Tag: marta

Close enough IT’S MARTA

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

I did predict that something else was going to happen: water main erupts on Roswell Road, causing a massive sinkhole, causing debilitating traffic to Roswell residents attempting to commute into Sandy Springs or Atlanta

The incident occurred mere miles away from the North Springs MARTA station, the current end of the Red line.  This does not do any favors to any Roswell, Alpharetta or further northern communities, as they still will have to slog down GA-400 in order to take MARTA.

SO CONSIDER THIS TOO A MESSAGE, north Fulton/Milton whatever you WASPy NIMBYs want to call yourselves way the fuck up north.  Cobb county got their message a little while ago, now it’s time for the white suburbs way up north to get their message too, that perhaps some extended MARTA service up to their communities might not be such a bad idea.  I mean, the proposal for the Red line to go all the way up to Windward Parkway is nothing new, but shit like this, like seeing Roswell Rd. go down is just what the people might need to see in order to be reminded of just how beneficial it could be to have an alternate means available to them, and to perhaps stop dragging feet in rolling this out, so that things like this can be alleviated in the future.

Continue reading “Close enough IT’S MARTA” →

MARTA STRIKES AGAIN

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

This one was to send a message: “Suspicious package” near the Howell Mill Road exit leads to shutdown of I-75 southbound during the heart of the morning rush hour.  There is no MARTA alternative route coming from this direction.

This one’s for you, Cobb County.  For those of you who aren’t necessarily savvy to Atlanta county-isms, despite the fact that it would make more sense than peanut butter and jelly, Cobb County absolutely refuses to allow MARTA into its hallowed county lines.  To the point where MARTA rail almost patronizingly skates on the county line as it goes all the way up into the northern part of Fulton County.

Don’t believe anything else you may or may not care to inquire about why Cobb refuses MARTA, and just know that it has entirely everything to do with the simple fact that Cobb County does not want black people to have rail access into their sacred communities.  Because nothing is more synonymous with scary, scary colored people and their definitive crime that they will in fact bring, than rail access.

Continue reading “MARTA STRIKES AGAIN” →

IT’S MARTA HERE TOO

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Alternate route: take MARTA to Midtown or North Avenue stops to avoid sinkhole that has shut down two city blocks worth of Fifth Street

MARTA STRIKES AGAIN (alleged conspiracy theory)!!  Destroying highways wasn’t enough for Keith Parker, now he’s employing the route of sabotaging local roads, playing the card of griefing the locals and their surface streets, with hopes of getting them to use more MARTA as well.

This is actually a great litmus test, to truly compare the infrastructure of an American city compared to a place like Japan, because despite the obvious answer, I get that there is a little bit of unfairness in comparing the repair of a suspension bridge like I-85 isn’t the same comparison as repairing a block-sized sinkhole in Fukuoka.

The question now is how fast can Atlanta repair a sinkhole the size of a Little Caesar’s pizza?  Fukuoka fixed one the size of a regional airport in a week, but I’m going to have to assume Atlanta won’t get theirs fixed in remotely close to a week, and might just need a few million dollars of incentive to drive workers to actually do their job, and maybe by June, Fifth Street will be open again.

Anyone want to take bets on the speed in which it’ll get fixed?  Fuckin’ MARTA.

Their URL says it all

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

ITSMARTA(.com)!!!!!!

You heard it here first.  MARTA is behind all of this shit.  The collapse of I-85.  The chemical spill that crippled the Connector.  The seismic buckling of I-20.  It’s MARTA!

Coincidentally, MARTA riders would avoid the entirety of the chemical spill, as well as the smoldering remains of I-85.  Coincidentally anyone traveling westbound of I-20 would avoid the giant fisting the road decided to give motorists, if they rode MARTA from Indian Creek station into the city instead of driving. 

It just seems a little too coincidental that all these highway maladies are occurring in areas where MARTA would make too much of a logical alternative.

