Another Metro Moment #29
fo...@eskimo.com
These are the continuing adventures of a typical
Seattle Metro patron. The incidents involved are
real and happened exactly as described. I keep a
log of the details in the unlikely event that Metro
gives a flying whangdoodle enough to challenge me.
I am not now nor have I ever been a cardcarrying
employee or manager at King County Metro Transit
& Sewers. I'm just one of the butts in the seats.
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#29
[CORRECTION: Bus 2181 was a M.A.N., not a Breda.]
And now it's the time of black armbands, funerals
and lawyers.
I haven't seen anything on Mr. Liebelt's funeral -
the passenger who died the day after the disaster.
I'm not even sure if his burial was to be here or
in his native Amsterdam, N.Y. The Seattle Times
had an article on him. He sounded like a man who
truely loved life and lived it with considerable
grace and elegance. It's a shame it had to end
in such a brutal, senseless way.
. . . . . .
Concerning Mark McLaughlin...
* Thrs Dec 3 7pm - Funeral - Christ the King Church -
all buses stop for a moment of
silence
* Tues Dec 8 ~9am- downtown bus procession to Key
Arena at Seattle Center
11am- Public Memorial Service at
Key Arena
At least two memorial funds have been established
through Washington Mutual Bank:
- Mark McLaughlin Memorial Account (for his children's
education)
- Route 359 Victims Fund (for medical and other
expenses of passengers injured on bus 2181)
Cathy Munro has created a very nice memorial page
for Mark McLaughlin which includes an opportunity
to leave a condolence message for his family. She's
a former driver so it's more from the heart than the
MetroKC page (she says that's her picture of Mark on
their tribute page BTW...I'm sure they'll get around
to thanking her sooner or later).
www.eskimo.com/~cathy/markmclaughlin/guestbook.html
. . . . . .
ATU587 and King County met and discussed security
matters in the aftermath of the Bus 2181 Disaster.
They issued a joint statement afterwards in which
there was much use of the words 'explore','evaluate'
and 'monitor'. The only place the word 'do' showed
up was with respect to other transit systems. Aside
from bringing a few extra sheriffs deputies in a
couple weeks earlier than scheduled, they've been
noticeably short on 'do'. A week ago we had a serious
event - a murdered driver, a dead passenger and loads
of injured. Not quite as bad as the mess Colin Fletcher
made on that Long Island commuter train a while back,
but competitive. If that's not an indication of problems
that need attention, then what the heck is? Earth
calling MetroKC management...anybody awake over there?
It was 'a highly unusual event untypical' of Our Town,
they say. The tourism and convention people will be happy
to carry that message abroad. Like there's someplace
in America where that sort of thing is usual and typical?
Is there anybody still alive there? Aside from being
meaningless, it's also absurdly priggish to imagine that
Seattle enjoys some sort of immunity from the prevailing
American reality. We've got it all: gangs, drugs, drive-by
shootings, not to mention the yet-to-be-apprehended Green
River Serial Killer and, the dearly departed but ever
debonair snuff-freak, Ted Bundy. It may have been
unusual but it wasn't a first. This is the second time
a bus driver has died here: 1966, Harry Wren during a
robbery attempt.
On the Metro frequencies the night of the disaster,
the pain and anger at the situation was evident in
drivers and dispatchers alike. The latter had to stay
completely mum on any details. The most they could
acknowledge, when asked by drivers, was that an incident
had occured. Details were so confused at the time that
they couldn't even be specific about the nature of the
incident. All they could do is refer drivers to the Bus
Barn at the end of their shift for news. But you could
feel it in their voices - they knew something terrible
had happened. With a major north-south route closed off
because of the disaster, they had to scramble to re-route
buses. There was too much to deal with to be discussing
the latest rumors on the operational frequencies. And,
undoubtably, Mark was a familiar face and voice to them.
They had their own emotions to deal with on top of it
all.
There's been no mention of the lawsuits yet. With over
thirty passengers on Bus 2181 at the time of the disaster,
I'm sure there'll be plenty of them. And, given the con-
fusion at the scene (emergency people had so much diff-
iculty sorting out Bus 2181 passengers from the locals
milling around that they had to stick a numbered piece
of tape on their foreheads and corral them into a roped
off area) it wouldn't be a surprise to see a few Walk Ons
trying to cash in. A lot of people were hurt, and some of
them will probably need expensive long-term care. It'll
cost a bundle. Hopefully the lawyers will leave a few
bucks of the awards for their clients. It'd be a nice
gesture.
..................................................
