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The Great L.A. Walk Treks Adams & Washington Today
I have to confess something: despite living in the NoHo Arts District, despite working on Sunset and Vine, despite writing for one of the most public-transit-friendly blogs in the city, I have remained hesitant about taking the Metro to work every morning. I mean, it makes sense: the station in NoHo is about a 10-15 minute walk away, it's a quick 10 minute trip to the Hollywood and Vine station, which drops me conveniently close to work -- and I can even stop at Molly's every morning for breakfast if I want! So great!
So why has it taken me so long to get on the train?
I love my car.
I know, I know, I know! I'm evil, callous, headed straight for hell, the special kind of hell reserved for puppy-kickers and people who tell dead baby jokes. I'm that oh-so-typical Angeleno who's too busy being blonde and insular and I have zero intellectual life and most of my limbs have been replaced with plastic and I live in a bubble where we don't let in Mexicans except to water our vast superfluous lawns and people from New York spontaneously vomit bagels and pizza slices when they see me!! I go to restaurants only for the celebrities! I know, I know, you don't have to tell me! You hate me and everything I stand for!
Actually, none of that is true (except for the blonde part), but I do admit to being the typical Angeleno when it comes to my car. My car is a part of me: I've owned two versions of the same Honda Civic since high school, and my little silver buddy has always been there to take me where I want to go. Nothing fills me with more joy than to gun the engine and go flying down some wide swathe of Sunset Boulevard, or wind through the canyons at dusk, or head up the 101 for a quick weekend getaway.
But nothing -- and I mean nothing -- fills me with more rage than driving in traffic. It's gotten so bad that I arrive home from my twenty-minute commute shaking with rage and prickly with frustration. I'm cursing more. I haven't resorted to the middle finger, but I sure love to lay on that horn. It's getting bad.
Thus: the Metro.
"Oh, you'll save so much money on gas!" everyone keeps telling me. Actually, that might not be true. I spend an average of $35 on gas every month, which is enough to fill up my tank once. That's right: 35 bucks. What can I say? The Honda Civic is an efficient machine, especially if you drive stick like I do. So it's not so much of a budget issue for me, since traveling round-trip every day on the subway costs $2.50, which works out to $50 for the typical work month -- and yes I could get that monthly pass, but it's still about the same price.
"Oh you'll get to work so much faster!" everyone else says. Actually, no again: my drive time is about twenty minutes one way (yes, again, I'm lucky), while a one-way trip door-to-door using public transportation uses up about 35-40 minutes of my day. However: when the traffic gods strike, as they are apt to do in this city, my drive can skyrocket to an hour or more. And who likes sitting in traffic for an hour to travel seven miles? Not me! It only took a few marathon trips to work before I said to myself, "Self, this is bulllllllshit. There has to be another way."
But if it's not the money or the time, then why am I really taking the Metro? Well, social pressure, naturally. The fine folks over here at LAist just won't shut up about how great and easy it is to take public transportation (Zach Behrens, I'm looking in your direction), and, well, I want to seem cool in their eyes. Before you start calling me names, you have to admit that peer pressure isn't a bad thing in this situation: I'll gladly be a lemming if it means I am putting fewer emissions out into the atmosphere and relying less on nonrenewable energy sources to get around.
Secondly, I'm doing it for simple peace of mind: if my day doesn't have to include driving around Hollywood, which is probably the world's capital of Stupid Fucking Sonsofbitches Asshole Drivers (sorry, Mom), well, that makes me a happier person. And, yes, living on the Westside for four years after college turned me into a hippie "People's Republic of Santa Monica" adherent, so it does make me feel good to do my part towards saving the environment and the whales and the owls and all that stuff.
I'm also doing it for the good of my ass. No, really, literally my ass: it's getting bigger, and I'd like that to stop. I sit a lot during the day, and it's not doing me much good just to jump in the car after work and head straight home. If I take the Metro, I'll get to walk, take stairs, and even indulge in the occasional mad-dash-for-the-departing-train! It'll be great for my mental AND physical health.
Finally, I just think it's going to be fun. I love traveling on the subway in other cities: London, Paris, New York, Copenhagen, you name it, print me out a ticket and I'm there. It makes me feel like a real citizen to take my seat in a train car, pull out my book, and chill with other commuters going about their days. The Hollywood and Vine station dumps you out right across from the Pantages Theater, and walking through the streets of Hollywood these days is an exciting prospect, what with all the construction and movement and progress.
