Comments on: Oscar Grant protests miss the big picture

By: Bill Steffen

Bill Steffen — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 19:33:42 +0000

YOU are missing the BIG picture my friend! Oscar Grant is DEAD! You talk about “extremist rhetoric”. What is your article but “conformist rhetoric” that detracts from the real issue. The murder of Oscar Grant.

By: whatsername

whatsername — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 07:04:18 +0000

I WONDERED why it’s so expensive just to go between Oakland stops, that didn’t make any sense. Now it does. Got to accommodate those commuters living in the ‘burbs…

By: Storm Bear Williams

Storm Bear Williams — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 04:55:59 +0000

Living in El Cerrito, I now fly out of SFO instead of OAK just because of the idiotic AirBART connection. Yeah, I have to go through SF but I go right to the terminal, my day is going to be complicated enough, I don’t need ANOTHER connection hassle while juggling all my luggage.

And to the point of the fair structures, they make no sense at all.

By: Translink finally implemented on Muni & BART « Living in the O

Translink finally implemented on Muni & BART « Living in the O — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 16:18:07 +0000

[...] This is really just another example of BART being difficult and not cooperating with other transit agencies. There’s so much more to the story of BART being a bad transit neighbor, and dto510 covered this in depth last week: [...]

By: dto510

dto510 — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 20:27:44 +0000

Mike, the point of a transit system should not be to transfer funds from the inner cities to the outer suburbs. The only way to fix BART is to fundamentally change its operating structure so that residents of the suburbs don’t receive as much in subsidy: that means no free parking, sharply higher ticket fares, and no more extensions to nowhere that duplicate existing infrastructure (there is already a train from the East Bay to San Jose, for example). BART is arguing in court that Alameda County voters voted to tax themselves with the intent of creating an extension to Milpitas! For BART to stop lying to voters about the enormous costs and puny benefits of its infrastructure would be a good step.

Also, no, that cannot be said for any one or two-station stop. A ride between Orinda and Walnut Creek is much costlier to the system than a ride from the DTO to San Francisco, yet the latter ride costs more. As the Transbay Tube reaches capacity and inner-city commuters start suffering service cutbacks, that will become apparent.

By: Mike Caton

Mike Caton — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 17:07:21 +0000

One statement that jumps out as not meaningful is that “every trip within Oakland is subsidizing a trip from the outer suburbs”. Can’t you make that same statement for any 1- or 2-stop trip?
i.e., every trip from San Leandro to Hayward is subsidizing a trip from the outer suburbs? Even if the statement is meaningful, is it relevant? Do we say “Screw you Pittsburg, you have to drive?” What’s the point of a public transit system?

I would love to take BART more but it doesn’t go where I need it to. And I live less than a ten minute walk from the closest station. But it’s better than nothing. Before we declare BART to be unsalvageably inequitable and a failure from the standpoint of getting people out of cars, let’s work together to see what we can do to fix it.

By: Oscar Grant | Daily News

Oscar Grant | Daily News — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 13:38:36 +0000

[...] Oscar Grant protests miss the big picture [...]

By: V Smoothe

V Smoothe — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 19:19:48 +0000

As a matter of fact, Charles, a frequent and efficient bus connection between the Coliseum BART station and the Oakland Airport is exactly what Kaplan advocates. Why did you even bring her up in the first place if you don’t know anything about her position?

By: Joanna

Joanna — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 18:14:03 +0000

Mr Pine, you say that you stand corrected, but from my perspective in reading various blogs that you respond to, I see you often making these bald statements that are often untrue. Rather than do that, why don’t you take the time to find out the real situation (ie what Rebecca Kaplan really stands for) before putting your own stamp of disapproval on the topic. Personally, I see it as stemming from your frustration in not getting what you wanted with the police measures, etc. (weren’t you at one point running for some office?) Tone it down and try working WITH people. That’s part of what’s wrong in this city. Snap judgements are made without knowing the whole story.

It’s like this – you can be for tax cuts and against tax cuts – but obviously it depends on the context of more than just the statement that you are either for or against tax cuts. That’s one thing that bugged me throughout the campaign season – on all sides of the political fences.

Please, let’s try something different. Working together to understand why each of us has a different reason for believing what we believe and understanding that there are some things that we’re simply not going to agree on, but are willing to work towards finding middle ground. Often if we see the big picture, we’ll understand why our snap judgement was wrong…

Thanks.

By: Charles Pine

Charles Pine — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 02:17:11 +0000

Yes, it is Rebecca not Rachel. I apologize for confusing cheap novel titles.

None of those Airport Connector schemes deserve priority in a list of Bay Area transportation needs. For a fraction of any of those schemes you can run luxury minibuses every ten minutes from a BART station. If Kaplan is specifically in favor of that, I will stand corrected.