No car? No problem!

Monday, September 28, 1998

No car? No problem!

By J. Sharon Yee

Daily Bruin Senior Staff

Lorenzo spends his eight-hour workday taking in the sights and
sounds of Los Angeles, from the east side to the west side.

He also drives a bus on one of the Metropolitan Transit
Authority’s (MTA) 200 bus lines.

The bus may fall short of what you would expect on a luxury
cruise liner, but before you give up your walking shoes and bus
tokens for the sweet comforts of a taxi cab or your own plush
vehicle, take the time to spend a typical day on a roaming L.A.
bus.

* * *

Lorenzo can always tell an experienced rider from an
inexperienced one.

He said inexperienced riders tend to ask lots of questions and
sit close to the front, usually in the seats reserved for elderly
and handicapped passengers.

Often, if the bus is full and they have to sit in the back,
they’ll push their way up to the front to exit because they don’t
understand the door in the back was created for that exact
purpose.

"Sure, it’s irritating the first couple of times, but, like the
traffic, you get used to it," Lorenzo said, "It’s just part of the
job."

Company policy requires drivers to call out the street names, or
at the very least, where you can transfer buses.

Watching Lorenzo announce the major streets, you realize that
drivers who do call out street names are like a godsend to the
inexperienced rider.

Often, the driver will have his mouth so close to the microphone
that his words simply transmute into a blur of words and ugly
sounds. What sounds like "Salt Lake City" is really "San Vicente,"
even on a relatively empty and quiet bus.

On a crowded and noisy bus, you’d have better luck sticking your
head out the window and watching for the street signs.

This morning, there are two passengers in the back who have
their heads down and eyes closed, doing that
I’m-trying-hard-not-to-fall-asleep-head-bob, similar to what
students often do in lecture.

Perfecting the bob on a constantly bouncing vehicle crowded with
tons of people and screaming kids, however, takes a certain kind of
person – someone who has synchronized his body rhythms to that of
the bus’s.

So why do people endure the inconveniences of riding the bus
anyway? "They don’t have a choice," Lorenzo said.

"Most students ride the bus either out of necessity or sheer
convenience," Daniel Dobbs, a UCLA alumnus, said, "It gives
students without a car a chance to get out of Westwood."

"It’s a necessary evil," explained Josh Britton, a third-year
aerospace student

Ultimately, the enormous costs of parking on campus and the
limited availability of parking spots may force students to take
the bus between school and home.

For Dobbs, the costs of car payments, gas and insurance come out
to roughly $600 each month, whereas riding the bus only costs about
$45 each month.

"You don’t have to worry about parking or sitting in traffic,
either," he said, "You’re letting someone else do it."

Britton, who regularly rides the Santa Monica Big Blue Bus from
campus to his Westwood apartment, praised the timeliness and
relative cleanliness of the Blue Buses.

But he admitted that he only rides the bus because he cannot
afford to park his car on campus.

"You have to schedule your life around the bus schedules, which
doesn’t allow for many opportunities to get a little extra sleep in
the morning," he said.

Five of the 12 Big Blue Bus lines that serve the west side
arrive and depart from UCLA.

Sixty-seven new, freshly painted Big Blue Buses recently
replaced the older versions in order to provide easier access for
disabled passengers and cut down on environmental pollution.

All of the new buses have lower boarding platforms – to help
elderly and disabled passengers board easier – and release less
toxic emissions, according to Blue Bus spokesperson Cynthia
Gibson.

The fare has remained 50 cents since 1985, and that includes one
free transfer to any other Blue Bus.

College students 20 and under save $1 per every 10 rides when
they purchase a special pass, which is available at local libraries
or on campus at the Central Ticket Office.

Nearly 10,000 college students purchase passes every month,
according to the MTA.

Fifty cents is, by far, the cheapest bus fare you’ll find in Los
Angeles. Culver City bus lines charge 60 cents (including transfer)
on a one-way trip, including one transfer. MTA buses cost
$1.60.

