2013-07-31
Vae Viator41
The photograph below documents the
situation at the Maxella AV and Lincoln BL stop on the BBB number 3 Line. It is the sort of “work” one would expect
from the LACMTA. They taped or caused to
be taped shut the aperture in the plastic pipes associated with power
poles. These pipes were used as
improvised trash cans. BBB N.B. The stop still needs a trash can!
Su Topo will include this comment in
every post with the above until BBB corrects the problem. For quite awhile BBB has been charging for intra-line transfers, reversing the long standing policy of free transfers to other BBB lines. And lots money to build a big headquarters on Colorado BL just east of 4th Street. Mr. King, just a few dollars for a trash can, you might need a few more to cover other bus stops too, will erase this section. After all, it is Marina Del Rey! :-)
BBB Maxella Trash Fix???
White Line Incursion Series
Su Topo uses video to highlight the
problem of scofflaw drivers endangering Metro bus passengers yet, no authority
seems to want to take ownership of the problem.
The issue is not unique to the particular site which this Mole
documents, but is illustrative of a general problem. Your Mole encourages you to report similar
problems to the appropriate agencies in your area(s) and hope that you will
have better luck than he. In the
youtube.com videos linked below one can see exactly what happens when the policing
agencies fail to enforce traffic laws.
The videos linked below document that,
and this is important, a never ending stream of vehicles fail to use the lane
as required by law.
Neither are the policing agencies
active when it comes to protecting us by bringing these obvious and frequent
traffic law violations to an immediate halt.
The LACMTA is derelict as well, in that they fail to use the near hourly
proof of the violations captured by the on board cameras, mentioned here and
discussed at length in the posting of 2012-05-31.
In the following video we see a driver change his mind and decide to hold in place, blocking south bound traffic, until he decides to follow the bus instead of cut it off. Either option is not a good one. See the youtube video here.
In spite of the potential for these violations to occur several times per HOUR, I have never seen a police presence at this location. One would think that with a bus schedule taped to the dashboard one of the several policing agencies would have made some arrests by now. Unless they have "more important" work to do, than protecting bus passengers.
La Taupe feels that it is appropriate
to dedicate each video to ALL the agencies who should be protecting us. So, they are dedicated to (1): Airport (LAWA)
Police, the L.A.P.D., the L. A. County
Sheriff’s Department and Mr. A. Leahy who is CEO of the LACMTA.
Unlooping the Loopy 232 Line
Please take a look at the photo below. It shows present route of the
The Loopy 232 Line♪
So, su Topo, for the benefit of the management and staff of both companies, has provided the picture below, which show things as the should be, viz., with the waste is removed!
The 232 Line Unlooped♪
Thanks to Google Maps for their distance measuring feature!
Taking the routes to the nearest kilometer, the loopy route at 3 Km and the unlooped route at 2 Km results in a 1 Km saving per North bound route per bus run. The south bound routes don't loop. This should have been a clue to somebody, ¿es no?
Let's analyze the waste. According to the current 232 schedule there are 47 northbound daily runs. Three runs stop short of the loop, leaving 44 runs daily each of which waste 1 Km of tire wear, fuel, operator's time and etc. The daily total 44 Km.
On Saturdays the wastage turns out to be 17 Km and on Sunday it is 15 Km.
We can calculate that ((44*5)+17+15) each week 252 Km are wasted. If we annualize that number, ignoring holiday schedules, then (252*52) yield a yearly wastage of 13,104Km. Converting the kilometers gives us about 8142 wasted miles or about 10 round trips to San Francisco - WASTED. And it goes on and on.
Here is the definition of a fiduciary "An individual in whom another has placed the utmost trust and confidence to manage and protect property or money. The relationship wherein one person has an obligation to act for another's benefit.*"
A breach of fiduciary responsibilities occurs when managers do not properly care for monies or property or waste monies or property in their charge. I see a good case for charging the management of the LACMTA and MV Transportation with breach of fiduciary (much of the LACMTA's funding comes form taxpayers) for allowing this waste to go on year after year. What do you say, Messers Leahy and Pate, can you bring this waste to an end? The cost of moving one bus stop and creating a new one will be more than paid for in less than a single year!
The Mole reads the papers and other things,
obviating the necessity of your doing so.
The Daily News (Vuong) covers yet another maintenance proble that the LACMTA failed to address in a timely manner. It seems that they simply wait until there are reported for ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) violations are reported then act.
