Bus Route Cuts Coming This Weekend

Members of the Bus Riders Union are expected Friday to protest cuts to Metropolitan Transportation Authority bus routes scheduled to go into effect over the weekend.

The Metro board voted 7-6 in March to approve cuts to the bus system, including eliminating five weekday routes and five weekend routes. Others will be shortened or run less frequently. The total cuts amount to 305,000 bus line hours, or about 4.5 percent of the total bus system.

In the NoHo/Sherman Oaks/Toluca Lake/Valley Village area, Lines 96 (Downtown LA – Sherman Oaks via Riverside Drive, L.A. Zoo), 230 (Sylmar Station – Studio City via Laurel Canyon Boulevard), 155 (Universal City – Burbank Station via Riverside Drive – Alameda Avenue), Line 230 (Sylmar Station – Studio City via Laurel Canyon Boulevard), and 902 (Pacoima – North Hollywood Station via Van Nuys Boulevard & Burbank Boulevard). For more information go to the Metro's Web site.

Metro argues that the changes matching capacity to demand, and in some cases the transit authority is adding service to routes or using bigger buses to accommodate more passengers. It is also increasing the frequency of the Silver Line, a rapid bus line that runs on the Harbor (110) Freeway from Artesia to downtown, then heads to the San Gabriel Valley, ending in El Monte.

"These policies have put a tremendous burden on low income people and people of color who rely on the bus to get around,'' said Sunyoung Yang, lead organizer with the Bus Riders Union.

The union filed a complaint with the Federal Transit Administration civil rights office, which plans to conduct an on-site review of MTA bus operations in mid-July.

The cuts include lines from San Pedro and Mid-City to downtown and a line from Westwood through the San Fernando Valley to Lake View Terrace.

In every instance, the cuts were made because of duplicate bus or rail service within Metro, redundancies with other municipalities' buses, or low ridership, Metro spokesman Rick Jager said.

"It boils down to quality over quantity," he said.

Jager said Metro will also use about $9 million of the savings from the cuts toward better maintenance of its bus fleet.

"Where maintenance is deferred, your bus system takes a huge beating, and buses continue to break down and impact the riders out there," Jager said, adding that where lines were cut there is at least a parallel line within a quarter-mile walking distance.

Yang disputed that claim, but said even if it proved to be true, Metro is not taking into account that the extra distance might be covered late at night, by elderly people, or in unsafe areas.

Yang said the cuts also mean extra transfers for bus riders who already have long commutes, and argued that using other bus service for multiple municipalities will cost riders more money.

Union members plan to attend Friday's City Council meeting and call on members to do what they can to restore some of the bus service. They also plan to protest outside a Federal Transit Administration regional office.

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Councilman Jose Huizar voted against the
cuts in March.

The City News Service contributed to this report.