So I'll be trying it out the next few weeks, and I'll be letting you all know how it goes. So if you're on the Red Line and you see a girl in an LAist tee smiling beatifically as she reads her Colleen McCullough novel don't hesitate to say hi. I'm not driving, what reason do I have to be angry?
Photo of the Red Line by Paul!!! via Flickr.
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Great post. As a PA, I drive around from studio to post production facility to sets all day, leaving little time for PT usage. But I too took the metro for the first time a few months back to the Hollywood Bowl. I must say, it was completely reinvigorating. When dealing with parking is one of the biggest sources of stress in your life, you know you gotta make a change at least once.
I take the Blue Line for 2 hrs everyday to and from Long Beach for work (even though I have a car). This public transportation commute has made me extremely appreciative of the luxury of having your own vehicle.
The Blue Line is about as bad as the metro gets, so you're lucky to ride Red Line.
$35 a month?! I drive an Accord and Im putting in about $20 once a week. Where the fuck do you work? Two blocks from your home?
I think it's really great that you're doing this, Carrie. In the past necessity dictated that I hop the red line from my NoHo homebase and then ride downtown and then pick up one of the express buses that runs alongside the Eastbound 10 fwy to get to the CSULA campus. I liked my commute because I was getting (relatively speaking) fresh air, some exercise, and a chance to make my drive time more mentally active (reading, grading papers, listening to tunes, letting my writer's brain wander) since I didn't have to watch the road, just mainly my back (ba-dum-dum). I would use PT still to get to campus if I didn't have a couple of drawbacks, mostly having to do with the massive amount of papers and books and paranphernalia I have to lug around, and also because I'm one of those smug hybrid drivers who is passing you solo in the carpool lane. But I take subway whenever I can, mostly recreationally like to parties, bars, etc. Go metro!
you will read so many books
your life will change
you might even wish for a longer commute
Good luck Carrie. Sounds like you have an ideal Metro commute. You have to remember that it's not about competition with the car per se, but about an alternative lifestyle. You seem to realize that with your reasons for riding, and hopefully the lifestyle suits you.
One thing that might become a hassle since you're not getting a pass (which is right financially) is having to go the ticket machines every morning/evening and fumbling with cash/change. You might want to consider getting a bag of tokens, they cover they base fare, and you can just carry two with you every day and buy your tickets without worry about having the right amount of cash on hand or putting in a $20 and getting a bunch of Sacajawea's back. It tends to happen that as your are fumbling to get the money for your ticket you'll hear the sound of the train leaving.
Also, if you want to shave some time off your commute time to/from the train, and get some more exercise as well, you can consider riding a bike to the station, since bikes are allowed on Metro Rail.
I'm excited to read about your experiment and to see what effect it has on your mental and physical health.
kudos on the decision to try out the subway in spite of it costing you a little more and taking a bit more time. the piece of mind will be worth it.
However I'm surprised your editor isn't enraged that you said:
"living on the Westside for four years after college turned me into a hippie "People's Republic of Santa Monica" adherent"
considering just last week he pretty much called the westside the anti-hippy.
I have a suspended license so I've been forced to go public for months now, and I've learned something about going Metro:
The train is kick ass, but I've never met a bus in Los Angeles that isn't a) late as hell and pissing me off, b) filled to the brim with hot, dank ass people.
But in all fairness, that could be due to where I live and bus sucking and being FULL OF PEOPLE. I digress though, good post.
What you need to tell your self is: "Self its time to get a bike and cut my commute to the red line in half and at the same time work on my behind which has grown from sitting all day." And then you can say: "Self I can now feel like I'm part of a big metropolis because I use my ipod with its white earphones." Follow that with "Self, we've been so good this week, lets eat a bacon cheeseburger at Molly's".
CaliKing, I live about six miles from my work -- if I'm driving, I get on the freeway at Lankershim and get off at Cahuenga. I get about 30-35 miles to the gallon and my car has a 12 gallon tank.
I almost never drive on the weekends unless I'm visiting my family in Simi Valley, and for errands, I either walk or carpool with my boyfriend.
So overall, it's rare if I drive more than 300 miles in a month.
So overall, it's rare if I drive more than 300 miles in a month.
If Metro ends up working at for you, and you like the lifestyle, imagine how much your mileage will drop! Hell, with that lifestyle, you might even consider giving up the Civic! Hehe, maybe not, but that's when you'll know the true feeling of liberation (and when you feel the real financial savings).
I like you're style, hopefully this works in your favor.
Revision to above post:
at = out
and you're = your
:(
Riding the Metro gets weird as the time approaches midnight. The clock ticks away and I believe the last Red line will run around midnight.
