Bus Stops: <i>Changing tracks in downtown LA on a transit-oriented adventure</i>

Since the beginning of this column I’ve focused on one specific neighborhood or landmark each trip. I’ve never transferred buses, never taken a train or a subway and never been farther than where the buses that service Westwood could take me. This week changed all that when I tagged along on the Bruins for Transit quarterly “transit-oriented adventure.”

Bruins for Transit focuses on issues regarding public transportation, including the construction of new rail lines and bus routes, funding for transportation improvements and increased interest in utilizing public transportation among students. Making it easier to get around Los Angeles is the end goal of the club ““ public transit is just a means to an end, said Matthew Kroneberger, a third-year political science student and Bruins for Transit president.

The day started around 10 a.m. when the group met at Wilshire and Westwood to catch the 720 heading east. From the Westlake exit we walked through the Lafayette Recreation Center to an El Salvadoran bakery (Panaderia Salvadoreña Bakery), a small, cash-only shop on 6th Street between South Benton Way and South Rampart Boulevard. The shop offers cheap pastries, including a pastry made with a sweet and moist combination of pudding, honey and raisin pieces and their empanada con leche (a soft, flaky pastry with a condensed milk center).

From the bakery we walked through MacArthur park to get to the Westlake/MacArthur Park subway station. MacArthur Park, which is intersected by Wilshire, has several reputations, some good, mostly bad. It’s the subject of several songs, including “MacArthur Park” by Donna Summer, but it’s also been known as a site of gang violence and the sale of fake IDs. The park itself looks like an oasis ““ the highlight of the area above Wilshire is the lake and the tropical feeling of the palm trees and shrubs that frame the walkways.

The red line leaves from Westlake/MacArthur and stops at Union Station, where we transferred to the gold line. The gold line, which travels from Atlantic Boulevard near the City of Commerce city line to Pasadena, is a small train that travels through the streets of Los Angeles. We got off on Atlantic Boulevard in East Los Angeles and took a local bus down to Tacos Bajas Ensenada, a lime-green restaurant near the corner of South Atlantic and Whittier Boulevard.

Tacos Bajas Ensenada specializes in Mexican food made with fish and shrimp, specifically, tacos and burritos. Michelle Go, an urban planning graduate student and the Bruins for Transit co-president, said she found the place while browsing the Metro website for food locations along different routes. The shrimp tacos are made with two corn tortillas, a generous amount of fried shrimp, sauce, diced tomatoes and cabbage. Two shrimp tacos, a side of rice and a side of refried beans that can be improved with some salt costs $6. Overall, the food is good, the prices are reasonable and the service is fast, though it was crowded at the time.

Our next stop was Little Tokyo for the Japanese Village Plaza, which is two gold line stops away from Atlantic. The plaza was full of people, tourists and locals, walking around the different stores. There are several small specialty shops, like the one that sells mochi, a few craft shops and a few sit-down restaurants. The mochi place was near the back of the plaza, near the market. One mochi, about 1.5 inches in diameter, is $1 and it comes in several flavors: mango, vanilla, green tea, strawberry, kona coffee and red bean.

The trip ended with sightseeing in downtown Los Angeles. Downtown, the sky scrapers are only broken up by landmarks like the Bradbury Building (the oldest office building downtown), the Angels Flight Railway (an old rail car built to transport people from downtown up an incline to Bunker Hill) and the Los Angeles Public Library. This intermingling of old and new, of Victorian architectural design and modern high-rises, is a part of what makes exploring Los Angeles so appealing.

If you suddenly find yourself “¨craving a fish taco, e-mail John at “¨[email protected].”¨”¨

“Bus Stops” runs every Tuesday.