Keith Parker is a diabolical son of a bitch, but this guy right here is one step ahead of you at seeing through your transparent guerilla methods of trying to force increased ridership.  Apps, slogans and “riding with respect” only got so much faith back into MARTA, but once he hit the wall, he’s been forced to bring out the big guns.  Literally, by destroying strategic parts of the Metro Atlanta highway system, and then conveniently waiting in the wings to provide this alternative means of transportation, behind his friendly demeanor and sharply dressed image.

Continue reading “Their URL says it all” →

So about all that increased ridership

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Sometimes, nature just takes care of itself: an apparent premeditated gun attack at the West Lake MARTA station results in one dead, several others injured

Yeah, about that thought that maybe MARTA planned the destrucity of I-85 in order to spike its ridership… such may have been the case, but much like using a cheat code Battletoads, sometimes the royal they know that something is amiss, and actions are taken to bring light to it.  MARTA destroys I-85 in order to increase their ridership, and then violence occurs on the trains to take the status quo back to zero; or at least that’s what the point of this whole post is about.

Surely, nothing is going to scare people back away from MARTA than good old fashioned gun violence.  Completely negating the efforts by MARTA to increase their ridership by destroying I-85.  But compared to the risk of getting hit by, stray bullets, I think commuters just might prefer setting in stand-still traffic for hours on end; at least in the confines of your own car, the chances of getting shot are less than being crammed shoulder to shoulder inside of a train car with no automotive skin to shield you from gunfire.

Continue reading “So about all that increased ridership” →

IT WAS A MARTA ALL ALONG

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Conspiracy theory alert*: A crackhead was blamed, crooked bureaucrats’ public waste was the fuel, but MARTA lit the match

*this post is tongue-in-cheek (partially), as if I really have to explain myself

One of the snarky observations I made when I heard that the repair of I-85 was going to take until like Thanksgiving, was who stands to benefit the most from this?  And I don’t think I’m entirely wrong with thinking that, because as most Americans know, little is done in the United States for free, regardless of the circumstances behind them, and as accidental as the burning and collapse of I-85 was, someone(s) will undoubtedly walk away from the scenario richer than they started.

From the onset, I would’ve suspected that part of the delay of repairing I-85 would be the extensive time it took for bureaucrats and talking heads to debate, broker and spin deals with crony companies to contract out the labor work for the bridge repair, to see how many people could pad their pockets as much as possible, before any work was actually planned much less executed.  Naturally, these involved parties would the ones who would somehow take a disaster and turn it into a money-making endeavor, regardless of how miserable it’s making citizens and travelers with each passing day with a giant hole in I-85.

Continue reading “IT WAS A MARTA ALL ALONG” →

lol Curbed hipsters

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Occasionally, I like reading Curbed.  Sure, the writing is a little biased, the commenters are amongst the most pretentious on the planet, but sometimes, it’s a nice way to see other neighborhoods and parts of town that I might not be so aware of.  At the end of each year, Curbed does this thing called The Curbed Cup, and they like to poll readers to determine, what the best neighborhood in the region is.

Previous winners in Atlanta aren’t any real surprises; Inman Park, Old Fourth Ward, Kirkwood, Reynoldstown; these are areas rife with pretty successful gentrification and are appropriately densely packed with hipsters, new money, and hipsters with new money.  Last year’s winner was a little bit of a head-scratcher; the West End, which to anyone who isn’t familiar with the area, it’s basically the region of town that is literally on the other side of the tracks, that is full of blight, crime, unoccupied and dilapidated homes and more crime.

There’s no denying that the potential of the West End is grandiose if it could ever actually be successfully cleaned, reset, and developed appropriately, as it sits on a lot of prime real estate that the burgeoning Atlanta real estate market would salivate over, if it were remotely usable.

But anointing it as the best Atlanta neighborhood of 2015 was quite the head-scratcher, and I would wager money that bloggers and snarky internet commenters could write essays on how great the West End is in their opinion, but they wouldn’t be able to say NO fast enough, if they were asked if they would actually live there.

That’s the kind of place the West End really is.

Continue reading “lol Curbed hipsters” →