Aboard Bus 456 : New Flaws Arise on Long Beach Express

Last January, after a month of no-show buses and late arrivals at work, riders of express Line 456 angrily complained that the troubled Rapid Transit District did not provide reliable service from Long Beach to downtown Los Angeles. The RTD promised substantial improvement by mid-1988, when 450 new buses were scheduled to arrive. A second look at Line 456 last week found that last year’s problems had been replaced by a new set.

Their workdays behind them, Kevin Pobst and Toni Bell squeezed through a crowd of downtown Los Angeles office workers to board a bus for home in Long Beach, more than an hour away.

Both found seats as the bus, at only its second stop, quickly filled. Fifteen people were standing, clutching overhead rails for balance, by the time the driver decided it was full.

“It’s always like this, or worse,” said Pobst, a ticket agent for a railroad company and one of 2,500 riders who take express Line 456 each day.

“We’re really at the mercy of the RTD,” said Bell, a secretary for the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce.

Seniors Get Big Discount

Dan Olson, a 66-year-old bank clerk, was one of those left standing. “I stood all the way in this morning, too,” Olson said. “The only reason I ride it is because I’m a senior citizen, and I get it for $10 a month. If I was paying any more, I’d be complaining.”

Near Olson, a blind man stood quietly through 50 minutes of jolting stops and lurching starts before getting off in North Long Beach.

Still, for these riders, who pay $78 for a monthly pass, the trip home on Line 456 was the best of times. Post-holiday traffic was relatively light. There was room to breathe inside the bus. And it was on time.

Punctuality was hardly the watchword of Line 456 last January. Service was so ragged, especially in the morning, that the regional Rapid Transit District was flooded with complaints. Sometimes two or three buses in a row would fail to show up at the line’s six stops along Long Beach Boulevard, leaving commuters stranded for up to 45 minutes in that “black hole between 7 and 8 o’clock,” as one rider described the morning rush hour.

The RTD says that last January’s bus shortage, which caused cancellation of up to four runs a day on Line 456 and 20 to 40 runs systemwide, no longer exists. A shortage of spare parts that sidelined the buses through 1987 and early 1988, has been corrected, they say. And most commuters agree that no-show buses are not a big problem anymore.

“It does seem that the buses run pretty much on time in the morning now, and that’s a significant plus,” said U.S. probation supervisor Jerry Flanigan, a veteran commuter from Bixby Knolls.

But riders say Line 456 still seems to have more than its share of problems--and angry customers. Buses have broken down or run out of gas at least six times since Christmas, passengers say. Overcrowding persists. And the competency and courtesy of some bus drivers has been questioned.

One Driver Got Lost

For example, on Jan. 10, a flustered driver allowed too many people to board his bus, then left the bus for 10 minutes to go to a telephone and call for help. He refused to allow angry, overheated passengers in the back of the bus to get off. Two bailed out through emergency windows, riders said.

Another driver recently was lost for 45 minutes while trying to take a shortcut, passengers said. He eventually stopped at an East Los Angeles hamburger stand and asked for directions to the Long Beach Freeway, they said.

Although large signs warn passengers that they can be fined $250 for loud radios, a young 456 driver cranked up rock music on his own radio for a week until complaints to his boss apparently got him to follow RTD rules, passengers said.

“He’d put on his loud, obnoxious, blaring music and if he didn’t like somebody’s driving he’d use profanity at them,” Bell said. “After a long day at work, I don’t want to hear that.”

In general, commuters say their complaints about Line 456 illustrate the continuing problems the RTD has in providing reliable rush-hour service.

RTD officials say, and riders confirm, that with an infusion of new buses, service improved for much of 1988. But it has deteriorated since October, when 90 new coaches specially designed for the comfort of long-haul commuters were pulled out of service with cracked axles, RTD spokesman Greg Davy said.

Twelve of those buses, Line 456’s entire fleet, were replaced by 10-year-old, graffiti-marred buses transferred from the inner city, RTD officials confirmed.

The replacement buses are shabby, Long Beach commuters say, and tend to break down.

“On one bus, the windshield is separated from the frame by about an inch,” Pobst said. “You can see daylight and feel the air blowing through, so we’re expecting the windshield to come out at any time.”

Such discoveries should be reported, said the RTD’s Davy. “We would ask for the riders’ patience while we fix these safety problems.”

Stranded on Freeway

During the last month, at least five buses have broken down in mid-route on Line 456, riders say. Another bus apparently ran out of gas three weeks ago, stranding passengers on the Long Beach Freeway for an hour.

