No Mad DASH

She may be the loneliest bus driver in Los Angeles.

As the 5:07 p.m. Metrolink train pulled into the Chatsworth station on a recent afternoon, DASH driver Audrey Jackson cranked her engine.

“They tell us we have to sit here until the train comes in,” said Jackson, blinking hard and opening her eyes wide.

Two minutes later, precisely at the time of her scheduled departure, Jackson drove off with only the chatter of a radio to keep her company.

“It’s very boring,” she said.

Since its mid-October introduction, the Chatsworth DASH service, designed primarily to serve Metrolink commuters, has experienced growing pains. Though ridership increased from one per hour in October to four per hour in December, it does not compare with the 20 to 25 per hour of established DASH routes. Many potential riders do not know the service exists, and for the route’s two drivers, that means long and lonely seven-hour shifts. The line runs from 5:30 a.m. to 8 p.m.

“We spent a month and a half running in circles . . . we didn’t pick up anybody,” said Mario Rauda, the morning driver. These days, he stops and explains the service to people waiting at bus stops, in part to let them know about the route and in part to prevent confused riders from jumping on and putting the $1.35 MTA fare into his 25-cent DASH fare box.

“It’s a new service,” said James Lefton, chief of transit programs for Los Angeles Department of Transportation. “It is going to take longer to develop.”

The city operates the service in addition to MTA buses, shuttling riders to various Chatsworth businesses, Northridge Fashion Center and other points. DASH services run less frequently, cost less and generally follow shorter routes than MTA buses. Five of the 22 DASH routes are in the Valley.

The Chatsworth route, on a two-year trial, costs about $250,000, with funding from the department and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.

“If you don’t do it, you never know if people want it or if there is a demand,” said Ali Sar, spokesman for Councilman Hal Bernson, an advocate of the DASH services.

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Jackson said most riders are commuters--which means that for the few hours that Rauda and Jackson’s shifts coincide with peak business hours, they can enjoy a little human contact.

It is a club of sorts, in which riders greet the drivers by first name and discuss jobs, new hairdos and families.

“They don’t even have to ring the bell because I know where they get off,” said Rauda of the 12 passengers he regularly delivers each morning.

New recruits often come by word-of-mouth. Lloyd Bell, a research chemical manager at Aware Products in Chatsworth, struck up a conversation with Jackson after he missed his MTA bus connection at the Chatsworth station.

“I told her where I was going and she said, ‘Have I got a surprise for you!’ ” Jackson dropped him at his company’s front door, and Bell has been a DASH devotee ever since.

Changes to the route will be considered, but Lefton said the main purpose is to provide rail feeder service, and they plan to stick to it.

“If we aren’t getting people, we need to look at our marketing,” said Lefton.

Brochures are being prepared, and Lefton said the staff is trying to get the word out to company ride-share programs.

But out on the street, Jackson and Rauda are left to their own devices.

Coasting slowly down De Soto Avenue, Jackson gazed at passengers clustered on the sidewalk waiting for a bus. She stopped at each point and opened the door.

“Sherman Way? Roscoe?” asked an anxious customer.

“Sorry,” said Jackson, smiling and shaking her head.

Several blocks later, Jackson stopped again.

“Where are you going?” asked a woman clutching bills and change in her palm. Jackson placed a hand over the fare box and offered a quick outline of her route. The woman backed away from the door.

Arriving back at the Chatsworth Metrolink station, Jackson parked and let out a sigh.

“I have three more rounds to go,” said Jackson, “and I don’t know who I’m going to pick up.”

For more information on DASH services in the San Fernando Valley, call (818) 808-2273 or visit the Web site at https://www.ladottransit.com.