The following post originally appeared on El Pasajero, Metro’s Spanish-language blog. It has been translated and edited for posting on The Source. The post in Spanish is here.
Sheriff’s deputies increased patrols and surveillance of Blue and Green line trains earlier this month due to persistent complaints from riders about illegal vending of products aboard trains, as well as other violations of the code of conduct by passengers.
“Not only do we prevent the sale of any product, but also other activities that endanger the safety or welfare of passengers or do damage to facilities or Metro vehicles, such as smoking, eating, spitting, profanity, screaming, painting graffiti, scratched windows or seats,” said Capt. Daniel Cruz of the Sheriff’s Department, which patrols Metro Rail.
Cruz stressed that a zero-tolerance policy is being implemented toward anyone caught selling, damaging property or mistreating Metro passengers to ensure that all Metro customers enjoy a comfortable ride. Fines will be applied according to the severity of the offense.
The Sheriff reported that two arrests were made on April 14 of people who had been arrested on prior occasions — including one for selling DVDs.
Cruz said that more deputies will be used to patrol trains and that numerous signs have been installed about rules against selling goods on trains as well as eating, smoking and disturbing other passengers.
Many riders, however, continue to ignore these rules. On the Blue Line recently, a young mother was walking along the platforms of several stations selling boxes of chocolates. Asked if she knew this was illegal, the mother said: “I knew it was bad. I do it because it helps me with my children’s expenses, but I won’t do it anymore.”
Other passengers said that the conduct did not bother them. “I have no problem with people selling, provided it is not harmful things like drugs,” said Cecilio Serrano.
However, Sheriff’s Capt. Cruz, said that sales on trains and buses are prohibited because it is usually people who have no vendor’s license and because it opens the door for other criminal activities. “Besides being illegal competition for established businesses, we do not know if the products they sell may cause damage to your health,” he said. “So it’s best to prohibit this activity and prevent further damage.”
Cruz added that initially the Zero Tolerance Policy will be implemented in the Blue and Green Metro lines and then spread throughout the Metro train system.
Good gawd, fare evasion is becoming the Godwin’s Law of Transit Nerds. Enough already….
1) Crack down on illegal vendors. Allow legal vendors. If that means selling vendor licenses to the guys who sell candy bars on the trains, fine.
2) But I’d rather see more Famima!! Let Famima!! be an extra set of eyes in the stations; they will have a vested interest in keeping the stations safe.
3) Let Famima!! sell TAP cards and TAP upgrades. FamilyMart in Japan even accepts SUICA as payment. TAP is finally starting to look like a real smart card, it’s high time that Metro riders learn to own and use TAP. Famima!! can be part of that process.
* I like Famima!!, but the same would be true of any convenience store. Famima!! seems like a natural because of the SUICA/ FamilyMart link.
@Spokker
At whose expense? Manning police officers at every station isn’t free you know. Times that every year and it’s just not cost effective.
It makes more sense to just install machines that does that job for them. It works everywhere else, why can’t we just lock those gates?
And with regards to your argument that fares don’t pay the full cost of transit, well no transit agency does. But it’s possible to reduce tax payer burden as much as possible by making efficient changes like fare gates which reduces the need to staff so many officers and going to a distance based model like all the other successful transportation systems around the world.
What you’re touting is a socialist utopia where you want it all for cheap and just keep on taxing everybody until it gets sucked dry.
I would rather have illegal vendors with product that directly benefits the vendor rather than some corporation like Quizno’s or Starbucks.
Local vendors bring local flavor and color and would uphold what is unique about our great city and county. Just as corporate vendors are the same in most every airport in every city, we would have vendors like many cities already have in their transit system:
“Wow welcome to the Wilshire/Vermont station, it’s just like that station we used in Chicago with the Starbucks and Quizno’s.”
(Don’t get me started on the so-called turnstiles boondoggle that the MTA wasted precious million$ on–while shutting down bus lines–without first seeking consensus from the other players needing to partake in the system (Metrolink, Big Blue Bus, etc.). Plus, think about it, if you were the Big Blue Bus, would you trust the MTA with paying you for the fares owed you due to the TAP system that they control?!!).
“At whose expense? Manning police officers at every station isn’t free you know.”
I never advocated staffing police officers at every station to check tickets. I advocate for the proof of payment system that has been practiced on Metro Rail and Metrolink for over a decade.
“But it’s possible to reduce tax payer burden as much as possible by making efficient changes like fare gates which reduces the need to staff so many officers”
Sworn police officers checking tickets creates a double benefit. Not only are they checking tickets but they are equipped and train to handle a wide variety of situations. Fare gates may provide some protection from those who wish to beat the fare, but they will not come to your aid if you are attacked. A strong police presence will be required with or without fare gates, and I would not accept reducing the amount of officers in the system just because there are fare gates.