Besides the clock, there is the occasional minstrel show and various less than desireable occupants that may or may not be stopped by the transit police.
If you do forget to bring change to pay for your fare, consider the consequence of trying to ride for free: If you have no ID proceed immediately to jail or suffer a not cheap ticket with your ID. It would be wise to panhandle for change to get enough to ride with a true metro ticket(or the occasional transfer of the day pass,which is illegal to do)
Awesome post and looking forward to follow-ups. But don't forget there's more cost to driving than just the gas. Even if you figure it simply at the basic federal reimbursement peg of 39 cents per mile (or somewhere around there; I'm not sure exactly) you'll see that the $2.50 roundtrip subway ticket is much more the bargain.
Also, check with your company to see if it provides some sort of incentive to use public transit options. Maybe they'll spring for all or a part of a monthly pass.
just a little comment back to philpalm... thats a very very limited thing. more times than not, and i mean, like nearly always there aren't an weird shitz going on so please, anybody reading this and considering using the subway, its completely safe and theres nothing to fear. my gf rides from noho to dtla all the time and many times late at night so fear not. not to mention, there ain't nothing wrong with seeing a sheriff hangin about. most of the time they're just a presence rather than a ticket checker. the ones in the white uniforms are usually the ticket checkers. however, just buy a ticket--i suggest the monthly pass--and there's nothing to worry about.
Congrats Carrie! I absolutely know the feeling of being one with your car, but I am certain you will feel much more refreshed every day. When I lived in DC I had the thrill of being totally public transit-based and it was amazing; Tony was right, I wanted my commute to be longer, and it had nothing to do with not wanting to go to work. Sadly, I am not on a transit-friendly commuting route now, so I am jealous.
I just hope that your new mellow commute doesn't mean the end of your angst-filled rants on the site :)
Good good! You are one of the luckies who actually has real use for the Metro. Its true- its a healthier, easier, less-stressful alternative to driving.
But don't feel guilty for waiting so long to get there. Its not a convenient system. I like it, I take it as often as I can, but its not yet at that point where its easier than driving (for most of us who dont commute straight from NoHo to Hollywood). Even if you can use it to get from Point A to Point B, its all the stuff that comes up in between that you have to worry about. "Oh, I have to head across town for a lunch meeting? Or to the store?" Any other city where the public transportation system is complete, these little things don't faze commuters one bit, because the Metro/subway/bus can get them anywhere. I grew up in ny and i dont recall needing to look at a subway map past the age of 14, no matter which borough i was headed to. And better still, barring late late night, the subway will get you there a hell of a lot faster than a car will. Here, if someone springs an errand on me on a day I took the bus or my bike to work, I have to run to a computer and figure out how to do it, if its even possible, and of course, how long it will take (almost always longer than driving).
Maybe in 10 years (20) that wont be the case anymore. But we've still got a long way to go until faithful Metro riders stop feeling like martyrs, or at least presenting themselves that way.
GREAT POST!!! Hahahaha! I drive in Hollywood and I agree!
And I did take the Subway to work when I lived in the NoHo Arts District as well. Right into Hollywood. Took it for years! I really do love the subway, and if there was one in Burbank, I'd continue. Oh well...
jenn wrote:
I grew up in ny and i dont recall needing to look at a subway map past the age of 14, no matter which borough i was headed to.
considering that la's rail system isn't as vast as nyc's one should assume you could handle such memorization post 14 as well. and if you're willing to use a bus in nyc there's no reason you can't do it here. the bus network is vast as hell and reaches just about everywhere. its of course not as easy as subways everywhere, but its a hell of a lot better than sitting in your car pissed cuz you've had the same personalized license plate in front of you for 30 minutes and 3 miles.
and
But we've still got a long way to go until faithful Metro riders stop feeling like martyrs, or at least presenting themselves that way.
lolze. this is great... so on point. i'm a full time metro rider and hate the idea of being lumped into the group that feels their being such selfless martyrs for taking public transit. people will tell me so grandiosely about how they took the subway as if they had just fed poor children all day. and if the took the bus... poor african children. shits hilarious. nice call.
Good Job!!!! As a Washingtonian....that mean's I'm from our nations capital Washington, DC...where we love public trans, I can't believe no one takes the metro here. I guess I get why...b/c it really doesn't even to go a whole side of the city, but I wish I was able to take it! Everyone drives here, even if a place is 2 blocks away.....for CA being such a "green" state, I don't see how. As an east coaster, I like to walk, everyone I know takes the metro in DC and cabs. I never even see cabs here...but that's another thing...and with the bars having valet! But if it's close to your home and close to your job, why not! Read the paper or a book, no stress of driving siting in traffic and yes you get to walk around. If you ask me LA is just "middle america" drive to work, sit all day, drive home. I'm surpised there aren't more fat people here, but then I guess everyone's an actor!!!