In this case it is the lack of a wheelchair ramp at the Gold Line South Pasadena Station (née Mission Station). The LACMTA has lots of money to change station names but none for maintenance! Please read the details of Mr. Vuong's article; the link is in the "Works Cited" section, below.
The Times informs (Nelson) us that at last we will "close the loop"" and have a link to LAX, one that is not provided by LAWA's Flyaway buses. But wait, there is less. It won't be the just a simple link from the Aviation Station to LAX, it will be the "Crenshaw Line"! This "brain storm" will cost an estimated 2.06 BILLION DOLLARS and as you might guess, will end up short of LAX by about an estimated one mile. Just different ways of wasting money. I have been conducting a tutorial for the LACMTA over the past months, hoping to show them by example that the way to build an airport link is, simply to build it. Not to come up with new and different ways to fail. I have tried again below but I don't feel confident that my students are "A" material, do you?
The link to Ms Nelson's article included her picture, and a lovely picture it is! All la Taupe could say was <<Très belle!>>. But, after a bit, la Taupe gathered his wits and searched for a map of the planned Crenshaw Line; he found one on Metro.net. Here it is. After carefully parsing what the LACMTA means by "... rail link to LAX", the sad news it appears is that they mean "a rail link to Aviation Station ". Aviation Station has only an estimated ten foot concrete road bed pointing in the general direction of LAX. Or the planned station at Aviation and Century Blvds which, when taken as the starting point, is 1.4 miles to the estimated mid-point of LAX.
The LACMTA's Rail "link" to LAX♪
Now if Ms Nelson and here editors wanted to cover the LACMTA in depth and are open to a suggestion, here it is: It would be interesting to hear an answer to the question: Why LAWA is in the transportation business, i.e., running a bus shuttle service between points throughout Los Angels County and elsewhere as well? Further: Why is the LACMTA, who happily collects public tax revenue, FAILING to provide such transportation service, while deferring to LAWA? The LACMTA sometime ago cancelled the 439 Line bus which not only took passengers to LAX but also served the very useful purpose of linking Union Station, with the Westside Transportation Center, the Culver City Transportation Center and Aviation Station; all of this for only $1.50! Your Mole had always felt that cancelling the 439 and allowing LAWA to run buses in the county for a fare that is, at $7, at least four and one half times the fare charged by the LACMTA was taxation without transportation. Such actions demonstrate a less than detailed understanding of transportation systems and also must certainly be in breach of something?
The Daily News features a series of photos which aptly demonstrate the dangers of NOT BUILDING RAPID TRANSIT, i.e., not grade separated from other traffic.
Of course, it is less expensive to build light rail but future generation will curse the LACMTA for its short sightedness. Rapid transit is safer, faster and can transport more people per unit of time.
I scanned the LACMTA's "LA Union Station Master Plan", another expensive brochure which is coded "13-1704RB ©2013 LACMTA" and frankly, I felt a twinge of anger as I did so. In these days of difficult economic times the LACMTA has the time, personnel and money to be concerned about "... shaping the future of Union Station", while doing such a miserable job of providing transportation to people for whom buses, trains and subways offer their only choice of transportation.
In the section below, su Topo show what people must put up with in making their daily commutes. While they are getting behind schedule the Management and staff at the Taj Mahal are sitting on their fat chairs and dreaming about maintaining the architectural integrity of Union Station or some like concept and planning "Community Workshops" about their dreams!
Here is what real people must experience. When a "regular run" of the 40 Line reaches the intersection of Hawthorne BL and Lennox BL it has just under .5 Km to go before it reaches the Hawthorne Green Line Station, that route is shown below. This route is equivalent to about .3 miles.
In the section below, su Topo show what people must put up with in making their daily commutes. While they are getting behind schedule the Management and staff at the Taj Mahal are sitting on their fat chairs and dreaming about maintaining the architectural integrity of Union Station or some like concept and planning "Community Workshops" about their dreams!
Here is what real people must experience. When a "regular run" of the 40 Line reaches the intersection of Hawthorne BL and Lennox BL it has just under .5 Km to go before it reaches the Hawthorne Green Line Station, that route is shown below. This route is equivalent to about .3 miles.
Line 40 Long♪
But, we find that the "Short Line" version of the route (Please see below) covers 2.7 Km! Or a distance of more than FIVE TIMES the distance above, that is 1.7 miles.