That fare gates decrease the burden on taxpayers is suspect. Former Metrolink CEO Richard Stanger drafted a letter pointing out that the fare gates will cost more to install and maintain than the amount they will recover from fare evaders. You may find his letter archived here: http://www.thetransitcoalition.us/largepdffiles/TC-Metro-2008-01-31-01a-FaregatingAnalysisReport-RichardStanger.pdf
“What you’re touting is a socialist utopia where you want it all for cheap and just keep on taxing everybody until it gets sucked dry.”
Be careful not to assume that because a person holds one position that they automatically advocate for another. I support raising fares as well as raising tax revenue for mass transit. I don’t believe that transit should be forced to maintain a 100% farebox recovery ratio, but I do think it should be higher than the woefully low farebox recovery ratios we see today.
The socialist comment is quite ironic, I must add. I do not support public transit because I care about the environment. I do not support transit because my heart is bleeding for poor non-white transit dependent riders. I do not support transit because I have touchy feely ideas about “livability” and transit orientated development. Though those are all fine reasons to support transit, that’s not why I’m here.
I support transit because it is an integral component of our capitalist society. It facilitates the growth of commerce. From the lowliest bus route to the mightiest high speed rail corridor, transit supports workers and consumers doing what they do best, working and consuming.
Friend, the largest beneficiaries of transit by far are big corporations like McDonald’s and Walmart, because without the bus, they might actually have to pay their employees a living wage.
Viva la capitalism, indeed.
@ Jack:
“The sheriffs HARDLY EVER check for tickets. I ride the red line every week day and I rarely encounter the sheriffs.”
You must be new to Metro Rail. LASD is always strategically placed at Imperial Station daily. In fact, they have a sub-station there. I understand what you’re saying though, but, the reality is they tend to target “certain areas” and “certain people” more than others. So, you’re not as likely to see them bothering tourists in Hollywood or the Starbucks crowd in South Pasadena as much as folks in, say, Compton or Long Beach.
I used to live literally right above Memorial Park station in Pasadena, rode the Gold Line daily and rarely saw them there or anyplace else along the line except for Union Station. Yet, there’s never a shortage of them (or their white-shirted Metro underlings) trolling the Blue Line, usually at either Rosa Parks, Willow or Transit Mall.
I’m sure there are plenty of people just like you who complain that there aren’t enough cops around to make them feel safe from the unwashed masses. But, for just as many who, contrary to stereotypes, prefer to mind their own business and are merely trying to just go about their daily routine without being either hassled or watched under suspicion by someone who knows they can get away with it because they wear a badge, it’s an entirely different situation to the point of ad nauseam.
Consider yourself fortunate.
@Spokker
” I advocate for the proof of payment system…”
Proof of payment is just a euphemism for an honor system, which does not work when transit riders increase to a certain level. Can you imagine what New York or London would be like if they went to a “proof of payment” system? When it’s 10% of 100 riders per month, then it’s only ten people. When it becomes to a level of 10% of 4 MILLION people per month, that comes to 400 THOUSAND evaders, much more than just ten people. Percentages can remain static, but the number of evaders rises to a point where it’s impossible to do just by hiring more officers.
“Sworn police officers checking tickets creates a double benefit. Not only are they checking tickets but they are equipped and train to handle a wide variety of situations.”
And yet, officers cannot handle more than one thing going on at once either. He could be writing a ticket for fare evasion when there’s a mugging going on on the other end of the platform. He can’t be at two places at once.
So what, we add two officers? Then what if there’s a fare evasion, mugging, and illegal vending activity going on? So what we staff three officers at every station?
See, it gets to become inefficient. If a machine can handle a redundant task like checking fares, you install fare gates. Let machines handle such a minute task so that officers can focus on real issues like patroling the area against drug dealers or sort. Why do you think we have red light cameras being installed all over town? So officers can focus on real issues like murder and violent crime than writing a ticket for going through a red light which a machine can do 24/7.
Imagine what Tokyo would be like if they didn’t rely on fare gates and just police officers checking the massive transit users in that metropolis. It’ll be hectic nightmare.
“That fare gates decrease the burden on taxpayers is suspect. Former Metrolink CEO Richard Stanger drafted a letter pointing out that the fare gates will cost more to install and maintain than the amount they will recover from fare evaders.”
And yet, we see them working perfectly fine in Boston, Chicago, New York, London, Paris, Tokyo, Seoul, etc. etc…
Care to explain the rationale why every other city gets it right while we still scratch our heads how trying to figure it out?