But we've still got a long way to go until faithful Metro riders stop feeling like martyrs, or at least presenting themselves that way.
Haha, passive aggro at it's best, but I would agree on some level.
But I still contend there's a fundamental lifestyle difference as well that creates martyr's in LA where they'd just be lay people in New York. The reason taxi cabs are so prevalent in in NYC is because even though there is a massive transit system that goes anywhere, there still times when it's not as convenient. You've got to walk to the station, walk down multiple levels of stairs, pass through iron-maiden turnstyles, contend with massive crowds, wait for trains in stifiling heat. But this doesn't make NYC subway riders martyrs because from their perspective, that's just how it is.
Just like in LA we don't generally consider people wasting away in traffic as martyr's, although from my point of view they are certainly suffering greatly for their cause (personal private transportation).
I ride Metro not as a sacrifice, but as an alternative to what I see as an inconvenient system. I just find it far easier to get around without having to take a 2-ton backpack made of steel and glass everywhere I go, even if it takes a bit longer.
can you guys all put little nametags on so I know who you are when I'm on the train? I'd love to have commute-buddies.
I really do wear LAist t-shirts around town, so if you see me, please say hi!!!!
p.s. Tony Pierce loves the westside, he just likes winding you all up, it's like a thing for him.
Bravo for public transportation!
I go to UCLA and like to go home some weekends, but being a poor college student, I can't afford a car or parking for that matter. I used to get rides home from a friend, but now I just take the Rapid Bus to the Red Line.
IMO, Rapid Buses are awesome because they come so frequently and have much fewer stops. I never used the subway prior to coming to college, but now I find myself using the Red Line and the Gold Line to get home every other weekend or so.
Also, I've always felt safe on the subway, as opposed to the buses or bus stops... which can vary greatly depending on time of day and area.
Tony is right too, you do get a lot of reading done on the subway.
As Fred pointed out above, those savings don't kick in unless you actually give up your car.
You won't save the amortized per-mile cost of car ownership just by driving fewer miles.
(I also think "Look how much money you save!" is probably a counter-productive thing for transit advocates to emphasize, since it tends to p*ss off the non-transit-using taxpayers - taxpayers who need to be won over to the idea of subsidizing transit for the good of the community, if we're going to build a decent transit system.)
(But that's just my own personal approach. Your Mileage May Vary.)
I also think "Look how much money you save!" is probably a counter-productive thing for transit advocates to emphasize, since it tends to p*ss off the non-transit-using taxpayers - taxpayers who need to be won over to the idea of subsidizing transit for the good of the community, if we're going to build a decent transit system.
Very good point. New transit advocates can't forget that transit is subsidized by public funds, and that fares only cover a small portion of the cost. All the more reason to ride, in my opinion. If there's a bus stop or train station near your house that is going where you wanna go, by all means ride, you already paid for it!
Yes. YES! Come to papa...
The Militant loves his car too. Loves it so much he doesn't want it to be subjected to everyday wear and tear and wants to have it last him for a long time. So when he drives, it's not during the daily commute when everyone else is driving, and he gets to enjoy the drive.
There's nothing wrong with owning and driving a car. It's just that being dependent on it is wrong.
I love my climate. Stop driving.
Here's a transit problem I'm having --I'm hugely prone to motion sickness and get nauseous if I read on the Metro or bus. Any potential solutions? I still take it 2-3 times a week, but would love to be able to read.
Dramamine? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dimenhydrinate
greatgatsby2 - I'm the same way - I just bring along the radio and get my daily dose of NPR, or you can get books on tape or listen to a podcast.
btw, I took the subway because I want to be part of the solution - it's one less car on the road, and if enough people do it, then when you do need to drive, hopefully traffic won't be as heavy.
The subway takes much longer than driving for me, and the cost difference is pretty minimal (I do save about a buck when it comes to gas for each round trip), but I need to take the subway because yelling obscenities at makeup-applying, cell-phone-blabbering drivers is not good for my mental health.
And sitting quietly on the metro rail gives me time to read.
Yeah, anything that can keep you from sitting in jammed traffic for an hour at a time, grinding your teeth and wanting to kill someone, is probably a good idea. :-)
In fact, I think it's one of the real keys to living happily in LA.
