MARTAgeddon

Continuing with our series on words you need to know, let's examine MARTAgeddon.

[mar-tuh-ged-n]

–noun

1. the place where the final battle will be fought between the forces of good and evil (probably so called in reference to the battlefield of the Gold Dome. Revelations HB 12:18).

2. the last and completely destructive battle: The legislative race can lead to MARTAgeddon.

3. a decisive or catastrophic conflict.

[Late Latin MARTAgedōn, from Greek, from Hebrew MAR TA məgiddô, the urban region of Georgia : MAR, Metropolitan Atlanta; see hrr in Semitic roots + məgiddô, legislative fuckery.]

Synonyms: annihilation, decimation, devastation, catastrophe, end of the world, MARTOCalypse

Politicians and MARTA

In the name of advocacy, I'm going to start a new thread of MARTA who's who down in the capital, where I will introduce the folks who either screw things up or advocate for us, and how we can try to make a difference.

To start us off, let's go with our friend, Rep. Jill Chambers, who heads the MARTOC committee.  First, what the heck is MARTOC?  Cause when I hear that one, I'm inclined to think of a caveman.  (Come on, picture it with me here, folks.  Geico dude, stomping around with his club, points to himself 'Me MARTOC!').  (Now quit giggling).

MARTOC, as I was told, stands for MARTA Oversight Committee.  They basically just left off that last A, so it's the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Oversight Committee and it's a relic left over from the days when MARTA was chartered.  The state legislature at that time wanted to maintain some sense of control over MARTA, but since they don't control the purse strings (i.e. give state funds to MARTA), MARTOC simply creates some hoops that the MARTA board has to jump through.  I'm not sure that they can actually *do* anything to MARTA.  MARTOC is a joint committee made up of both house and senate representatives and it does not handle legislation nor does it have a vote on the MARTA board (blame your GA Legislative website for that double negative).  They just get to see the budget.  But someone sure seems to think they can.

Enter Republican Rep. Jill Chambers, who currently chairs MARTOC.  Jill comes to us from District 81 in North Dekalb County, which encompasses Doraville and Chamblee (The Yellow line!).  We're not her biggest fans here at the TMiATL land.  She likes giving MARTA a little too hard of a time, and rather unfairly.  Last year when MARTA announced plans to hire a new lobbyist Rep. Chambers threatened the board that she would "have their seats" if they approved this new contract.  Honey, maybe if you supported MARTA they wouldn't need to hire lobbyists.

Actually, Jill was one of the gang that killed SB 120 last year.  See, the Republicans in the House would only let the bill to relieve MARTA of that 50/50 restriction if the Democrats would support their property tax freeze.  The Dems refused and the Republicans stalled SB 120 at the last minute, so that the 2009 legislative session ended without a change.  Rep. Chambers was one of the few who really worked towards that campaign.

To add to her list of transgressions, she cut off Senator Stoner's mic in a meeting!  I mean really, a fellow legislator?  (I will talk about Stoner later, whom I personally adore).  She is known for constantly bullying and berating MARTA, the board, and CEO Dr. Scott and has hunted for discrepencies and corruption to fuel her fire and found none.  Rep. Chambers was also quoted as saying something along the lines that MARTA keeps crying financial woes but hasn't gone under yet.  Lady, did you notice the ARC bail out for MARTA?  That had no effect, right?  And all the other transit systems in the nation are just peachy, too, right WMATA?

I don't like negative people.  I think my problem with Rep. Chambers is that rather than be proactive and be part of the solution, she just adds to the problem.  She could help MARTA secure funds rather than waste their time dealing with her. But running against Rep. Chambers this year is a young and upcoming politician, Elena Parent.  She's from Virginia, I might add, and we all know how awesome things from Virginia are (play nice!)  Elena has made strides in her fundraising and is proving to be someone we should watch.  And, she's just a nice person to know, and someone who's pro transit.

The MARTA Pub Crawl

In one word, EPIC.  Last Saturday I, in conjunction with the Club, hosted a MARTA pub crawl.  If I was cool, I would have posted it on the blog so you reader types could join us, but I'm not.  Enough said.

We started at Avondale and hopped on the train to Twain's in Decatur, where we had dinner.  Then we hopped on bus number 2 down Ponce to Engine 11.  We spent so much time at Twain's that we had to cut the Highlands out, but all in all, it was a blast.  I may have to do this in May for my birthday.

 

MARTA matters!  And we show our support by getting our butts on the bus!  :p

Cell Phones and Breeze Cards

Last week was an adventure as always, I tell ya what.  First off, I loose my cell on the 10b outbound.  Lucky for me, one thing CCT does do well is lost and found.  I got off the 10b at Arts Center Wednesday night and my phone must have fallen out of my coat pocket.  Sure enough, when I went to get it, there was no phone.  I waited until the next morning, called CCT, and inquired about the phone (at that point, I wasn't sure where I'd lost the darned thing) and they had it.  Either the driver or someone at the bus yard had found it and was so awesome they immediately turned it in.  CCT, you get a brownie point.

But then, on Thursday, after leaving the Gold Dome, I got to the Peachtree and my Breeze card was DOA.  And I mean DEAD.  When I scanned it, I got nothing.  No X, no beep, no reject, nothing.  The station agent, who wasn't about to take his time figuring it out, just let me go through.  I had a meeting, so I went on to the Sierra Club office and texted One, who I shamelessly go to with all my transit problems and questions (get attacked at Five Points?  Call One, even though he's in Boston.  Stranded by the bus in Cobb?  Call One!)  He said something about the antenna in my card breaking.  Huh?  I decided that the @$$holes under the Gold Dome ruthlessly hated MARTA so much the vibe killed my card.