Depends Upon What One Means by Short♪
In this case, "short" means waste; the same waste documented above - wasted tire wear, fuel, operator's time and etc. What make this worse those of us who are forced to ride this route are offered the Hobson's choice, of debussing at Lennox BL and walking to the Green Line OR having our trip unnecessarily extended by the 40 "short" Line. Adding a further inconvenience those wanting to continue on using a 40 Line or a 740 Line bus will be further inconvenienced by a trip down into the station a walk under Hawthorne BL, followed by a trip back up to street level. I am not going to attempt to do all of the LACMTA's work, but I will say, Please, for once think of the convenience of your ridership, Mr. Leahy, and make the short line end at the Green Line Station, just as a normal person would.
<<L'expérience s'achète par le Malheur.>>
Honoré Balzac: (1799-05-20~1850-08-18)
[Experience can be purchased by misfortune.]
Merci bien à www.evene.fr !
¿Musica?
Let's listen to the Marche française by Immanuel Chabrier. ¡As usual, Thank you to our good friends at groveshark.com!
Merci bien à www.evene.fr !
¿Musica?
Let's listen to the Marche française by Immanuel Chabrier. ¡As usual, Thank you to our good friends at groveshark.com!
Ear
(and Eye) to the Rail
Cautionary
Note: Those employed by the LACMTA should NOT view the following videos. The speed of the trains in the videos,
because they are truly rapid transit, their quietness, the clarity and sound
level of the onboard announcements will likely make you dizzy, nauseous and
frighten you. Additionally, the concept
of having a DIRECT LINK to the airport should place you in a state of “cognitive
dissonance”, which occurs when two cognitions
complete. Cognitive dissonance results
in the case where Cognition 1, “It is impossible to
directly link a city to its airport” and cognition 2, “many
cities are directly linked to their airports”.
One
can learn more about cognitive dissonance here.
But again, I must caution LACMTA management and staff that they should
not try this sort of psychological study at home and definitely not without the
involvement and guidance of a trained professional.
Again, if you work for the LACMTA, you should under no circumstances view this video.
N.B., please, the cleanliness of the station and the clarity of the public address system. Note too, that the Germans are providers of international maglev systems.
Thank you youtube.com! Thank you N199UA for the excellent video!
Cosmology
Here is a link to some interesting activity which has been in process at the center of our home galaxy. That is, the black hole at the galactic center is drawing gas into it at a speed of 10 million Km per hour (6.2 million MPH). Why that speed is even greater than the Metro/MV Transportation can rack up wasted miles on the loopy 232 Line. And faster than Metro can spend taxpayers' dollars!
The
Mole rides again, you will be aware that your green "Walk" light means nothing to some Metro drivers.
(All
times are expressed in the 24 hour system.)
Long Waits for the 40 and the 42/42A♪
2013-07-23 13:38 aboard a 117 Line bus (#8214): This bus which according to my schedule should have left at 13:25, left late. The driver seemed to spend time aboard the parked bus using his cell phone. He wore a "partial" glove on his left hand, had long hair and, how can I say this softly, was, ah, ah, not well-groomed. When we finally left he exited directly out of the entry driveway (the east-most driveway) of the LAXCBC. Which action caused me to write this, make permanent the list of drivers " I.D. numbers of drivers who will give you a potentially life-threatening ride" and make his number, 25102, first on the permanent list.
2013-07-25 On the Blue Line @ 06:40: A woman is seated behind me, another about three rows ahead of me. They are co-workers and without a single thought and impervious to the desires of others, they begin a LOUD work-related conversation. It is about their accounting headaches reconciling invoicing, inventory control and accounts receivable. It goes on for the entire length of my triap and my history book must be set aside.
As a Blue Line train enters the Willowbrook Station, I see that the headsign says "Willow" meaning that I am out of luck again. We will be forced off the train at Willow so that it can head back to Los Angeles from there. It another of the LACMTA's efforts to please some while inconveniencing others. Just like the Metro Rapid Lines bypassing people at some stops while favoring others by shortening their trip, somewhat.
I will end up waiting at Willow Station longer than it would have taken to take me to my destination in Long Beach. What can the LACMTA be thinking by breaking trips this way? If they are thinking at all it is certainly not about customer service. More and more, with examples of bad management and mis-management piled one on top of another, su Toppo feels that the only talent possessed by the LACMTA is spending tax dollars.