The rain has arrived. While the mountain passes fill
up with snow, the lowlands fill up with water and mud.
It's been a series of one or two day aqua-extravaganzas
accompanied by tree-bust'n winds. Typical fall and
spring stuff around here. The continuous one and two
week rains that mark a mature Northwest winter (and
drive transplanted Californians right up the wall)
haven't arrived yet. But they will. I've got my sandbags
piled up, dry firewood, a whole stack of old Racing Forms
to relive past glories, my bumbershoot is siliconed
and oiled. Let 'er rip.
Metro's had its hands full with that pre-Thanksgiving
storm. With many under-passes flooded and a whole slew
of trees/powerlines down all over King County, it got a
little hectic trying to find alternate routes and get
people to their destinations. But nothing they haven't
seen before many times. The Thanksgiving Day holiday
arrived right on the storm's heels, providing a welcome
breather the next day. And then the monster struck.
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@Local Transit Company
Way back in November, in happier times, I asked
TCFL what he knew about Metro's "Italian Stallions" -
the Bredas. Never a man to dissapoint, he came up
with this delightfully shocking expose' that makes
Geraldo Rivera look like a slacker and backslider.
I'll bet he thought I was just protecting my favorite
Paesanos. Nah. Just trying to keep this thing from
bloating up like a beached whale.I know you're out
there somewhere...come in TCFL...
- * -
Remember Breda is another way to say Fiat!! The designers
at Breda did a hurry up job when they designed these
coaches!! They were so sure that they would not build
any more they refused Metro's request for a proposed
option for more coaches.
Do you remember the Neoplan Duel Mode?? It was not as
complicated as the Breda coach because it operated as a
diesel - electric which in theory cuts down on parts.
Metro decided, for reasons that are beyond the common
transit worker, to buy 235 coaches from a company that
did not even have a prototype!!
But we often talk about Breda coaches in their next
life...send twenty to the artillery range down in Fort
Lewis, house the homeless, use as fodder in operation
lifesaver campaign on BNSF western division!
[ED. Pazzo cafone!]
I went out to the Issaquah [southeast of Seattle]
assembly Plant when Breda were putting them together.
The Breda coaches were assembled by local labor that
were paid $6.00 per hour until Metro Found out...then
they told Breda to pay the prevaling rate...the only
jobs that came close to the same kind of work was at
the Kenworth Plant and...the lowest paid person was
making $12.00 per hour so Metro compromised with Breda
and set the wages at $9.00 per hour. The place had
dirt floors and there was no security at all!
We found the location of the diesel engines and
could have made off with the whole darn warehouse...
but we were common transit workers just nosing around
until this big Italian guy threw us out.....
we had been looking around for almost two hours before
we were noticed.
[ED. Sicilian maybe - they're a little slow - but
definitely not Calabrese - he would have been too
drunk to even notice you. A Lombardese would have
invited you in for a little gorgonzola and Barbera
then cut you a nice deal on those engines. They're
not like those southerners. They got class.]
The Bredas do not have color coded wiring!! Somebody
wanted to save some money!
TCFL @ MetroKC ...Just a common transit worker who
likes his job
.......................................................
- METRO TRANSIT UNIONS -
[I've been meaning to include this for at least a month
now. Even put it up on the AMM webpage. Finally, its
time has arrived.]
For various reasons, unions are always a touchy
subject in America. The yahoos consider them dangerously
socialistic, the media - owned by fat, rich, pink guys -
have always given them short-shrift and the politicians
have shamelessly jerked them around for free campaign
labor, donations and occasional scape-goat duty in
exchange for little more than peanuts. Though there is
the odd union president who has cashed in handsomely
on the relationship.
I've sat on a union executive once. And, on the other
hand, been mercilessly ripped off by a union that did
nothing more than collect dues. So I can't say I'm either
a True Believer or a Right-to-Work type. They're just
another necessary evil much as government is. Clearly,
wages and bennies wouldn't be anywhere near what they
are now without them. The whole country would look like
Microsoft with it's tiny head of billionaires and bloated
butt of cheap temps/contracts with very little in the
middle. By analogy, Boeing, with it's union-shop 'beer-
belly' in the middle and properly proportioned head and
tail is the sort of profile you can build an economy
around. The wealth is properly distributed.
The Amalgamated Transit Union, Local 587 covers most
of the people who work at Metro: drivers, inspectors,
mechanics, dispatchers, janitors, trades people, etc.
