The Orange Line had its first collision just before 4 p.m. Thursday when a northbound motorist driving on a suspended license ran a red light at Vesper Avenue and hitan eastbound bus, authorities said. There were no injuries.
I reviewed the new Rod Stewart standards disc in today's Daily News. The key in evaluating these kinds of records -- wildly popular, necessarily compromising -- is to put yourself in the shoes of those (and there are many) who buy them. Here's the lede:Guys like Stewart have all the luck. The crooner has sold 13 million of these "Songbook" discs since the series began in 2002, with a new one issued each year. But can Rod the (former) Mod hit the notes? Yes, and some impossibly high, too. Are the arrangements top notch? Absolutely. And one thing about that voice - it's an original.
As on Stewart's earlier standards discs, instrumental solos are limited to restating the theme in eight bars or less, no solos allowed, even by big-name guests. Trumpeters Chris Botti and Roy Hargrove, guitarist George Benson and saxophonist Dave Koz are wasted.
But on all 13 songs, Kenny Asher's bread-and-butter piano and Bob Mann's steady rhythm guitar keep the proceedings humming along.
If you love Stewart's voice, there's no better way to hear it than here. And if you can't stand it, at least give the guy credit for tackling the Great American Songbook, although the millions he's made from the venture is probably thanks enough.
"Why would anybody with a car want to take that, even with the cost of gasoline?" said John Nakahama, a retired architect in West Hills."I won't do it myself. I'm not even curious to try that. It's a bus."
Lisa also reports that estimates of only 5,000 to 7,000 riders per day are way too low, possibly to make it look that much better if/when they exceed expectations:
"I think the 5,000 number is really low-ball," said Professor James E. Moore of the University of Southern California's Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering. "They'll have absolutely no trouble beating that 5,000-passenger-per-day figure."
Moore hesitated to make his own ridership projection for the busway, Line 901, without doing formal computer modeling, but expects much higher numbers.
"Don't be surprised if it's double that. Don't be surprised if we hit that 20,000 to 25,000 this year, as opposed to 2020."
But there's also skepticism about whether the project is doomed from the get-go:
Veteran bus riders have also had a mixed response. While some look forward to a trip that's faster than current east-west routes, others say the MTA hasn't provided enough connecting buses to make the system effective - especially for those living in the North San Fernando Valley. "It does nothing for us," said Bart Reed, executive director of The Transit Coalition, an advocacy group for bus riders. "The amount of money they saved by not providing connecting services marginalizes the Orange Line," he said. "There is a huge amount of shooting yourself in the foot when you're spending one-third of a billion dollars and don't bring in the supporting cast to make it work."
This is going to … join us again to greater metropolitan Los Angeles," said Van Nuys resident Andrew Hurvitz, noting that the opening of the busway comes three years after the Valley tried to secede from Los Angeles. "It's going to de-isolate the Valley.
"I feel like we're at a turning point," he added. "We are finally becoming less of a cliche than we were before. We're a dense, urban city and must live differently than we did in the 1950s. We can't [all] live in a single-family house with a three-car garage anymore."
But Hurvitz, an associate producer for a documentary film company with offices on Ventura Boulevard, said he's unlikely to ride the Orange Line, although he thinks a student to whom he rents a room in his house might.
"This is going to … join us again to greater metropolitan Los Angeles," said Van Nuys resident Andrew Hurvitz, noting that the opening of the busway comes three years after the Valley tried to secede from Los Angeles. "It's going to de-isolate the Valley.
"I feel like we're at a turning point," he added. "We are finally becoming less of a cliche than we were before. We're a dense, urban city and must live differently than we did in the 1950s. We can't [all] live in a single-family house with a three-car garage anymore."
But the Orange Line "doesn't go anywhere you would want it to go," said Joel Kotkin, a Valley Village resident and Irvine senior fellow at the New America Foundation, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank. "It's a tour of the industrial bowels of the Valley. And there's no place to stop to get a cup of coffee."
Kotkin and others believe the Orange Line, like most bus lines in the city, will fill a need for low-income workers and students. But, he adds, it won't do much to unclog the 101 — or even nearby surface streets, such as Ventura, Victory and Van Nuys boulevards.
"I think it might be a great thing for a teenager in Valley Village who's got a job three days a week at Nordstrom" in Woodland Hills, he said. "For a woman cleaning house in Chandler Estates and living in Reseda, for that person, it works."
"You won't notice it on the 101 Freeway. It won't be those kinds of numbers," said Kevin Roderick, author of "The San Fernando Valley: America's Suburb."
MTA officials ... calculate that the line will have 5,000 to 7,000 riders a day in its first year, low even by Los Angeles mass transit standards. They hope daily ridership will grow to as much as 25,000 in 15 years.
MTA officials point out that the busway could be converted to light rail if it became wildly popular.
Mitch and Tess Ramin live in a small, one-story house on nearby Chandler Boulevard with their baby daughter and are renovating a larger home next door that they plan to move into. Their tree-lined neighborhood in Sherman Oaks resembles that of "The Brady Bunch," the classic family sitcom set in the Valley. (The "Brady Bunch" house is in Studio City about two miles from the Orange Line's eastern terminus.)
The Ramins question whether the busway belongs there.The real estate investor and his wife are concerned that the bus corridor that runs behind their backyards will cause noise and crime, pointing out that a transient has already moved into the landscaped easement between the sound wall and their back fence.
MTA officials "don't care as much as we do because they don't live here," Tess Ramin said. "We moved here because of the backyard, to get away from the noise of the traffic…. Now there's no escape."
What's more, during test runs this month to introduce bus drivers to the new vehicles and the route, the Ramins said they noticed that drivers were honking their horns as they drove through the blind intersection at Ethel Avenue just up the street.
West Hills resident Dan Blake, an economics professor at Cal State Northridge and director of the San Fernando Valley Economic Research Center, said he's looking forward to using it to get to Walt Disney Concert Hall in downtown Los Angeles on Saturday nights. It costs about $6 to park downtown but only $3 for a Metro day pass to ride any bus, subway or light rail train in a 24-hour period.
"It really does connect," he said. "From one end of the busway, you can go to Long Beach and look at the aquarium."
