Bus Guru Puts Riders Back on Course for Marathon

Less than three months before the running of Sunday’s Los Angeles Marathon, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority suddenly had a major people-moving problem on its hands.

For the second year, changes made to the 26.2-mile race route meant that 46 inner- and mid-city bus routes would be thrown off course, affecting 200,000 people--mostly blue-collar Angelenos who depend on bus service to get to work, church or the grocery store.

So, who you gonna call?

Somebody high up in the MTA universe got on the phone and made a call to suburban Sunland, to the back-garage workbench of Russ Wilson, a retired operations planner who knows the Los Angeles street grid better than he knows the veins on the back of his workmanlike hands.

To most MTA insiders, the 66-year-old Wilson was nothing less that the city’s bus route guru, a veteran planner who began his career as a bus driver in 1959 and--before his professional run was through 33 years later--had either driven, mapped, routed or rerouted nearly every bus line on the labyrinthine line map.

Indeed, his credentials were impressive: Wilson had designed the MTA’s marathon day routing system each year since the race’s second running in 1987, finally

devising a plan so foolproof that it outlasted his retirement in 1992.

He had also masterminded the transportation plan surrounding the 1984 Summer Olympic Games in Los Angeles and had gone to Atlanta to consult with transportation officials during last summer’s games.

So, when they asked Wilson to come out of retirement, his answer was quick.

“I told them I’d be honored,” he said. “After all, this kind of thing is a blast for me. It keeps my brain young.”

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Wilson’s challenge was daunting: Marathon officials had essentially turned the race route on its head, running it clockwise this year instead of counterclockwise. That meant collision courses between buses, bikers, bladers and long-distance runners.

Clipboard in hand, Wilson ventured out to investigate the routes in question inside the looping course that would take a large part of L.A. hostage for a day.

He was like a kid designing a new route for his model trains. “I knew most of the routes by memory,” he said. “So it was pretty easy.” Then he went back to his old MTA office and, under the exacting lights, consulted his maps, flipped coins, using both science and pure serendipity to devise his plan.

Inside the marathon loop, there were some 20 east-west bus routes and another 12 north-south routes that would intersect race participants along the way. Major problems were the Wilshire Boulevard corridor and the Hancock Park areas.

Working out a cohesive plan took being equal parts architect, master planner, crossing guard and street surgeon, a doctor who could keep the rest of the body working while major surgery was conducted on the heart.

MTA officials call the results nothing short of brilliant.

On some routes, especially along the Wilshire Boulevard line, passengers will be delivered at predetermined sites to the Metro Red Line, where they will be able to ride the subway free to spots on the other side of the marathon route.

On other routes, such as Line 14 along Beverly Boulevard, buses will drop passengers at certain points intersecting with the race route, where they will walk across the race path (on the lookout for oncoming runners) to another bus ready to take them on their way.

Sound complicated?

Not to Wilson. Heck, he says that even an 87-year-old grandmother with a walking cane will be able to get where she’s going Sunday, race or no race.

“She’ll be fine,” Wilson said. “We’ll have officers along the race route to make sure people have plenty of time to get across safely.”

Will it all work? If you’re a Los Angeles bus rider, will you be able to get there from here on race day?

Relax, the route doctor says the operation will be a certain success.

“Some riders will be surprised at the changes,” Wilson said, “but, for the most part, we’ve got this down to a science.”