Thankfully, we have a vigilant watchdog media looking out for us
Okay, here's Rad Sallee's story from last November about Metro's cancelled, er, never scheduled public meetings:
Last week, the Metropolitan Transit Authority abruptly canceled two public meetings on proposed changes in 59 of its 85 bus routes, six of which were set for elimination.
But Metro says protests from the public were not the reason.
"Of course we did get e-mails and phone calls when we posted the changes," said spokesman George Smalley. But the meetings were canceled for three other reasons, he said.
First, combined bus and rail ridership was up nearly 15 percent in October over the same month in 2004. Smalley said Metro wants to find out why, and assess whether the rise is likely to be permanent, before making service changes.
Metro also wants to simplify its complicated fare structure, which some at the agency believe has turned off potential customers, Smalley said.
Third, Metro is waiting to see the results of a poll by the mayor's office, asking whether residents would rather have the agency deal with high fuel prices by cutting service or by raising fares for the first time since 1994.
"Metro's fuel costs for the fiscal year that began Oct. 1 will be about $20 million more than they were in the fiscal year that began two years ago," said Mayor Bill White.
White said the questionnaire went out last weekend to 160,000 households and responses should be back in a couple of weeks.
Okay, so how long does it take Metro to study the other three reasons? Metro's old service changes press release had Sunday, January 23rd (!!!) as the new meeting date and then that disappeared and we heard nothing further. Nothing out of Rad Sallee or anyone else from our local watchdog powerhouse paper, nothing out of any of the local tv news stations, nothing from Metro, nothing from anyone.
This might have been nice fodder for a Chron traffic blog or a Chron local politics blog, but, alas, the Chronicle doesn't offer those.
KHOU-11's news blog hasn't had anything on it that I've seen and I check it daily.
So, if you are a Metro customer and your route has been changed or cancelled, you are SOL. No public meeting so you can voice your opinion, and local media couldn't really care less.
Ahhh, there's nothing quite like the elite media's idea of providing a voice for the voiceless, eh?
RELATED: Yet another Metro press release on service changes.
Posted by Anne Linehan @ 01/23/06 08:59 PM | Print |
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