The bus line was created after a commission appointed by then-Gov.
Jones, who grew up in Alabama, urged everyone to try her Southern fried chicken. “Hey, everyone, I brought doughnuts!” cried Bertrand Ford, a 68-year-old caddy at the Riviera Country Club in Pacific Palisades and the lone man of the group, showing off a store-bought box. The housekeeper from Belize unwrapped a tray of Belizean stewed chicken. The nanny from El Salvador brought steaming heaps of homemade tamales. But the mood on Friday was resignation about the loss and celebration of the longtime friendships that sweetened their early-morning journeys to work and weary rides home. “They should be making it easier for us, as opposed to making it harder.”Ī few passengers had protested the route closure at MTA hearings. “All these people have been working for so many years,” said Flowers, as she handed out napkins to riders eager to start the feast. After the route cuts, she will have to make two additional transfers, resulting in a stop-and-go trip that she believes will add more than half an hour to her commute. Sherelie Flowers, a 26-year-old housekeeper considered to be the “baby” in a group mostly middle-aged or older, said she takes two buses to travel from her South-Central home to her housecleaning job in Sherman Oaks. To help riders adjust, bilingual MTA employees have been boarding the bus in the last few weeks to explain the replacement lines and schedules.īut some riders complain the transfers will be inconvenient and take more time. But sometimes the bus rumbles with just two or three riders onboard across the sprawling city, from the auto repair shops of Vernon Avenue to the ocean’s edge on Pacific Coast Highway.īecause the entire route is served by other Metro buses, riders will be able to get to their destinations with transfers, MTA officials say. On an unusually good day, it might have 25 or 30 passengers at a time. The Monday-to-Friday bus route - which used to be packed with riders - now only carries about 225 people total over its five round-trips daily, and its hourly ridership is less than half of that of other buses, according to the MTA. We have to be as efficient as we can be.” The last day of service is next Friday. “But the ridership on that line is heavily subsidized, and there’s so much duplicate service. It’s the Nanny Express,” said Marc Littman, spokesman for the MTA. As the engine idled, people formed a line down the aisle and along the metal poles and heaped their paper plates with food.
#The nanny express driver
When the chugging motion made it difficult to serve food or pour sparkling cider, the driver briefly pulled over to the side of La Cienega Boulevard. They brought trays of food befitting their membership in the United Nations of Los Angeles and turned the bus into a rolling clubhouse. They celebrated birthdays and Christmas and collected money for those going through hard times.Īnd on the run that began at 7:52 Friday morning, 15 women and one man stepped onboard from street corners and bus benches along Vernon and Western avenues to share Christmas one last time.
Over the miles and through the years, the riders gossiped, shared jokes and became tight friends. and the lush Westside communities of Beverly Hills, Bel-Air and Pacific Palisades. The current two-hour route zigzags 23 miles between gritty neighborhoods in South L.A. We’re going to really all miss it.”īorn in 1968 out of the Watts riots’ ashes to improve access to jobs, the line ferried maids, cooks, butlers and others like Jones across the economic and geographic divides of Los Angeles. “We’ve had some good times, mmm-mm, good times,” Jones said as riders toasted and hugged one another on Friday, a few eyes moist with tears.
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