Listen to the onboard announcement we heard as we neared Willow Station.
A technical note: when the Dropbox page appears, click on Download, when the bar with the yellow racing stripe appears on the bottom of the page, click on open. The recording should then play through your Windows Media Player or Quicktime if you have that. The recording is raw, unedited and has about 10 seconds of "quiet" at the beginning, so please be patient.
Your Mole is working on editing software and making the process smoother but Blogger.com doesn't have a built-in player and my past attempts at storing things online were dissapointing in that the site would delete files that hadn't been used in some arbitrary time period. I would like to use more audio and I will do so when these minor hurdles are overcome. End of technical note. :-)
2013-07-29 At LAXCBC: Although there exists signage which prohibits entry of vehciles such as the one pictured below, there is virtually no enforcment at this location. This particular vehicle entered the area and headed right into what is supposed to be a one way street which is clearly marked. Then the driver u-turned right into the area where buses enter and backed up blocking the area. One day there will be an accident because of the poor signage, lack of enforcment and sadly, some confused driver who has blundered into the center.
Where are we?♪
Then too, LAX, read LAWA, hasn't established official drop off locations where people can connect with the airport shuttle service. Lot C could serve that function, but not in its prsent configuration. Everyone at the LACMTA is busy working on the "big ideas", so evaluation and analysis of operations NEVER gets done. Your Mole has sad before, and will likely say it again, "If you don't know what is wrong you can't fix it!" One fix is to have more police patrols here to stop these illegal entries, which I estimate to occur, at least, hourly.
Fare
Box Score Box and related Lists of Shame
Note:
No or few entries above do not necessarily mean all fare boxes are in
operation.
I.D.Numbers
of Distracted Drivers: xxxxx (i);
None
included here, but observations of a minor nature may be included in the main
posting;
Codes:
(i) Extended conversation(s) with passenger(s) or (ii) cell phone call(s). Frequently, details can be found in the text
above, (ii*) cell phone call(s) which are aggravated by some other action,
(iii) Self-distracted. Codes (ii*) and (iii) will ALWAYS be explained in the posting.
I.D.
Numbers of Buses Defaced by WhoIs stickers: xxxx;
~UR
or +UR = (+UR) whois sticker and the ugly residue left after passengers partly
remove the sticker. (~UR) = Only the ugly residue left after passengers almost
completely remove the sticker. +L = an old (legacy) sticker black letters on a
plain white background –these are the original form of the
defacement.
*
Another reason for displaying the operator's ID on the internal display and the
headsign.
ID
numbers of Buses whose Head and Tailsigns disagree: xxxx xxx/xx;
Format
is Bus number followed by Headsign number/Tailsign number.
ID
numbers of Buses without Braille signs: XXXX;
METRO
drivers Lack of Basic Technical Skills Report
The
format is Driver number F[{Y/-n/+n} C[{Y/N+/-}]. Meaning of F if Y the driver stopped with the
Bus stop “flag pole” somewhere between
the bus front door frames. A negative
number, e.g., -3 is the approximate distance in metres (think yards dear
readers) between the nearest bus door vertical frame member and the flag pole
signifying that the bus stopped short of the flag. A positive number, e.g., +3 (metres) is the
approximate distance between the nearest bus door vertical frame member and the
flag pole signifying that the bus stopped past the flag. The value for C[{Y/N}], “Y”
tells us that the driver stopped within an easy step from the curb to the bus, “N”
means it was NOT an easy step from the curb to the bus. It is this Mole's belief that an average
experienced good driver should be able to control his bus so as to position in
near the curb and with the flag pole slightly to the front of the bus.
Xxxxx
F[Y] C[Y]; xxxxx F[Y], C[Y]; xxxxx F[Y], C[Y]; xxxxx F[Y], C[Y]; N.B. distances are in metres, think yards.
nnnnn*
= Contract Driver
I.D.
numbers of drivers who are almost guaranteed to give you a Rough and Jerky (R
& J) ride: xxxxx;
I.D.
numbers of drivers who will give you a potentially life-threatening ride: 25102(J)/2013-07-23; XXXXX(-);
Codes:
S = not wearing seat belts; J = bad judgment (unsafe driving practices).
La
Taupe's Abréviations
ADADO
= Automatic Destination Announcement (on) Door Opening. This feature is
installed on many buses and operates on extremely few.
