I received an interesting email from Browne Molyneux of the Bus Bench blog this afternoon. I thought Browne asked me a perfectly appropriate question, given that I work for a mass transit agency. I, however, disagreed with how she asked it.

Here’s her email:

Greetings Steve,

Writing a post about the bus and men. I have two questions for you?

What bus do you take regularly?

And if you don’t take the bus regularly, why not?

The post goes up tomorrow, sorry for the short notice. I’m asking quite a few people the question and since you write on transit, thought I’d ask you also.

Browne Molyneux

And here’s my response:

Hi Browne.

1. I do not take the bus regularly to and from work. I either take the Pasadena Gold Line to downtown Los Angeles or drive. When I take the Gold Line, I usually drive to the Del Mar or Fillmore station, although I occasionally ride my bike to stations in Pasadena because the parking tends to fill up.

2. I don’t take the bus regularly because I take the train, which is much quicker and more convenient than the Metro bus that connects Pasadena to downtown L.A. I do use the DASH bus and/or the Red Line to get around downtown.

I would suggest you think about how you ask questions. Asking “what bus do you take regularly?” is an assumption and leads me to believe you expect or want a certain answer. You could have simply asked “how do you get to work?,” which would get you the same answer and also make me believe you at least want to be fair and that I’m not setting myself up for an attack by providing an honest answer to you.

Damien Newton of Streetsblog Los Angeles interviewed me in Dec. 2008 back when I was working at a certain large newspaper in town and was covering transportation. He, too, wanted to know how I got to work. Click here to read my answer.