Streetsblog Los Angeles

When one thinks of TransitTV, those ubiquitous television boxes on Metro buses, there’s many things that jump to mind.  Poetry is probably not one of them. However, thanks to a new project by Freewaves’ Out the Window series, a little bit of poetry is coming to a bus near you.

When triggered by a GPS, TransitTV will be briefly taken over by a short poem by long-time Metro rider Marisela Norte.  Along the routes she regularly rides, five intersections were chosen to host Norte’s poems.  Here’s how it works, a GPS system in the traffic signals triggers remotes inside of the televisions.  For 1,000 feet, 500 before and after the signal, whatever Transit TV was broadcasting is replaced by this:

“We wanted to expose people to something different,” explains Anne Bray with Freewaves.  In the past, Freewaves had sponsored video contests for students and local artists with winning videos shown on all Transit TV’s at the same time.  But, “We were drawn to using the GPS technology.  Any bus rider that rides past certain intersections will see the poems.” Read more…

Every year, the Metro Board combines its December and November meetings into one giant meeting in mid-December.  One item, passed by the Board’s Safety and Operations Committee in November is already raising concern from bus advocates and riders who are worried that a change in bus’ headway times could lead to more crowded conditions.

The innocuously titled Agenda Item 45: Update Metro Service Standards and Policies proposes to increase the maximum headway time for rapid bus service to 20 minutes for peak service and 30 minutes for off peak service.  This doesn’t mean that there will suddenly be a thirty minute wait for all rapid buses in the middle of the day, but it gives Metro the flexibility to altar time tables for bus service on rapids and other lines that it doesn’t have at the moment.

“The new standards are unequal and biased, allowing buses to have slow 60 min headways versus 10-12 minute headway cap for rail service.  If these kinds of service standards get applied more buses can be slowed down and trip thinned by the MTA.  Bus riders will have to bear additional wait times and this will kill ridership on the buses,” explains Sunyoung Yang, an organizer with the Bus Riders Union.  ”If the same headway standards applied on any of the rail service even the Red Line, no one would ride it—imagine waiting 30 min to an hour for the next train to go to Union Station.”

For its part, Metro staff says that Agenda Item 45 is as innocuous as its title.

“We’ve been using 20 minute frequency for evaluating Rapids over the past few shakeups, so the standards are consistent with our informal guidelines,” writes Dave Sotero from Metro’s public relations division.  ”The original planning guidelines for Rapids were 10 minute peak/20 minute base.  We were required to operate Rapids at this level for a period of one year from each line’s implementation.  Read more…

Late last week, most likely in response to a report by the Bus Riders Union and their community allies, a letter from Metro CEO Art Leahy dismissing the Civil Rights complaints of the BRU appeared on The Source.  The letter basically announced that the Title VI complaints against the agency announced last Spring were dismissed, leading to much cheering from Metro supporters.

While there’s nothing in Leahy’s letter that is factually incorrect on its own, it paints a picture that the Federal Transit Administration has already ruled that Metro has not violated Civil Rights laws with recent fare increases and bus service cuts.  While the FTA may rule that way, they haven’t yet.

Here’s a timeline of the BRU’s complaint and where we are now.

Over the past four years, Metro engaged in a series of fare hikes and service cuts in the name of efficiency and stabilizing the farebox recovery ratio of the agency.  Thanks in large part to Measure R, fares on students, people of lower income and the elderly have not gone up as dramatically as they have on other people.  Despite a 40% increase in its base fare, with more increases to come, Metro has one of the lower fares in the country.  The agency has also cut almost 1 million hours of bus service including many of the “lower performing” routes completely.

In November, the Bus Riders Union wrote the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) asking for a review of Metro’s practices under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Executive Order 12898 and Department of Transportation Regulations.

In March, the FTA declined the request but announced that it would conduct an on-site compliance review of the agency.  The letter from FTA credited the BRU’s complaint to the Civil Rights Department as one reason for the compliance review.  This began a split narrative on what the FTA’s review actually is.  Metro claims its a routine review and that the BRU’s complaint was dismissed, which is technically true.  The BRU claims that they pointed out a system of decision making at Metro that further disadvantages the disadvantaged.  In fact, the BRU trumpeted the announcement of the compliance review in a major press blitz.  You car read the FTA’s decision letter, available exclusively on Streetsblog, here.

