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Old 06-25-2008, 09:12 AM
 
Location: Southern Illinois
10,364 posts, read 20,717,424 times
Reputation: 15642

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Well I got a great intro to the metro system yesterday. My husband takes it every day to work and they pay for it so we're saving lots of money on gas. We've decided to try to make it on one car because of that.

Yesterday my husband needed the car and I wanted to go to SLU from the Manchester/Maplewood station, so I looked up the trip on the internet and worked out my route--this took over an hour of research, because the site was not that user friendly. I decided to get off at CWE instead of Grand, and take the bus from there, but I never found the right bus or the bus stop. Nothing was well marked when I got off the bus and there was construction going on, so I decided to walk up to Lindell and I figured there had to be a bus stop there and CWE is nice to walk thru anyway. The first bus stop I found was after about a mile and only listed bus #93 stopping, but I needed #90. So I kept going. I walked about another mile before I found another bus stop but by then I was almost there I thought, so I kept going, and besides, it didn't list the buses that stop there. I never did see bus #90, even though I was on the route that the bus supposedly takes, according to the website.

I did have a nice walk and needed the exercise and made my appt on time, so not complaining there, but why isn't there better info about the buses? I've ridden public transport in many cities around the world and never have I seen a system so difficult to use as the one here. It's easier to figure out in Paris or Bangkok, in another language, than here. One of the problems I had with the website is figuring out exactly which stop you want off the metro--trying to figure out what the stop is near to--I kept having to go back and forth between the metro site and mapquest, and that was time consuming to say the least. Anyone else here had problems? My husband said he sees more and more people riding the metro b/c of the gas crunch, so good info is getting more important.
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Old 06-25-2008, 09:21 AM
 
Location: Yes
2,667 posts, read 6,750,239 times
Reputation: 908
I ride the Metro Train all the time and it's great - and the schedule is very easy to understand on the website PDF.

Have never taken a bus though and don't plan to. I won't pretend to understand the bus schedule here. It's like trying to read a different language on the website PDF's.
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Old 07-07-2008, 09:09 PM
 
4 posts, read 11,410 times
Reputation: 11
I completely agree. I ended up doing the same thing years ago, wandering aimlessly around CWE the first time I tried to catch a bus there. Granted I didn't do any research first, but I didn't think I needed to. I find the Metrolink user friendly, but the buses are pain to figure out. The only other place I've really used public transportation is in Europe, I know it's not a good comparison since their's is obviously better and used a lot more, but practically every bus stop had a map of the system, lists of lines that stopped there and even times. I don't expect to get all that here, but a little info would be nice.
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Old 07-07-2008, 10:44 PM
 
Location: MO Ozarkian in NE Hoosierana
4,682 posts, read 12,013,707 times
Reputation: 6986
Might be good if enough peoples emailed or wrote MetroLink to notify them of these issues, and copy the STL Post-Dispatch paper too, some reporter or other that could gather the facts and help disperse some friendly pressure on MetroLink... STLtoday - contacts (http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/help/stories.nsf/pdcontacts?openview&count=500 - broken link)
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Old 07-09-2008, 11:09 PM
 
Location: Ballwin, MO
366 posts, read 1,739,548 times
Reputation: 228
Forget about schedules and stops being easy. I think what really is a major problem in the U.S. (except New York) is the complete lack of easy, good, fast and reliable public transportation. I see, and feel so badly for people all the time waiting at a bus stop for a bus that only comes once every half hour or longer. I believe that if we had busses that came by every 10 minutes, at most, we would have many more people using public transportation. In Europe the busses seem to almost follow each other, and they're always packed.

Okay, I'll step down from the pedistal (but you ignited one of my pet peeves).
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Old 07-10-2008, 09:59 AM
 
Location: Tower Grove East, St. Louis, MO
12,063 posts, read 31,474,214 times
Reputation: 3798
I def. agree that public transit is a problem in this country, but even in Chicago the markings for the bus system are very good and their Web site is very user friendly, which makes it far less scary as a "first-timer" than it would be otherwise.
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Old 07-13-2008, 10:22 PM
 
Location: Southern Illinois
10,364 posts, read 20,717,424 times
Reputation: 15642
Quote:
Originally Posted by RickMG View Post
Forget about schedules and stops being easy. I think what really is a major problem in the U.S. (except New York) is the complete lack of easy, good, fast and reliable public transportation. I see, and feel so badly for people all the time waiting at a bus stop for a bus that only comes once every half hour or longer. I believe that if we had busses that came by every 10 minutes, at most, we would have many more people using public transportation. In Europe the busses seem to almost follow each other, and they're always packed.

Okay, I'll step down from the pedistal (but you ignited one of my pet peeves).
I agree Rick, and we really need to get it together. Gas is getting way expensive, though still cheap by world standards. I don't think it will get cheaper either. Maybe a little bit temporarily, but never again $2.00/gallon. We really need to be working on getting good reliable public transportation going before things go nuts.

I have traveled around the world, and never had this much problem figuring out the public transport system, and buses every 10 minutes would be a big help. Part of our problem here though is that buses are seen as a low income alternative and so there is that snob factor, which will be hard to get around.

Shadow, I'm going to take your suggestion, and if I get something together, I will share.

aragx6--I agree that Chicago has better info, but one night my family and I got on a bus from downtown and it was going the opposite way from what we intended. The people on there looked very rough and they told us that we needed to get off that bus and fast, but told us to wait until we got to Cook county Hospital and then wait there in the light. It was neat the way these people, who were drunks and drug addicts and such, were taking care of us in the sweetest way, and gave me a renewed faith that most people are very good at heart.
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Old 07-14-2008, 01:36 PM
 
Location: Tower Grove East, St. Louis, MO
12,063 posts, read 31,474,214 times
Reputation: 3798
I often find the buses to be safe at night than the el here in Chicago too because at least there is a bus driver very near you, whereas on the el, you could be the only person on the car with a very bad dude and know one would be the wiser.

But I agree that perceived "low income status" and safety are big problems with public transit in St. Louis and to a lesser extent in Chicago too.
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Old 07-14-2008, 05:27 PM
 
Location: Ballwin, MO
366 posts, read 1,739,548 times
Reputation: 228
Quote:
Originally Posted by stepka View Post
Part of our problem here though is that buses are seen as a low income alternative and so there is that snob factor, which will be hard to get around.
Very good point, in fact, this could be the biggest problem at this time. The good thing about all the higher prices is that it has become in to save money anyway you can. The rich are even shopping at Wal Mart now, so I think this would be the best time to try something new. First thing they should do is the 10 minute idea and then get smaller busses that I would think have to be more comfortible and more fuel efficient.
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