Another “money down the toilet”
LACMTA investment. La Taupe that this is intended for the
visually impaired because people who can see can read the “head
signs”.
ASAS
= Automatic Stop Announcement System the GPS (Global Positioning System) driven
mechanism for generating audio for the upcoming stops. N.B. Because of the low
power (read weak) processors used in the on-board stops may be too close to
identify stops separately. This is known as a
granularity problem. Then too, if the driver operates the
bus at speed above the speed limit you will find the system “back
announcing” stops which you have already passed.
I find that this will NOT keep some drivers from complaining “that
you didn’t signal (ring) in time.
They don’t understand their relationship to the
system and how, by driving faster than the GPS computer, they can bias it.
BBB
= Santa Monica’s Big Blue Bus
CHSRA
= California High-Speed Rail Authority, which is the equivalent, in more ways
than one, of the LACMTA.
CC
or CCMBL = Culver City (Municipal) Bus (Lines)
CCTC
= Culver City Transportation Center this is the place formerly known as FHMTC =
the Fox Hills Mall Transportation Center (Sepulveda & Slauson)
FFE = Full Fare Equivalent (presently $1.50)
GMBL
= Gardena Municipal Bus lines
ITC
= Inglewood Transit Center
LAWA = Los Angeles World Airports.
LAXCBC
= the LAX City Bus Center.
OCTA
= Orange County Transportation Authority.
OOS
= Out Of Service.
Rapid
Transit = does not compete for right of way, that is, it will not run at grade
unless it has EXCLUSIVE DEDICATED USE of the right of way).
R
& J = Rough and Jerky [ride].
TT
= Torrance Transit.
T1
= the normal type of driver/staff.
T2
= is the non-stop talker type of driver/staff, on the phone or to passengers,
T3
= the uncommunicative type of driver/staff, sometimes surly.
Su
Topo’s Disclaimer and apologia
Your
Mole always attempts to write an easy-on-the-eyes page using text input.
Blogger.com however, has other ideas and will often not stay with a single font
type or point size, produces extraneous spacing and etc.
I wish I had time to debug the HTML which they produce, it is NOT the straight
text which I pasted into the form, but I don’t.
Therefore, I apologize on behalf of Blogger.com for the changes which they
make, of which I do not approve. Sometimes, what I
see, thankfully you don’t, is 24 point type –it
is giant and other times they swallow my text, although it still seems to be
there. In fairness to them, things seem
better, although this is partly because I do understand which of their “features”
do the most damage to me and consequently do not use them.
Communicating these problems to them, for me, is something like having teeth
extracted without the benefit of anesthetic, actually it is less fun than that.
By their design, there is no simple e-mailing them with "Please look at my
say, posting of 2009-06-28, it is weird!” I am hoping that one
of their developers will someday read this, copy my code and improve their text
to HTML engine. Until then, lo siento.
Your Mole’s
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Your
Mole’s Conflict of Interest Statement
This
is to certify that I, the blogger who is known as the LAmetroMole, with respect
to this blog, except as described below, am not now nor at any time during the
past year have been, nor is it my current intention to ever be:
1)
A participant, directly or indirectly, in any arrangement, agreement,
investment, or other activity with any vendor, supplier, or other party doing
business with any of the entities about which I have written, which has
resulted or could result in personal benefit to me.
2)
A recipient, directly or indirectly, of any salary payments or loans or gifts
of any kind or any free service or discounts or other fees from or on behalf of
any person or organization engaged in any transaction with any of the entities
about which I have written.
Any
exceptions to 1 or 2 above are stated below with a full description of the
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There
are no exceptions.
Date:
2009-06-24 S/LametroMole
Works
Cited
Nelson, Laura J. “Funds OKd for rail line to LAX”. Los Angeles Times. Jun. 28, 2013. http://articles.latimes.com/2013/jun/28/local/la-me-metro-rails-20130628
Nelson, Laura J. “Funds OKd for rail line to LAX”. Los Angeles Times. Jun. 28, 2013. http://articles.latimes.com/2013/jun/28/local/la-me-metro-rails-20130628
Vuong, Zen. “South Pasadena Gold Line station to have
another ramp”. DailyNews. Jul. 17, 2013. Web. http://www.dailynews.com/news/ci_23674238/south-pasadena-gold-line-station-have-another-ramp?IADID=Search-www.dailynews.com-www.dailynews.com
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The
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# posted by LAMETROmole @ 10:46 