This summer, the investigators came to Metro and interviewed staff, Board Members and other interested parties including the Bus Riders Union.  Following their meeting, the BRU submitted a brief on the service cuts passed by the Metro Board since their initial complaint.  This was not a second complaint, rather an informational packet submitted to the reviewers. Read more…

Yesterday afternoon, the Bus Rider’s Union and thirteen allied organizations released “Transit Civil Rights & Economic Survival in Los Angeles: A Case for Federal Intervention in LA Metro,” a report detailing how service cuts and fare hikes have devastated working class families in the past four years.  Since the expiration of a court ordered consent decree which mandated levels of service, Metro slashed 12% of its bus service hours while approving a series of fare increases.

“The tragedy of the MTA policies over the last four years is that they roll back almost all of the transit improvements – namely more buses, more bus lines, and lower fares – that MTA implemented under federal court order in response to the BRU’s civil rights lawsuit and 10-year federal consent decree,” states Barbara Lott-Holand, the co-chair of the Bus Riders Union and a transit rider herself for the last 35 years.

Metro and the BRU are awaiting the results of a Civil Rights Audit conducted by the Federal Transit Administration at the request of the Bus Riders earlier this year.  Only transit agencies in Atlanta and Los Angeles underwent this review in the past year.

A lot of the facts and figures found in the report won’t be new to regular readers of Streetsblog and others familiar with recent Metro policy, but it’s still striking to see some of the figures laid out, showing the cumulative impact of the service cuts and fare hikes that have been a major part of Metro’s bus planning since 2007.  The BRU also rejects Metro’s argument that the cuts are about increasing efficiency noting that Metro’s buses carry more passengers per mile than any bus fleet in America except New York City’s.

The report goes on to argue that the cuts and hikes have a disproportionate impact on struggling minority communities noting the higher rates of unemployment and poverty facing many bus riders.  90% of all bus riders are from minority communities and over 70% of all transit riders are minorities in Los Angeles.  In Los Angeles county alone, African Americans are facing a 19% unemployment rate while Latinos face 14% unemployment. Read more…

Recall the language in the 1st amendment to the U.S. Constitution about “the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances?” Keep it in mind as you read this overview of the recent interaction of Metro, a group of disgruntled riders, and a local politico. If nothing else it illustrates what American Democracy in action looks like.

When I wrote about Metro’s February 1st ‘all regions’ public hearing for the June service change proposals, I mentioned that among the attendees were “a vocal contingent from East L.A. Their message was to reverse the truncation of lines 30/31 by instead having them again extended to Atlantic Ave.”

By April the residents with the aid of the Bus Rider’s Union held a rally to press their case that the changes had left many residents stranded and was causing hardship.

When I spoke to some of the eastsiders attending the February meeting they shared frustration about their concerns receiving a lack of attention from L.A. County Supervisor Gloria Molina and her staff. By May the Eastside Sun was reporting that Molina’s staff had gotten the message and attempting to assuage constituents’ complaints by proposing a re-routing of the El Sol community shuttle to address access issues along 1st Street.

By August Metro’s San Gabriel Valley Service Council was holding a public workshop “to listen to the concerns of East Los Angeles Metro bus patrons”along with presenting proposals to address the complaints. Read more…

Fantasmas de Los Angeles by Patrick Miller from Out the Window on Vimeo.

“Out the Window“ is back on the bus.  Until the end of November, Transit TV is donating two minutes of every hour to Freewaves’ Out the Window series featuring local film makers and artists short videos about what they love about Los Angeles.

“The films are meant to be shown on the bus,” explains Heidi Zeller with Freewaves.   “People who may live in the Valley and commute to South L.A.  might pass through 20 different neighborhoods but they never get off the bus to experience them.  Out the Window’s goal is to encourage them to get off the bus and into these neighborhoods.”

When Out the Window was running on Transit TV  this Spring, the series focused on student films about their unique communities.  Often times these films focused on how to make the communities safer and healthier.  This time, the focus is a little different. Each day, a new video will be featured highlighting a different place, event or community in Los Angeles.  The series runs from the start of October until the end of November.  When Out the Window.

If you don’t ride the bus, but want to see today’s film, and all the ones that have come before it, visit the Out the Window website.

Read more…

Earlier today, the Bus Riders Union, Transportation for America and a host of other urban advocates rallied at the corner of Wilshire and Vermont, a hot intersection for both bus and rail riders to make the case that clean, safe and efficient transit options must be a priority for the federal government.

Current proposals put forward in the House of Representatives by the Republican Majority would slash 37% of federal funding for public transportation and all surface transportation programs.  In response, transit riders and advocates have dubbed today, “Don’t X Out Public Transit” Day.

