Code Red
What is this, Rag on MARTA Day?
Yes, yes it is.
Maybe if MARTA were a feasible option for more people, I wouldn’t have left work early today feeling like crap because of a Code Red smog alert.
I’m not putting the blame totally on MARTA. People also need to have it beaten into their skulls that yes, you can get your fat ass up out of your car and still go where you need to go (understanding caveat #1 [above], of course) - driving isn’t the only way to get places! This mentality has got to change… but I don’t know how to accomplish it when people from Alpharetta are scared that The Black Man will ride public transportation up to their big-ass house in the boonies and steal their children and their family fortune.
July 28th, 2005 at 9:36 pm
It takes building more in the immediate areas around the stations. I just recently wrote a research paper for a class, and I found, looking throughout the literature that the one single variable that has the greatest effect on transit success and modal choice is density.
One interesting tidbit I found out was that the Sandy Springs station was built with the assumption in mind that the original plan for the area — high-density, mixed-use — was actually going to happen. Then a particular county commissioner got chickenshit and decided it would be better to have a wimpy-ass strip mall there instead.
It makes me want to go into real estate development.
July 28th, 2005 at 10:18 pm
Wow, I never knew that about the Sandy Springs station! That would’ve been awesome if it had actually happened.
You shoudl totally go into real estate development. I’ll buy something from you, one day when I have money.
July 28th, 2005 at 10:25 pm
This is really a convenience issue, and one that needs to be solved by changing the way we build our communities. I would take public transit if it were convenient, but it’s not. When I do take MARTA (like I did this week), my commute is longer than it ordinarily would be. I’m also not convinced it’s any cheaper, since my company absorbs the full cost of my Midtown parking. Anyway, Joe, you should get into real estate development.
July 29th, 2005 at 11:36 am
It’s a vicious circle–they have low ridership, then they cut service to save costs, which makes it inconvenient, which decreases ridership, which makes them cut back service even more…blah, blah, blah. I know it’s been said before.
But I feel the same way you do. I have tried, really tried, using MARTA as a primary form of transportation. (I gave up my car for Lent two years’ running and used MARTA as my only transport (besides my feet). I also used MARTA to get from my home (Old Fourth Ward) to my new job (Emory) for the first two months I was here, but it just didn’t work. No matter how I did the bus, shuttle, train combo to get me to my office, it took an hour to get here. (Bus runs are inconsistent, buses get caught in gridlock traffic…shuttes run hourly or every 30 minutes. No sidewalks…don’t get me started.) I still use MARTA for non-work travel around town, or when I don’t have to be somewhere at a particular time.
It’s going to take city and regional government and business leadership to see that quality public transit is an asset (not an in convenient cost), and that just has not happened yet. We need state financial support for MARTA and we need incentives and logistical support to get people out of their cars. But in the current environment that’s a pipe dream…
Sorry for the long post. It’s a sore spot with me.
Re Joe and real estate development: please, please do. It’s our only hope.
July 29th, 2005 at 11:48 am
They just need to suck it up and view MARTA as an actual investment. A transit system built “late” (in comparison to those of Boston, New York, & Chicago, for example) can still work and become a viable, usable sytem. Just look at DC’s Metro. I was very impressed with it when I was there in February. And having lived in New York, transit systems don’t impress me easily. (I’m not trying to be one of those jerks that throws around “I lived in New York, look how cool I am!” - just trying to offer some perspective.) I recognize that DC is a much more compact metro area - but that is just one of many factors involved. If the ATL powers that be would actually get behind MARTA whole-heartedly, we could have a pretty awesome system.
July 29th, 2005 at 8:04 pm
Route # 8
My boyfriend takes Marta home. He always complains the # 8 is late or a no show. Once he saw the bus go down the other side of the street and continue to the rail station before it came to his side of the street to pick him and several others up. The driver was upset since he noted that he saw them standing when he was on his way to the rail station. He told them he was reporting the other driver as it was not right. The other driver just ditched the route that day.
Nothing happened except the buses ran good for the next day on time and all of them came. A supervisor rode on the bus and of course they were right on target with the schedule. Then it goes back to the same old stuff. Today he said the bus was late by 40 mins. Marta seems to have a broken chain of command and no real disciplinary measure is enforced. Once you get a job with them you are set unless you just drink and drive. I can’t wait until I can help my boyfriend to purchase a car but for now he takes Marta when I can’t get to him.
July 29th, 2005 at 8:50 pm
this is off-topic, but i just discovered the wonderful blog you guys have going and wanted to post this in your entry about the nascar hall of fame, but forgot, so i’m posting it here so that more readers will see it. i went to the web site linked to by the atlanta bid’s web site where they are hosting a poll and discussion board about where the hall should be located. i find it hilarious some of the comments that these suburban-atlanta nascar lovin fans are posting about downtown. if you’re ready for some funny, ignorant atlanta bashing, check out the poll and forum. Vote for a city in the poll and it will take you to the forum. It will take a while to flip through the more than 100 pages of comments and there are only a few true gems, but if you have time, it’s pretty funny what some of these people think about the city. (the words “queers, gays, and bums” are used).
August 4th, 2005 at 12:21 am
While I don’t deny that NASCAR fans may have a few troglodytes in their midst, one dimension of bigotry that has reared its ugly head has been the plea by some to keep the NASCAR Hall of Fame out of Atlanta for, you guessed it, racial reasons. One such line I remember reading in the AJC stated that the “…Black community should do something to prevent this”. Guess we don’t need those damn rednecks lousing up the ATL, eh?
Atlanta will begin to find its identity when it stops this bullshit of throwing its history away with both hands. When it decides that it is just as willing to embrace its connection to NASCAR as anything else (the good ol’ boys used to run shine into Atlanta from the mountains - that’s how stock car racing got started, for the benefit of the uninformed among you).
It is time for Atlanta to face the fact that no one facet of its history fully represents it, but they all juxtapose one another very nicely. Atlanta tries too hard with shit like coined public-relations slogans and focus-group identity quests. The answer is square in front of them (if they’ll take the time to notice it)