@ M a r c
“I would rather have illegal vendors with product that directly benefits the vendor rather than some corporation like Quizno’s or Starbucks. Local vendors bring local flavor and color and would uphold what is unique about our great city and county. “
I highly disagree. Illegal vendors are just that – ILLEGAL. They are a nuisance who annoy other passengers and do not pay into taxes or put in any source of revenue to the mass transit system.
Furthermore, what you describe as “local flavor and color” is basically just re-hashed stuff that’s sold at any other local store which in turn is some cheaply made product from China anyway. But those illegal vendors just buy stuff like Hershey’s chocolate by the bulk at any CVS Pharmacy and tout them for an inflated price.
Considering that, I’d rather have a mini-CVS Pharmacy at the train station itself, which would create more jobs, actually stimulate the economy, in which that business brings in revenue through sales taxes and revenue to Metro via rent.
Now if it were like homemade sweets or Made in Los Angeles local pomegranate flavors lychees then it’d be a different story. But then, it should be sold through legal and proper means by getting a vendor license and opening up your own store or negotiating with legal retail vendors at those train stations to sell your stuff on your behalf. I’m sure if a Famima!! Store was opened inside 7th/Metro, something could be negotiated to sell homemade cookies there as with the other better foods that they sell there from local sources.
Mr. Fukuzawa,
Please stop comparing Southern California and U.S. society to Japanese society. They are dramatically different cultures and just because something works in Japan, it does not mean it will work in the U.S. or So. Cal. This is not to say either is better than the other, they are just dramatically different.
As far as vending/vendors in the individual red line stations goes there are a miriad of issues people are not aware of:
1) Fire Codes: These stations are build to meet the requirements of a specific ‘occupancy type’ as defined by the National Fire Protection Association and the applicable fire codes. Changing the occupancy and modifying the stations to allow power, plumbing and other utilities needed by vendor kiosks would likely change the occupancy type and potentially change the fire code requirements.
2) Vendors on public property would need to go through a public request for proposal process that would result in a contract with the public agency. Metro would have to establish a criteria for the vendors, conduct a competitive process to choose the winning proposers, sign contracts, monitor those contracts and the vendors compliance with the contracts, appropriate regulations and laws and collect some percentage of the vendors income to pay for Metro’s expenses.
In the long run, I don’t see this type of activity doing anything but costing Metro more money, which is why it will not happen.
@Ralph
First of all, that’s a Miss not a Mister. Please don’t jump to conclusions about my gender.
Number two, pulling the “oh we can’t do that because it’s a different culture” phrase is nothing more than a lame excuse to not getting anything done. At least I provided a common sense approach to let vendors into the stations which is supported by many here. What have you come up with?
Same as my advocacy for going towards a distance based system “waaaaah, it’s so hard to do, let’s just keep it $1.50 and ask for more tax increases because it’s soooo much easier.” Give me a break.
Laziness is not an excuse in the business world: you don’t get rewarded for not getting anything done and constantly saying “gimme more [tax] money, gimme more [tax] money.” Businesses are run for a profit, going after efficiency, and making common sense choices. Yet, this city’s public transit wonders why they continuously run in the red and constantly complain about lack of funding.
This plague of “it’s so hard to do so let’s just tax everybody” got into this mess in the first place. What good has this idea has done so far? Fares are now raised to $1.50, we have cuts in service, we have rampant fare evasion, illegal vendors annoying riders, filthy trains, unlocked gates, a TAP system that doesn’t work as it’s supposed to, and not even a rail to the airport. Well, clearly I don’t see the “culture” working here in LA, do I?
There’s nothing “culturally different” between US and Japan in regards to public transit, moreover, public transit is nothing more different than running an efficient business. They have the expertise and the knowledge how to run it like a business with less tax dependency and making common sense choices that makes sense. Clearly I do not see that happening here with constant whining of lack of funds, cutting back service, still going “duh” over how to lock the fare gates, and pondering what to do about illegal vendors.
If LA wants itself to become a transit oriented city, stop the tax waste and just model after Japan. It’s far easier to do that trying to reinvent the wheel only to come up with the same result decades later after spending billions in wasted taxpayer money (Oops, I think we need to install fare gates now. Oops, never thought about illegal vendors maybe we should’ve built train stations with retail space in mind). In the end, it comes back to the same result anyway, why waste tax money when the answer is the same? No matter what LA Metro tries to do, they aren’t gonna come up with a new answer to 1+1. Japan already figured out 1+1=2, why spend billions to find if 1+1=3 when you’re just going to come back decades later and say “oops, Japan was right, 1+1=2. My bad for wasting billions in tax payer money.”
Again, let me make myself clear: Tokyo did not wake up one day to find itself to be a model transit oriented city. If LA is having trouble figuring something out, most likely Tokyo went through the same problem decades ago and found a solution to them.
So, what’s so hard in just asking the Japanese for advice? Pride?