1:02: I’m on the Rapid Ride going from Downtown to West Seattle. It smells like a new car, but stronger. I’ve smelled worse smells on the bus. I’m still downtown and so far it feels pretty much like any other ride. Maybe it’s because the Orca Card reader at my stop wasn’t up yet. Maybe it’s because the display for how many more minutes there are to go wasn’t up yet. In any event, I’m using the bus’s WiFi, so here goes.
1:05: All the doors open, although, as I say, the card reader wasn’t working yet, so it doesn’t feel like that’s an advantage.
1:06: And I’ve had my first random dude speaking to the driver through the light. Fuck you that guy.
1:11: I just typed something about how we’re on the Viaduct now, and got an error message. Lovely. Switching to ClearWire.
1:15: The views on the Viaduct and the West Seattle Bridge are quite nice. When it’s a Saturday, this is quite Rapid for real. Of course the real test will be Rush Hour on Monday and beyond.
1:19: First stop in West Seattle. I didn’t take the 54 enough to compare, but it feels better than the circuitous route it used to be.
1:24: The junction. 22 minutes feels about the same as before, maybe a bit quicker.
1:27: The person next to me says I shouldn’t use my wireless, because it’s really fast on the bus. I told him I got an error earlier, and he didn’t believe it. I don’t have to justify my WiFi device to you, random guy.
1:30: Morgan Junction.
1:31: I realized I’ve got used to the smell of the bus. Usually when it smells of homeless person piss, that’s something you can be thankful and maybe a bit worried about. With new bus small, I guess the same.
1:36: Ferry terminal. Whenever I go to Vashon via the bus, it feels like a crapshoot as to if the bus and the boat are well timed. With more frequent bus trips, I imagine it’ll feel like a crapshoot with better odds.
1:41: Westwood village. So fine route, but it doesn’t feel like that much of an improvement over the old. People who take it more often than I do will probably have a better sense of it.
Um… I’ve ridden my bicycle from Easy Street on California to Pike Place Market many, many, times, and on a bad day I’m still faster than 49 minutes. They should change the name to slower than a bicycle ride.
@1
Nevermind. I miss read the post. Carl’s going further than I originally thought.
@1 & 2, Also, I should have been more clear that I caught it at 3rd and Bell, so North of Pike Place. It was certainly faster than biking, at least for me who isn’t particularly speedy. But so was the 54.