March 14, 2023
"'Horror.' That’s how one train operator recently described the scenes he sees daily."
"He declined to use his name because he was not authorized to talk to the media.
Earlier that day, as he drove the Red Line subway, he saw a man masturbating in his seat and several people whom he refers to as 'sleepers,' people who get high and nod off on the train. 'We don’t even see any businesspeople anymore. We don’t see anybody going to Universal. It’s just people who have no other choice [than] to ride the system, homeless people and drug users.'"
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'We don’t even see any businesspeople anymore. We don’t see anybody going to Universal. It’s just people who have no other choice [than] to ride the system, homeless people and drug users.'
They're not trying hard enough. Clearly, more trains are needed.
How fitting for California. We're close to failing. Please don't let Newsom ever get close to Washington.
Hell comes of compassion built on self congratulation. Heaven comes of compassion built on self sacrifice.
Thanks to smartphones the public transit experience in LA should have improved tremendously. So much easier to plan travel and cut down on waiting time. But can never compete with cars and uber/lyft for convenience. Don't use metro enough to comment on increased drug use but have not felt threatened.
They're not unintended consequences anymore, cause it was obvious to any moron that this would happen.
Nobody walks in LA, even fewer ride the 'subway'
Just think of how quickly the druggies and homeless people can get places when California gets its high speed rail system built.
And because of the white drivers in L.A., the masturbator also has to put up with more air pollution!
you tax dollars at work!!
Up in San Francisco BART is reportedly having issues, too.
And now even the most hard core high speed rail advocate is ready to concede that the California high speed rail will never connect LA and SF. Not clear how many miles will finally go into service, but it won’t be much. At least “the bridge to nowhere” in Alaska would have connected an important municipality with its airport, located on an off shore island. The California high speed train seems unlikely to do more than connect Bakersfield and Fresno.
Mass transit in spread out cities is a gigantic waste of money. Costs a fortune to build, a fortune operate and hardly anyone uses it especially those who were to convinced to give up their cars. The only beneficiaries are the politicians who get greased and the public "servants" and their unions.
Anarchy is pretty ugly. Get ready for it close to home.
I hope the denizens of LA keep voting dem. Until there is nothing but rubble and corpses.
California finally has its Train to Nowhere.
Public transit is struggling even in cities where it's integral and needed (e.g., NYC, DC, Chicago). Thank the rise of remote work and the flight of the highest paid workers to distant locations.
LA's public transit has long reflected a stubborn and impractical wish for an alternate reality (as typical with all California politics). The locals will probably head off for a microbrew and some cannabis to go on a bender and hope the problems go away.
"L.A. riders bail on Metro trains amid ‘horror’ of deadly drug overdoses, crime"
What, they don't like diversity? Deplorable.
But it's not something more federal money can't fix. For "transit."
They say decline is a choice.
It is also daily horror.
Ever see, as you walk to a recommended downtown restaurant, someone shooting heroin (if they're lucky) between the toes of a foot swollen to the size of melon?
We are now building glorious light rail systems. The vaunted "infrastructure" that people for years have clamored for. But instead of enjoying the ability to travel about the city like this was Paris or Berlin, we will turn it over to opioid users, like high-tech weaponry handed to the Taliban.
Portland, OR is much the same. Warming huts on steel wheels.
Do the locals push you onto the tracks when the train arrives, or is that just a New York thing?
Drug addicts and the homeless have a heckler's veto over public transit.
Readering said...
"Thanks to smartphones the public transit experience in LA should have improved tremendously. So much easier to plan travel and cut down on waiting time. But can never compete with cars and uber/lyft for convenience. Don't use metro enough to comment on increased drug use but have not felt threatened."
I got threatened in Laguna Beach.
It could all be fixed. But California's been putting DIE people in place. All DIE appointments are people chosen for being the less competent one, the one who knows something other than how to do the job in question. Someone knows what it is to be a gay father perhaps. The DIE merit system selects that one to be the Secretary of Transportation and as Secretary of Transportation Lil' Pete is utterly inadequate as the one who deals with train derailments and supply chain crises. Toxic waste from a train derailment rains down on a community. The people need help. But, of course, the DIE guy can't help them. And then, seeing how people were let down by a DIE guy, Biden amazingly, makes DIE a requirement throughout his administration. Nothing is to be run by someone who knows what they're doing. Everything is to be run by someone who knows something other than the job at hand. And the Dems are counting on the black community's votes to let DIE incompetence rule without consequences at the ballot box. That's ... really ... you know ...not good.
