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Wilshire Boulevard commuters are up in arms over the MTA's decision to extend their Westside dedicated bus lane experiment, a program that has led to even more teeth-grinding traffic than usual along the heavily congested Federal to Centinela corridor.
Commute times along the one-mile test route have doubled. Businesses say they are losing money due to the loss of on-street parking. There are no indications that anyone is giving up their car to take advantage of the shorter bus commute, which has been shaved by a whopping 30 seconds.
And yet, Metro officials say to expect more of these bus lanes.
News flash to Metro: people are never, ever going to give up their cars for the bus in numbers large enough to positively affect traffic flow. If the thinking is that some guy who lives in Beverly Hills and commutes to MGM is going to take the bus, that thinking is seriously flawed.
But they probably realize that. This is really just another unintended consequence of the consent decree that put the Bus Riders Union in the driver's seat of Metro's bus system. That decree, which forced Metro into addressing critical shortcomings in LA's bus system, has nevertheless led to a bus-centric vision of city transit that often gives short shrift to projects that would actually decrease traffic congestion.
Busways like the Orange Line, which will run on a separate roadway, are one thing. But flooding crowded city streets with more busses will, ironically, lead to longer commute times, more congestion, and more engine emissions: in short, more of what we already have, only worse.
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The MTA needs to deal with the reality of the situation: this city was built for cars. We feel proprietary about them. We hate driving but don't want to surrender our independence to the fickle whims of bus drivers and Metro conductors.
Sure, buses are useful to a lot of people—but then again, so are cars. I'm as pro-public transport as anyone else (I must admit NYC has a leg up on us there), but we have to overcome the fundamental resistance of LA commuters to giving up their cars, starting with the rancor over buses slowing us down, stopping up traffic, and contaminating (more) air on the streets.
why would people give up their vehicles for public transportation, when l.a. people drive 2 blocks around the corner to their local starbucks or coffee bean? public transportation and frequent walking...that's unheard of in l.a.! hehe
Works at MGM? Lives in Beverly Hills? MGM's corporate HQ is in Century City--you could get there on the bus fairly easily. The Santa MOnica office would be a bit trickier.
YOu mean "works at Disney and lives in BH". But anyone with that set-up would never take public transport. If you can afford to live in BH and work at Disney, you have a driver.
Actually, I was referring to the MGM office on Santa Monica, since commuters on that route are who Metro is ostensibly targeting. Your point is well taken, however: some people are just never going to take the bus. Transit-dependent people are the vast majority of bus-riders. The only way to reduce traffic is to make public transit a viable option for car owners. Transit has to become as nearly convenient as solo driving in order to lure drivers from their cars.
Either that, or jack the gas tax up high enough to reflect the true (environmental, social, geo-political, health) costs of our out-of-control oil consumption.