[Mpls] March 17th- No Buses?

[WizardMarks]

Peter Bell told the Strib today: "If I were a betting man I'd bet there 
will be a strike." Well, duh! When you deliberately engineer a strike, 
then a strike happens, you've already placed your bets and hit the 
starting gate bell.
When the Thursday morning rush hour begins and who knows how many cars 
will fight to get to places of employment, then the ca-ca begins to 
gravitate toward the whirling blades. Peter Bell is also betting that 
the population will get angry with the drivers and take out their anger 
on them. The thing to do to counter that would be to place many calls to 
Peter Bell, the gov., and Molnau vis-a-vis mass transit. Place calls to 
county and city officials as well.
He can drive ATU 1005 into the ground, hire scab drivers, train and pay 
them for weeks, but he'll still have to suffer through over 825 rookies 
on route simultaneously (and so will we). There will be a great big bell 
curve in accidents, from fender benders to very serious, there will be 
buses late and early, but less often on time. If it goes down to 20 
below again with commensurate wind chill. If there's a layer of cloud, 
the exhausts and particulates will fill the cities--especially downtowns 
on Fridays.
This is a very calculated--and very stupid move (unless, of course, the 
point is to break unions). Nobody wins when it's either transit workers 
or waste haulers who strike.

WizardMarks, Central

Sean Ryan wrote:

> If the bus strike occurs before or during St. Patrick's Day, what will 
> be the conditions on the unofficial drinking holiday of the year? I 
> know many (including myself) depend on the bus as a safe and sober 
> driver going to and from downtown Minneapolis. The free buses on March 
> 17th have been a wonderful alternative to cab rides or getting behind 
> the wheel and have probably saved the city much money in court time 
> and repairs as a result of inebriated persons getting behind behind 
> the wheel (not to mention peoples' lives).
>
> I know for a fact that the Minneapolis (and metro) cab systems are too 
> small for our metro area. A 2-3 hour wait for cabs on a busy weekend 
> is just to long. Have you ever tried to hail a cab downtown? Either 
> they ignore you or they are too busy making conversation on 7th street 
> to take notice.
>
> Let's hope this gets resolved quickly.
>
> Sean Ryan
> Audubon
>
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