They've done so for over 75 years. They run a nice
webpage at:
http://www.atu587.com/
Local 587 started back in the 20's. Not only was
Seattle's public-transit perennially broke but, being
union was pretty risky business. Only a few years
earlier there had been the wild upheval of the Everett
Massacre, the Wobblies, the General Strike and the
deportations to the U.S.S.R. of a few locals in the
Palmer Raids. But by the early 20's the Teamsters Dave
Beck and his highly conservative brand of unionism
had taken over the Washington labor scene. The business
weasels and conservative Republicans who ran things
around here found Dave much more palatable. He was
willing to do business. It may not have been pretty,
but the unions survived.
Beneficiaries of Roosevelt's hydroelectric projects
and the huge military influx of WWII, Seattle was
no longer a poor cousin by the post-war years. Local
587 wanted a piece of the action and hit the bricks in
1946 for its first strike. It was a long one. Only a
few years later, in 1950, they had to do it again. That
one was shorter. The right people were beginning to
realize that the union wasn't just going to go away.
For the next 26 years a labor peace of sorts prevailed.
Their last strike was in 1976 - just a few years after
public-transit was reorganized around here and Metro was
born under the direction of King County.
Their latest contract expired on Halloween Night. I
imagine, like most unions in the phony-balony 'Roaring
90's' (that roaring sound is the money getting sucked
up to the boys at the top), they'd just be happy to hang
onto their bennies. The media would plaster them as
'greedy' if they tried for a pay raise of any substance.
By some media magic, greed looks highly respectible on
Bill Gates but dangerously ugly on the rest of us. Three
guesses who's paying their bills.
Other unions involved with Metro are:
* International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers,
Local 77 covering the people who handle the trolley
wires.
* Office and Professional Workers, Local 17 picked
up the managers and chiefs after King County took
over Metro.
* Service Employees International, Local 6 speaks
for the waste water and sewer people.
--------------------------------------------------
The above is copyright material. You want to use
it, ask. You want to make money off it, gimme
some first. I'll let you know if it's enough.
You want to steal it, I'll sic my lawyer Yoshi
'The Proctologist' Rasmussen on you baby. He'll
teriyaki your sorry butt and turn it into Lutefisk.
~--------------------------------------------------
KH
>Remember Breda is another way to say Fiat!!
better in diesel than coach 4026 on rt 44 was under electric. 4026 was
pathetic. The driver said that it wouldn't run after he put a lift in, and it
took 10 mins to get it going again after putting the poles up and down a few
times. Then, to compound that, his radio box was broken off of its little
mount. He had to strap it into the transfer puncher chain. And then when he
dropped off both of the wheelchairs, all the fans and heaters shut off and
the lights would dim. His radio box would flash and beep a few times, and
then flash somemore while emitting this horrible tone to remind the driver to
log in. He had to log in 4 times on one run!!!! This bus was pathetic. :-(
The driver said he didn't want a coach change because he knew whatever he got
would be worse that 4026.
KH
Open Mike
Yeah, report trouble on your bus to the BDFH[1] and you don't know what
they'll give you as replacement... I once had the audacity to report
an overheating engine and got 211 (an Old Look that barely could get out of
its own way, kept in the back of the garage for just such malcontents).
[0] Fix It Again, Tony!
[1] B*****d Dispatcher from H**l.
--
mikey ^at^ wwnet ^dot^ net
Please un-MUNGE return address to reply!
"Can't buy what I want because it's free."
KilroyGuy
is such a terrible place to live, with all those drive-bys, serial murders,
gangs, drugs and (gasp!) windstorms.
Yes, the Aurora shooting/crash was a tragic event, but it IS isolated ---
Mark's death was the first fatality of any sort incurred by a Metro driver
since its inception over 30 years ago. It sounds to me as if the driver's seat
of a Metro bus is one of the safest places to work.
Folks who must sort through decades of crime to justify how dangerous our lives
are might be advised to find some happiness in their lives. This sort of
paranoia, when communicated to the general public, sets up a siege mentality in
urban dwellers that is absolutely unnecessary.
As with most urban areas, violent crime in Seattle has been dropping for almost
10 years, and is lower now than it has been since the early 60s. The reality
is that our city is a safe, vibrant, exciting place to live.
Am I suggesting we turn a blind eye to crime --- not hardly. What I am saying
is that we put things in perspective. Violent crime impacts very few of us,
and the numbers are going down every year.
I am not for a second trivializing the Metro incident. But I am saying that
the actions of Silas Cool were an aberration --- not a sign that we have to
hide behind bullet-proof glass --- either in out buses or in our homes.