[img]2014|right|Steve Rose||no_popup[/img]Hardly anyone in the community has a more accurate reading of Culver City’s pulse than Steve Rose, longtime president of the Chamber of Commerce and two-term former City Councilman.
He told the City Council that the Chamber’s concern was that the shuttle scheme “is being planned backward.”
In businessman mode, Mr. Rose said the city was plunging into unknown, expensive and deep waters without having explored precise costs and without having conducted any outreach into the Hayden Tract heavily tech work environment to gain even a remote understanding of the potential ridership.
City Manager John Nachbar would say later that it would be a huge challenge to transition smoothly from a nine-month pilot program to a fulltime undertaking.
After watching an hour’s worth of dialogue last evening over the fate of the supposedly innovative shuttle from the Hayden Tract and Expo light rail station into Downtown, Mr. Rose, who always thinks like a businessman, pronounced the shuttle’s future as a “longshot.”
A bike-sharing plan may be a better bet.
Shaky, uncertain financing, and a vague need to transport a minimum of 140 passengers an hour between 11 and 3 o’clock from a pool of 3,000 workers in the non-traditional Hayden Tract business environment are only the opening reasons for Mr. Rose’s grim assessment.
“Let me explain,” he said. “The Historical Society had an event Saturday at the California Club, two blocks from the light rail.
“I saw two guests walking it. Two blocks is not that far. I do not understand the shuttle’s usage in Culver City from our light rail station to Downtown. I understand it more from the Hayden Tract.
“I believe that bicycles may be a better alternative.
“If you look at Higuera Street (in the Hayden Tract) as the spine, take Higuera to Lucerne, take Lucerne west to Van Buren, Lafayette or Irving to Downtown.”