I think I'm right.

So Friday I went to a RideStore to get the sucka fixed.  As I'm waiting in line, a station agent walked up and asked what he could help me with.  I told him my Breeze Card died.  Of course, he asks me if I broke it.  I hand him my card, he inspects it, and of course, nothing's wrong with it.  He asked me what he was going to get if it worked.  As I thought about it, all I could think was, doesn't matter, I know it's not going to work.  I'm a newbie, but not an idiot.  I know how to work a Breeze card (on the other hand, one of my favorite stories is the time some dummy tapped One with her card cause he told her to tap it.  I guess you need to be specific, cause that big ole circle with BREEZE on it isn't explicit enough).  So I offered up a hug, cause that seemed safe on the off chance my Breeze Card betrayed me.  We walked over there, he tapped, and sure enough, dead.  He might have just stuck his hand up there.

I gave him his hug anyways and went to get a new card.  Twenty minutes later the rude woman handed me my new card back and I was a happy camper.  I needed that for the pub crawl!  As I left, the station agent asked if, "He treated me well?"  I suppose he treats me well, assuming MARTA would let him out of his cage every once in a while.  That, however, was not my response, which was simply, "Yes."

Homeboy said: "Well, you know I was gonna have to ask for your number if you said no."

Yay for new Breeze cards and getting hit on!

MARTA needs pets, or mascots, or something!

Most of the time I like to use WMATA as an example of how awesome MARTA is.  I mean, we haven't killed anyone this year.  However, WMATA has one-upped us this time, and I'm sorta jealous. 

WMATA has pets!

MARTA Community Forums

Both JV from That's MARTA and I attended the community forum this past weekend at the MARTA headquarters.  It gave me a wicked headache, infuriated me, and pretty much disillusioned me.  The people who attended aren't the best representatives of the MARTA riding population.  They were rude, aggressive towards the MARTA employees, and at times, just plain stupid. 

Therefore, I'm going to leave it to JV to tell y'all all about.  She paid better attention than I did, anways.

Notes on the Afternoon Forum

Alright, catch-up time!

So a lot has been going on, and I need to buckle down and write about it.  I'm not sure why I need to tell y'all, but hey, I'm gonna.  The first topic up: legisltative breakfasts.  Last week I attended two.

Last Tuesday was the legislative breakfast held by the Georgia League of Conservation Voters, at the Blue Room in the Freight Depot.  I was there representing the Sierra Club, of course.  There were three speakers, all of whom I adore, April to discuss water conservation, Joe to tell us about interbasin water transfers, and Lee to press on us the transit issue.  I was lucky that I sat with Senator Doug Stoner, a transit advocate, my former rep, and the author of SB120.  Highlights of the breakfast: April telling me that she reads the blog (hi April!) and getting to talk to Sen. Stoner about the likelihood of SPLOSTs passing.  While most folks were concerned about Dekalb and Fulton going along with potentially passing additional taxes on themselves, I'm more concerned with Cobb passing the SPLOST, which is where Sen. Stoner hails from.  Let's face it, Cobb has the only economically viable transit system in the state, which this year created new routes and bought buses, while other transit systems are facing cuts.  Why would they buy into a tax to support MARTA?  Sen. Stoner said that Cobb would love to give up the responsibility of having it's own transit system and join in with a larger one, which helped calm my fears some.  I guess Cobb is too stuck up to be proud of their own transit system.

Thursday was the Transit Lobby Day, starting off with a breakfast at the Freight Depot.  The Sierra Club purchased a table there, along with some other environmental groups.  After breakfast we went to the Gold Dome to talk to our reps - that was a total fail.  The place was a zoo with all the folks, most of them from ACT, trying to get in touch with their legislators.  Hardly anyone actually got to speak with any elected official, it was such a zoo.  It makes me think that being there on your own is more effective.  But don't head down to the capitol for a couple of weeks, they're in recess to save money?

Here are some photos of the day:

 

A southbound MARTA train as viewed from the Freight Depot.

 

The bus display.  Supposedly this was so the legislators could ride a bus in a safe, un-intimdating environment.  Too bad only 7 legislators attended the breakfast.

 

The mad house of the Gold Dome - all these people are waiting to talk to their representatives.

 

More chaos.

All I have to say is WOW

Weekly Transit Photos

I have a lot to catch up on, blogs about my two days at the capitol, one being transit lobby day, and the general craziness of my commute, i.e. leaving my cell on the bus and my breeze card dying.  Epic.  But until then, here are your transit photos of the week!

 

Working on the escalator at Peachtree.  Woot! 

  

Someone needed some extra help trying to get from Avondale to the Airport, apparently.  The MATRA map is hard to figure out.

Dude, you're eating an ice cream cone on the train.  A: Gross.  B:  That's a huge cone, and boy does he look excited.

 

I wanna know what the heck in on that dolly, all covered up in trash bags.

No Streetcar :(

Sadly, Atlanta did not receive any federal funding for the streetcar.  In fact, it looks like Georgia won't be receiving any of the stimulus funds available, not Gwinnett to redo some parts of 85, Cobb to move the CTC, or Savannah to widen its port.  Is this a slap in the face for Georgia?  Are the feds trying to encourage us to get our butts in line, because, let's face it, why would they put $300 million into a project to be maintained by an agency that may soon shut its doors three days a week?