For five years, I’ve tried to figure out your tics. The way you stop in front of a multitude of green lights; why, in the middle of a tech hotbed, your website is made from macaroni noodles; your showing up only when you feel like it (and in those cases, so, so late). The harassment/assaults while your drivers look on. The stops with no schedules. Third Avenue. Somehow still, I moved to be closer to you, defended you to my friends, and struggled to make you palatable by downloading every podcast known to man.
But you know what? It’s over. I bought a fucking car. Maybe I’ll become out of touch, or a fatty, or wait half my life in traffic. Certainly I’ll be killing the earth. But, Metro, the way you treat people is awful. You blew before the recession, you’re worse now, and I’m not hanging around to see what this heap of shit will devolve into next.
—Anonymous
I have not spent time there is several years, so I cannot swear this is still true but the San Francisco Bay Area has (had?) a kick ass system that integrates busses, a subway system and the fabled streetcars into a convenient,affordable, reasonably sanitary, reasonably well regulated means of getting to wherever you need to get within the city and very close to pretty much anything in the surrounding service area.
Between this and the wonderful things I’ve heard about Portland’s public transportation I fail to understand why Seattle’s pencil pushers can’t examine those systems (in cities with torrential rain,several campuses, convoluted neighborhoods and hilly, windy bits-some of the same challenges Seattle has) that do work and apply the results of that study to efforts to make Seattle’s public transportation more useable.
I have a real job and a child….BUT
On my route (I made sure I was on a single route between home and employment), the bus costs me less than 30 minutes/day in time vs driving a car. I am lucky to be part of a family where we rarely need outside childcare. The bus (or more rarely, bike) is often welcome downtime. After One-Bus-Away and its ilk came along, I was far happier about the bus (I hate waiting, especially when the wait time is unknown). Work subsidizes my bus pass and charges the big bucks for all but occasional parking.
So in a near-optimum setup, Metro can work pretty well (and even so, there’s room for a
lot of improvements but those all cost $).
That’s “my” Metro. “Your” Metro might be quite a bit different.
Best I, Anon in a long time. I wish more people did this.
45: I live in Ballard, I work on South Beacon Hill. I get to work in under an hour every day (takes about 50 minutes), with maybe a late day three times a year. It really isn’t that hard to get to work on time if you know how to plan a head and know your routes. Based on my daily experience, it seems like lot of other people also commute from Ballard to downtown and beyond on a daily basis, and it seems quite likely that most of them are making it to work on time. Don’t just make shit up.
I have but only mild gripes with transit, between OneBusAway and Google Maps I’m rarely surprised.
Sans-smartphone I’d probably be more irked.
Thank you finally for a legit I,Anon. Metro is decent as long as you are going downtown – otherwise you’re screwed. I live in Ballard and work in the Rainier Valley. It takes me a 90 minutes to get home on a good day – 2 hours is more typical. You’re really screwed if you are elderly or disabled. When was the last time you saw an able-bodied person voluntarily relinquish their seat? That’s right, never! Unless you are in a wheelchair you can forget about assistance from the driver.
I loved Metro’s recent campaign -“We’ll get you there.”. They neglected to add the disclaimer, “eventually”.
I think it’s the word ‘public’ in Public Transportation that causes such a knee-jerk reactions and fervent partisanship when talking about a bus ride. But let’s be real, it’s a SERVICE that I pay for (both in taxes as a homeowner and as fare for the ride). And like any service I demand a quality product at a quality price. Waiting 20, 30, or 40 minutes, in the rain, isn’t quality service, no matter what definition of quality you use.
Metro provides decent service considering its limitations, and if the people of Seattle and adjacent cities want better transportation in general they have to improve their attitudes and tax support for public transportation. I recently bought a car after six years of using Metro Transit and Sound Transit in lieu of a personal vehicle. Idealism is great, but it only gets me so far in life when so few of my peers think similarly. I quit until more people consider community transportation as an option for themselves rather than just as a charitable option for the less privileged. Martyrdom for public benefit is tiresome.
I commute from Seattle to the Eastside on the bus. Takes me about 50 minutes door to door each way. The reason I can’t really fault Metro: my employer also operates shuttle buses. The stop in my neighborhood is a 12 minute walk from home. It still takes me 45 minutes door to door. That’s the thing about an 11 mile commute.
I can actually get there in a little over an hour on my bike. At a certain point that option starts looking better and better. At least that way my speed isn’t subject to traffic…
@59 :: you’re the only person here who isn’t bat shit crazy!
@62: I guess that disqualifies me. I may be crazy, but I’m an out-of-towner and only use Seattle Metro once or twice a year. I hope the richie-rich approved deep bore tunnel doesn’t fuck commuters up. I’d really hate to see Seattle become pedestrian unfriendly. It already sounds like it’s getting that way.
agreed, entirely. also, i may love you.
@64 warren79:
Who, ME? The Queen of Eccentric??
Run, you poor man, while there is still time!!
If you’re too dumb to figure out how to ride the bus properly I suggest you either move back to the midwest where they worship cars as much as you do, or kill yourself and let someone more deserving use the resources you would have wasted in life.
@66: Ummmmmm, are you talking to ANON?
You can’t mean me. I was born in Seattle. And while I still own and drive a car, I walk and use public transportation to conserve resources as much as possible. No WW3, I’m just saying.
I’m sorry to hear about what just recently happened on a Metro bus downtown!
@47 Ahh philgirl, what the fuck you want me to say? I kept it short, dickhead. I’m sure if your mom died and your grammy was raising you, she’d have all kinds of pet names for you. And she would smear your ass on the sidewalk for your pissy comment on a gramma’s term of endearment.
Why are the only options bus or car? Get a scooter/motorcycle/BICYCLE or even a smart car, if you can’t bear to get rained on.. but if that’s the case what are you doing in Seattle in the first place?