Now, me, I try to sleep through morning rush hour, and then spend afternoon rush hour messing about in the garden, hanging out with the cat and watching the birds play in the fountain.
I love my commute. I 'commute' barefoot, from the bedroom to my computer chair.
But I realize that not everyone has that option :-)
I usually bike on most of my commutes, but there are those commutes that are a bit too long in which I love to take the rail or the bus even.
And the characters one finds on the bus/rail are just FREE entertainment. Really! You live in a city with millions of people, deal with it. Most people don't realize they LIVE with all these people because the AUTOMOBILE is the bane of isolation/alienation. It absolutely removes you from your environment.
Yay for going CAR-FREE (or lite).
back to tyke-
I hesitated to post that ny comparison because I completely understand how obnoxious it is for people to come clog the city of la then go on and on about how great it is "back home." im not trying to give ny a one-up or anything- i really have come to love la and recognize that it is perhaps the most misunderstood city in the country, or at least as ive encountered it.
i never really took buses in ny, because they're not efficient. They sit in the same traffic cars do and its faster to walk. I wasnt even considering buses as part of the equation; the way i see it, the prime public transit option in ny is the subway, and the prime public transit option in LA is the bus. The Metro here is great, but it can only be great where it IS, and there is no Metro in too many places that I need to go on a daily basis.
So the way I see it, the enormous subway system of NY can only be compared to also enormous bus system in LA. And no, I dont believe I ever will have the bus system memorized (though believe me, im trying!)
But please don't lecture me on why I should take the bus here, because youre preaching to the choir. I do take it. And i ride my bike (although less so, now that it gets darker earlier- for fear of the previously mentioned cell phone-talking, make-up-applying, text-messaging drivers.)
But as I said before, the issue is on those days I do take the bus to work, and I realize I have to get to Culver City or Sherman Oaks for an unexpected delivery or meeting. It can be a real problem. And that to me is a sign that we still have a long way to go- in a real, complete transit system, public transit is the most convenient way to get around- all over the city.
And seriously- in what other cities would a post about Taking the Subway bring out over 30 comments and counting? Isn't that in itself a sign of how far we have to go?
nice post! whoever mentioned the bonus reading time per day makes my favorite point.
Your post inspired me to finally start commenting on LAist. Yay for that, and yay for you! I live in Valley Village and work in Downtown so I take the metro 2 to 3 times a week - sometimes i have to drive for work stuff. I've had some problems with Orange Line reliability (plus I found a cache of sweet parking spaces that appear to be semi-undiscovered by NoHo metro commuters) so I still drive to the NoHo station, but it feels good to lower my mileage that much. It's great -if I'm not crocheting or reading, I'm catching a little metro cat nap.
Just a warning though, be smart about the ipod, as I learned the almost hard way. I was sort of napping (I never fall fully asleep, but was definitley out of it) and stupidly had my ipod just in my hand, not attached to a wrist band or in my purse. A nice young hooligan tried to grab it from me while his friends cheered him on. Thankfully I was awake enough to grab it right back and ask him what the eff he was doing, but it was a close one. Also, this happened at 6pm on a train full of people (who didn't say or do anything), so it's not like the time of day has anything to do with it. This is obviously an easy situation to avoid and I felt/feel completely stupid about it, but just goest to show Street Smarts 101 still applies. Now I notice commuters all the time with their wallets/ipods/expensive phone gadgets in easy-to-grab positions. Overall though, I still feel safe on the Metro.
The Orange Line is unreliable during rush hour? Anytime I take it during these times, there is one like every 2 minutes.
@ZachBehrens - I've definitely waited longer than ten minutes during rush hour for the orange line quite a few times. Sometimes buses will come one right after the another (one time I saw three together). Likely due to the fact that I'm the last stop before the NoHo station. I assume they are less reliable the farther away they get from the starting point.
L.A.'s transit system is actually just as dense as any major U.S. city except New York. If you live in the Central City (not just Downtown). There are over 40 routes that operate 24/7. Boston has none and S.F. has just a handful.
The big difference is that the upper middle class elites, including writer types, usually live on Westside where there is no rail service but more transit service than in Boston or S.F. suburbs an equivalent distance away.
I live 30 miles out in Fullerton and can get downtown in 30 min. or the Valley in less than 1 hr. by Metrolink (commuter rail) and Metro. This is true for most parts of the Eastside as well.
Why don't the elites live east of the 405 where there is lots of transit ? Why is there no rail on the Westside ? I think you all know the answer.
The only people I know who know and use the L.A. transit system are people who grew up in the city. You transplants just need to study the Metro map !