Convoys of Empty Buses Clog Hollywood Freeway : Metrolink: Shuttles en route to maintenance yard in Van Nuys in evening are testing patience of motorists.

They are supposed to be driving downtown office workers to the new Metrolink trains.

But operators of Metrolink shuttle buses being used in Los Angeles each evening are also driving freeway motorists up the wall.

The reason? Clumps of up to 15 empty Metrolink buses at a time have begun fighting with evening commuters for scarce, rush-hour space on the Hollywood Freeway.

At the busy four-level interchange downtown, angry motorists have found their cars boxed in by empty, 45-passenger buses that sometimes fill all three outbound freeway lanes.

Is this a clever ploy to force motorists out of their cars and aboard commuter trains being promoted as “a great alternative to the freeway grind?”

No, Metrolink officials said Friday.

“That would be giving somebody too much credit,” said an apologetic Jim McLaughlin, a transit planner for the month-old service.

The buses are being driven to Van Nuys, where they are parked for the night by the Laidlaw Transit Co., contractors for the Metrolink shuttle service, he said.

Fifty of the buses with “Commuter Express” painted on their sides make swings through the downtown business district at five-minute intervals to carry rail commuters to Union Station.

A dozen trains leave the station for Pomona, Moorpark and Santa Clarita weekdays between 3:45 and 6:25 p.m.

Officials said they were unaware that bus drivers were convoying, military-style, on the freeway. That may be because of the way the shuttle service was organized.

Metrolink is run by the Southern California Regional Rail Authority, which had the Los Angeles County Transportation Commission contract with the city’s Department of Transportation for shuttle buses. The Department of Transportation, in turn, subcontracted the job with Laidlaw.

To compound the confusion, shuttle bus complaints are handled through a fifth organization, the Southern California Rapid Transit District.

Officials with the Department of Transportation said the nighttime parking arrangement raised no eyebrows at City Hall. “When they go back to the barn, they don’t charge us for the trip, so we don’t mind,” administrator John Fong said.

But why not ease freeway gridlock by keeping the buses overnight at Union Station and shuttling drivers in and out as a single group? Better yet, why not give drivers train tickets and send them downtown on Metrolink?

Pete Berman, who is in charge of Laidlaw’s commuter services, said that won’t work because the buses have to be returned nightly for refueling and maintenance. Some are also used in the early morning for suburban commuter runs, he said.

Metrolink’s McLaughlin said some of the shuttles may be phased out when the new Metro Rail Red Line subway service begins Jan. 11 in the downtown area.

For now, he said, bus drivers will be told to stagger their return trips and halt their high-profile convoys.

“That’s something that creates the wrong image to what we’re trying to do,” McLaughlin said.