cars were put in revenue service.

Siemens, usually considered a competent rail car builder, had been delayed for years bringing this P-2000 model to Los Angeles. Only L.A. has these cars in service. They are on the Green Line and Gold Line.

The P-2000s are quite stylish cars, and offer riders in the front cars a treat, as the large operator cabin window allows passengers to see through the front. Also, the P-2000s are musical. The car in this photo is singing the lyrics to The Doors’ “The End.”

One of the toughest things about doing a Green Line tribute topic for MetroFlickrLA is that it is Metro‘s least photogenic line. There are just too few photos available for the Norwalk-to-Redondo Beach line. Even in the Metro Library‘s Flickr treasure chest.

There was this item, eye-catching for its cuteness. This was from the Green Line’s opening 15 years ago. Travis the Safety Owl is the Operation Lifesaver safety ambassador, teaching children how to be safe in and around Metro Rail trains. Before Operation Lifesaver, Travis was employed by Metro and the Southern California Rapid Transit District. He is even the star of a 5-minute safety video.