“What has gone down the tubes is the maintenance of the buses.” said Dick Friend, a gas company employee whose bus twice stalled on the freeway one morning last week before crawling to a complete halt near downtown Los Angeles.

“The heaters and the coolers never work. There are (emergency) windows that are flapping in the breeze,” he said. “It’s transportation, that’s all.”

But Michael Leahy, RTD assistant maintenance director, said the old buses, though subject to more breakdowns than the new ones, are clean and well maintained.

The new, luxury buses with damaged axles will be returned to the Long Beach route as soon as they are fixed, probably within “several months,” Leahy said. “We’re anxious to get the buses back. That’s why we bought them--for these (express routes).”

Unbelievably Crowded

Even if the new buses solve problems with breakdowns, several commuters said, they still must deal with standing-room-only crowds on evening runs between 5 and 6 o’clock.

“The crowding is unbelievable. I try to get out (of the office) early or stay real late,” said Rick Marsellos, manager of a printing company. “I usually stay at work and do data input, and I’m not a big fan of data input.”

RTD spokesman Davy said it is against agency policy to have consistent overcrowding on any of the system’s 2,000 runs every rush-hour period. “Why it’s happening on that line, I don’t know,” he said. “Our planning and scheduling department exists to monitor problems like that and to solve them.”

No rider should be standing during express trips via freeway, said Arthur Leahy, RTD acting assistant general manager for operations. “If we verify that there’s a consistent overload, we’ll make an adjustment in the schedule,” he said last week.

More Frequent Runs

After personally checking loads Monday evening, Arthur Leahy said he may order more frequent runs at the peak 5 o’clock period. One 43-seat bus leaving downtown Los Angeles at that time had 55 passengers, he said. But only one other run between 4:30 and 6:30 p.m. had more riders than seats, he said.

Results of three other non-holiday RTD spot checks since last June have varied. A check 10 days ago found no passengers standing for nine peak evening runs. Passengers stood on four of nine runs during a November check, and five of nine during a June check, he said.

As for problems with drivers, Arthur Leahy said passengers are encouraged to notify the RTD about them. Supervisors confront drivers with the complaints and action is taken if problems persist, he said.

For example, complaints about the driver who allowed the overcrowding Jan. 10 are considered serious and will be fully investigated, he said. RTD undercover riders have recently been assigned to the line to check driver conduct, he said.

Asked to See Tickets

Pobst, Flanigan and others said problems Jan. 10 were exacerbated by the belligerence of the driver.

He angered some passengers in the front of the bus by ordering them off in a rough part of town, and infuriated others in the back by ignoring their requests to get off. Then, a few minutes later, he further delayed the commute by demanding to see the tickets and passes of every passenger, riders said.

Some of the passengers lashed back. “He definitely was verbally assaulted and I saw one lady hit him with her purse,” Pobst said. “He sort of had this attitude that he didn’t have to listen to anything we said.”

As the incident progressed, Alice Sims-Vaughn said, she stood and recommended that passengers complain to the RTD. “He told us what his badge number was. He didn’t care.”

‘Kept Like Prisoners’

At the end of the trip, one rider said he told the driver “that he’d kept us like prisoners. He said, ‘Well, you can write in and complain, and be sure to put your address down,’ like he was going to (retaliate).”

Line 456 stories abound. Flanigan, a 456 rider for 10 years, said one veteran driver repeatedly looks at him as he rushes toward the bus stop, then drives away with a smile on his face.

“One morning, I was almost at the stop and Smiley just drove away,” Flanigan said. “A young guy from Nicaragua saw what happened, put me in his truck and drove me to the next stop so I could catch that bus.

“He was outraged. I guess even Daniel Ortega doesn’t treat people like that,” Flanigan recalled, laughing.

White-Collar Commuters

The treatment and satisfaction of white-collar commuters like those on Line 456 are serious business for the RTD. Such passengers are the new market that the RTD, which had faced a $36-million budget deficit before raising fares this year, says it hopes to lure onto buses. Currently, typical riders systemwide are poor and take the bus because they have no choice, surveys show.

“We very much want to operate good service on this line,” Arthur Leahy said. “We appreciate people letting us know about the problems, and we’re going to try and correct them.”

Several riders of Line 456 said they had begun to commute by bus within the last year to avoid driving and to save money. They gave the service mixed reviews.

New rider Jocelyne St. Pierre, a 27-year-old accountant, said she thinks service is “pretty good.” Crowding one evening made it “so hot that I got claustrophobia,” and buses are sometimes late, she said. “But it costs me half of what I was paying to drive in and park.”

Pobst, however, said he wishes he could afford a car. “We pay $78 a month and we’re treated like this,” he said. “It seems like we’re being taken advantage of.”