It’s not news that Metro has cut over 1,000,000 hours of service in recent years, and if the Republican leadership’s plan becomes federal law, further cuts would certainly be coming even as Mayor Villaraigosa and the Metro Board of Directors is scrambling to maintain and even in some cases restore bus service.

“For the millions of Americans and 100,000s of Angelenos without cars, public transit is the difference between having and not having a way to go to the market, the doctor, to school, to a job interview,” said Crystal McMillan, Organizer of the Transit Riders for Public Transportation. “The buses are our legs. Where can we go without them? Now is the time for our government to be investing in public transportation and our infrastructure, not cutting.”

A recent report by the Brookings Institute rated Los Angeles as one of the best places to be car-free as far as access to transit is concerned.  While over 90% of transit riders have easy access to transit, the same report showed that the transit they have access to didn’t take them to job centers.

Read more…

Buried in the FAA extension passed last week was a line item for air service to connect rural communities to major airports. These are usually tiny flights, leaving from remote airports. All together, they use annual subsidies of over $163 million.

In July, when Republicans forced a temporary shutdown of the FAA, this “essential air service” was one of the major sticking points. The House wanted to end the federal subsidies funding the service (even though Republicans disproportionately represent rural districts) except for routes in Alaska and Hawaii, which would still be eligible for federal subsidies.

The Reason Foundation, the Natural Resources Defense Council, the American Bus Association, and Taxpayers for Common Sense – groups with wildly divergent missions – have come together to figure out if those communities could be connected more sustainably by using buses instead of planes.

Of the 153 communities served by what’s known as essential air service, many are long distances from major airports, especially the large proportion in Alaska. But M.J. Bradley and Associates, which was commissioned by the four groups to write the study, “Keeping Rural Communities Connected,” found that 38 of the 153 airports served – about a quarter of the total – were within 150 miles of a hub airport [PDF].

They found that 79,000 one-way flights leave each year out of those 38 airports, carrying 615,000 passengers, at a total cost of $131 million. Of that, about $60 million is government subsidy and $70 million comes from fares. M.J. Bradley found that equivalent bus service could be offered for just $41 million, for a savings of $90 million. Average passenger costs would go down by as much as $285 per round trip.

Read more…

Last week, the Brookings Institute, one of Washington’s oldest think tanks released, Transit Access and Zero Vehicle Households, a report that looked at transit access for the country’s most dependent populations and ranked each major American metropolitan area on how well they provided bus service to this population.

Los Angeles ranked second in terms of providing access to car free households.  99.1% of car-free Angelenos live in a neighborhood with some access to transit, a higher percentage than New York, San Francisco or any American city east of Honolulu.

This announcement led to some pretty heady headlines such as Los Angeles Tops List of Cities For Carless Residents in LAist, Los Angeles Public Transit Access Top Among Major Metropolitan Areas, Besting Even New York in the Huffington Post, and Car-loving L.A. may actually be a public-transit paradise in the Los Angeles Times.

Sounds great, the only problem is that the Brookings Report doesn’t actually say any of those things.  There’s a reason Saturday’s Bus Riders Union event wasn’t a victory party.  What the report does say is that L.A.’s transit system has service in a lot of different residential communities, more than every major city outside Hawaii.  Here are other important notes from the study. Read more…

Tomorrow morning, the Bus Riders Union and a large coalition of sponsoring organizations will host a “Transit Justice Town Hall on MTA Cuts to Bus Service Lifelines.”  The event begins at 9:30 A.M. at Immanuel Presbyterian Church, 3300 Wilshire Boulevard in Koreatown.  The “Town Hall” will feature both a chance for community members to testify about the impact that recent bus service cuts and fare hikes have had on their lives.  You can read the BRU’s press release, here.

Combined with the surprising news that bus benches are disappearing around the city, BRU Organizer Esperanza Martinez claims, “From bus benches to bus lines, people are being stranded at the bus stop.  This is their chance to tell their story.”

In addition to the public testimony portion of the event, there will be a panel discussion featuring BRU leadership, public health experts and Dr. Robert Bullard, hailed by Newsweek as one of the top 13 environmental activists in the country and the “Father of Environmental Justice.”  A full list of panelists and short bios can be found at the end of the article.

Coming on the heels of the Federal Transit Administration’s visit to Los Angeles to conduct a civil rights audit of Metro; the Town Hall’s goal is not only to shine a light on the impact of Metro’s bus policy in recent years, but to place the local struggle of bus riders in a national context.

Yesterday, Transportation Nation reported that 80% of transit agencies across the country are experiencing hardships as a result of the national budget crisis.  At the same time, 700,000 Americans live in families without cars or access to transit. Read more…