Day Four
Ok. Friday July 4th, and this has to be the worst day of all for JTA.
Im serious. Every possible bone headed or inconvenient thing that the unimitated transit authority does that is guaranteed to make sure that no one except the most desperate or whimsical people will ride the damned transit authority was in full force with spotlights on today.
First thing.
Unannounced, the entire damned Skyway System was shuttered and closed down. No signs, no notice, no nothing. You just walk up to the gates of the stations and surmise for yourself that they bloody operation is nixed for the day.
First off, this is bloody stupid. Th Skyway, if it does ANYTHING, at least services the river line on the Southbank of the St. Johns and commands a brilliant view of the River. There were thousands and thousands of southbank people who would have found this service invaluable yesterday and last night.
Closing the skyway was such a stupid idea, I don't think there is a word in english that adequately explores the depths of stupid embodied by this one incredibly mindless prank.
Additionally, the JTA chooses six holidays in order to run what they call "Sunday Service" which means, "Public transit?....meh." Routes run once every one or two hours and the whole clown show takes off its oversized shoes and stinks up the place before 11pm.
Way to go, JTA. Make yourself as useless as possible on one of the few days of the year that the public might give you a chance to show you arent completely without merit.
Why, in the name of God, would a transit authority all but cancel its basic services on a day when half of the city is travelling to the beach for a bit of late night fun, and the other half is making its way to the Downtown in pursuit of the same thing?
Why would it actually close down its skyway services in the ONE area of town GUARANTEED to need thousands of parking spaces and a little transit to the riverwalk?
Sheer, mindless, blistering stupidity.
So. Skyway? closed. Trolleys? off. Buses? half service and geritol class closing hours.
No wonder the downtown is so bloody dead on Sundays.
So, after walking an additional mile to the central station (since all bets and assumptions about service are apparently off on sunday schedule and the little flea circus doesnt even staff its otherwise indispensable customer service line (630-3100)) I found a new thing that the uninformed public has to keep firmly in mind if one doesnt want to take the low road to shanghai with JTA.
Within the regular bus service the JTA has two seperate kinds of lines.
Lines based on the sides of town, Like Southside (SS), Westside (WS), the Beaches and Arlington (BH and AR) and the Northside. (NS)
Easy enough, right?
Then there are cross connecting lines. These are the lines that connect say, the westside with the northside, like "L-8" or the southside with the northwest quadrant, like say, "B-7" (a line we have already become acquainted with in earlier posts)
Still simple right?
Easy enough to understand. One would think. Just go to the station and hop onto the busline with your route and off you go.
Now what would be the one way that a sabotuer could completely f*#% that up, add an unsuspected layer of complexity that would confuse and enrage customers over the ensuing mixups?
Stumped?
Get a load of this stellar idea.
All the 'regular' buses have a fixed "Stop" at the central station. Every time you want to catch BH 1 (the excellent beaches route), you go to the same bay at the station. It takes you to your destination. Same with SS-3, WS-4 or any other of the busses that are based on a side of town.
HOWEVERCross over lines have a hitherto unsuspected TWO different stops at the Station.
Depending on where you catch the bus, you will end up in VERY different locations.
Take for example, B-7. Which we should remember is already running at half the service hours and closes early on the nefarious "sunday schedule"
If one catches the B-7 on the west side of the station, one goes to San Marco and then onto Baymeadows.
If, for example, one naturally caught the selfsame bus at the same 'bay' where one has been dropped off on 6 prior occasions, one would end up on the extreme northwest corner of Jacksonville, gazing westward to Los Angeles and points unknown.
There is nothing resembling a users guide that alerts one to this vitally important information at the station. Apparently one is expected to learn by experience. A trial by fire, a coming of age story of sorts. An asinine initiation designed to scare away the mild of manner and delicate of timeliness.
This is exactly what your humble servant has now passed through.
I feel like I have crossed the equator in the US Navy now for the first time.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Line-crossing_ceremony, The rest of you pollywogs will get yours soon enough.
Since of course, every bus drives endlessly around downtown in various directions before launching on its actual voyage, it is impossible for a neophyte to ascertain the mistake until its well and jolly too late to correct it.
So I found myself at worlds end on Commonwealth rather than at Uncommon Grounds (free wifi, drinkable unburnt coffee, awesome local entreprenuer).
The driver who shall remain nameless (and i suspect faceless in as yet undreamt nightmares) then launched on a thirty minute monologue regarding the obvious colorcoding of the various stops and the innate stupidity of not having a priori knowledge of their significance.
While I appreciated the wildly detailed nature of his explanations, the inherent blame that was the gist of his schooling was enthusiastically NOT appreciated.
As though sent by a personal diety to pay my ass back for undiscovered sins, the busdriver then launched into an unprovoked diatribe against the very idea that one day, Rail might replace the utter confused bedlam of the 'sunday schedule'.
The screed lasted all through the northwest quadrant, passed into the heart of downtown and finally ended on the steps of San Marco.
One thing though. The northwest quadrant is a very naturally beautiful side of town. So many majestic oaks that it reminds one of the better days of Mandarin.
Color me unimpressed with "Sunday Service". It now sounds like an especially dirty trick practiced in one of the more vicious order of bordellos.
JTA. seriously. WTF are you people thinking.
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