There are nearly 15 times more MTA buses, however, which serve
1,400 square miles all across the county and over 1.2 million
passengers daily.

Altogether, six MTA lines serve the UCLA community.

The MTA predicts Los Angeles traffic will become 25 percent
slower in the next 20 years , and spokesperson Mark Littman had a
few predictions of his own.

"Hopefully, companies will give more incentives to employees to
share rides and help subsidize the costs of using public
transportation," he said, "There are a lot of options people are
simply unaware of, such as the Metro light rail and buses."

If the commute between his home in west Los Angeles, job in the
valley and classes at El Camino College was shorter, Dobbs said
he’d definitely consider taking the bus more often. But what is
usually a 20-minute drive can easily turn into a 2-hour commute via
bus, he explained.

Spending so much time waiting for and riding buses, Dobbs said,
has made him appreciate the simpler things in life more – like
making it to all three bus- and one-train connections within a
short, three-minute window of opportunity for each one.

"That’s the ultimate satisfaction," he said, with a smile.

"It teaches humility and makes you appreciate your car," he
added.

The biggest complaint people share with Lorenzo is, not
surprisingly, about the quality of the ride itself. One day, it’s
the air conditioning that doesn’t work. The next day, it’s the rude
operators. And though the buses are cleaned daily, another common
complaint is the filthiness buses seem to cultivate.

"People do just about anything and everything on a bus –
urinate, regurgitate, defecate, anything," Lorenzo said.

At 9:45 a.m., there’s already an unrecognizable, pungent smell
permeating the air, and candy wrappers and old newspapers float
about.

Overcrowding remains the largest singular problem facing the MTA
and other bus systems in Los Angeles, which as Lorenzo observed,
has the "most overcrowded bus system in the country."

To alleviate this crowding, the MTA has tried introducing more
buses on the heavily travelled lines, and Littman said there are
plans to add an additional 1,300 buses in the near future.

For example, seven or eight lines run along Wilshire Boulevard.
Some, such as the No. 322 or No. 320, are considered limited buses
– ones that only stop at major streets and a few in between.

Jason Park, a fourth-year English student, said L.A. buses are
exceptional in their timeliness and overall service compared with
those in Korea.

"Just double the worst imaginable situation on an L.A. bus, and
that’s what you’ll find in Korea," Park said.

Park added that over there, all the buses face overcrowding
problems on a daily basis.

Aside from major concerns such as overcrowding and discourteous
drivers, most students only mention minor inconveniences about
riding the buses.

Mike Blust, a fourth year business economics student, recalled
one memorable passenger on a recent bus ride.

"(A man) started yelling profanities out the window, and all the
people who were sitting near him, myself included, got up and moved
to the front of the bus," he said.

Students cite other annoyances such as complete strangers
approaching unsuspecting passengers, others who talk too loudly,
and still others who simply forget to put on deodorant in the
morning.

Of course, most everyone gets used to the strange people who
ride the bus because, as Blust explained, "No one’s ever personally
bothered me, and it’s just something you come to expect."

Ironically, the first complaint of the day comes from a man who
is very angry about the previous bus not stopping for him. Lorenzo
tries his best to explain to the man that the No. 320 bus doesn’t
stop at the street he was waiting at.

The man is not listening, and all the 13-year veteran driver can
do is roll his eyes.

Los Angeles boasts some 2 million cars on its nearly 7,000 miles
of streets and highways, which, as one would expect, can take a
toll on the city’s bus drivers.

"It’s too easy to get a driver’s license in California," Lorenzo
said of car drivers in this city.

"Most of the drivers out there can’t even walk and chew gum at
the same time, and yet they’re trying to conduct business on their
cell phones and drive at the same time," he added.

Despite the potential hassle and stress of riding the bus, most
students and other passengers overwhelmingly recommend it, even if
only for the experience itself.

"Ride the bus for a week and you’ll have more stories to tell
than you could ever write in an entire lifetime," Dobbs said.

Related site:

“¢bull;City of Los Angeles Department of Transportation

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