PACOIMA : East Valley Residents Decry Bus Service

Bus routes are too sparse, have too few runs, don’t connect in a rational manner, and stops often are trash-strewn, open-air homes for the unsavory, residents told transit officials during a two-hour public hearing on bus service in the East Valley.

Los Angeles City Councilman Richard Alarcon struck the first discordant note at the meeting--held at the Boys & Girls Club of the San Fernando Valley--when he told nearly 20 transit officials and about 10 residents that his district isn’t getting its fair share.

Pointing to vast white spaces between routes traced onto a map of the Valley, Alarcon said: “It doesn’t make sense. There are no routes here.”

Alarcon said transit agencies are spending vast sums on rail routes to wealthy West Valley communities while neglecting basic bus service to needy areas in the northeast Valley.

“Why the big investment when we don’t know if people will get out of their Cadillacs and ride the train?” Alarcon asked representatives from the county Metropolitan Transportation Authority and Public Works Department, city Department of Transportation, and Commuter Transportation Services Inc.

“You get to get hit by the train, but you don’t get to get on the train,” complained Carol Silver, a North Hollywood resident who owns a printing business in Sun Valley. Her employees can’t get from their jobs to Mission College in Sylmar, she said.

“You can’t get to Mission College from anywhere,” she added.

Residents of public housing also have no way of getting to work, complained Ed Kussman, vice president of the Valley chapter of the NAACP.

“These people don’t believe that coming out and sacrificing time will be worth it,” said Kussman.

“I think, quite honestly, this is an embarrassment to the MTA,” said Rob Zapple, who represented the Kagel Canyon Civic Assn. “I think what we’re looking for here is a commitment from MTA.”