My 30 year old daughters, who formerly commuted to downtown via subway, won't ride the LA subway any more. Their problems with the subway do not concern the powers that be in Los Angeles. Republicans bad. Socialists good.
The alliance between the cognitive and wealth elites, on the one hand, and on the other hand the underclass, is very strong. The only real newspaper, the LA Times, will not bestir itself to call for laws to be enforced. So much virtue is signaled that it can be seen from Neptune.
The weather is very good. The solvent people (both the hard working poor and the middle class) are almost all pretty nice. Lots of great recreational and dining options. If LA only had good government, people would flock to live here.
Portland's Tri-Met has become a rolling psychiatric ward.
A society gets more and more of whatever misbehavior it tolerates. Our society is far gone at this point, tolerating many things that would have been criminal acts that were punishable in the past. Jurisdictions that support the criminals over the law-abiding citizens will continue to lose population as the sane citizens depart.
Seems like an expensive way to house the homeless.
Of course money could be saved if they just parked the trains with doors open.
Just think, hundreds of rail cars with padded benches. And miles upon miles of tunnels to pitch a tent.
How long until the Morlocks can reign supreme?
It would be so nice for tourists and visitors to have a well-functioning public transit system in LA. Driving here is so challenging.
"Late Fragment" by Raymond Carver
"And did you get what
you wanted from this life, even so?
I did.
And what did you want?
To call myself beloved, to feel myself
beloved on the earth."
This.
What I thought I wanted in my twenties was big adventure; I had vague dreams of taking my law degree, youth, and beauty, and tossing myself into the world where the magic and the Exciting Career would find me. I found a bit of adventure, the right career (criminal prosecutor), but also a whole lot of what-the-hell-am-I-doing-with-my-life-anyway.
Then God was merciful to me--fool and sinner that I was--and sent the dearest, sweetest man my way. Well butter my buns and call me a biscuit, but it turns out that having a husband and children was and is the most amazing and meaningful adventure. I could find happiness as a full-time Trad Wife much more so than if the other choice was to prioritize Big Career.
And yet, the "democrat" news media doesn't think this is even worth reporting. They are just flat out government propaganda now.
Re: cubanbob:
Mass transit in spread out cities is a gigantic waste of money. Costs a fortune to build, a fortune operate and hardly anyone uses it especially those who were to convinced to give up their cars. The only beneficiaries are the politicians who get greased and the public "servants" and their unions.
I sort of agree, and sort of disagree.
Los Angeles is fairly dense (8,500 people per sqmi), significantly lower than metropolises like Tokyo or Seoul, but higher than, say, Kyoto (4,600 per sqmi). Kyoto has a pretty robust and useful subway system, along with privately owned and operated rail lines (run by the Hankyu Railway, maybe other companies I don't know). A good subway and light rail network absolutely could work in a city like Los Angeles.
The problem is that Los Angeles is an American city, and Americans are unbelievably incompetent at public transit. One of the reasons -- highlighted in this article -- is that American authorities don't feel comfortable enforcing bourgeois minimum standards of behaviour anymore. Sometimes because they're worried it's "racist," sometimes because they're worried it's "classist," and sometimes because it's a lot of hard work telling unpleasant and combative people to stop doing what they're doing, and then you get sued by a bunch of activists for your trouble. But even if that dynamic didn't turn our public spaces into dumps, our public transit agencies are poorly run, with bad quality control, bad project management, bad training, and bad employee culture all reinforcing each other. It just costs way more per mile, train, passenger -- whatever metric you want -- to operate a public transit system in the US than it does in other countries, and the product you get on the other end is usually mediocre at best, and a public nuisance at worse.
But if local authorities want people to use public transit -- and I think local authorities should want people to use public transit, because public transit is great! -- they need to be willing to crack down ruthlessly on bad behaviour on public transit systems by passengers and employees. And if they aren't willing to do that, they really can't complain that people prefer cars. Or remote work.
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