Yesterday I went to the alternative car expo at Santa Monica airport. It was well worth the trip out there. I rode the motorcycle because I know that on a sunday in L.A. seven million people may be trying to drive from one side of town to the other. That's simply not a net I wish to be caught in. The bike can always be manuevered out of the worst traffic. Nevertheless I've long felt that the transportation activism crowd is down on motorcycles. Perhaps because bikes are often loud and ostentatious. You could add to that: too fast and foul-smelling, too macho. Too guido. Bad boy.

It may be worth noting that the electric car expo had no alternatively-powered motorcycles on disply. There were scooters and electric bikes, but no motorcycles. Forvere eternal combustion, VARROOOOMM.

Electric cars are great. I find that in the present time they make the most sense as little city fleet trucks. I got that imprsession from the vehicles which were on display. There were one or two companies which had cool little trucks. There was a stakebed rancher model, and a utility body with diamond -plated boxes built on the bed for plumber tools or such. Great vehicle for an anarhcist collective. But don't go too far out of town!

After walking around the airplane hangar for 15 minutes or so, I finally get to a table occupied by rapid transit advocates. Four guys sitting there had lietrature promoting the completion of LA 's subway line to the beach; The Exposition Line. (I decided to try my kung fu on them). I've had ideas brewing on LA rail for awhile. I mean a long while. I had a feeling it would be easy to get the guys lit up, so I was as self deprecating as could be. But I started criticizing the proposed line they support. It's too many stops I say. It will take forever. LA needs a system like the RER in Paris. An expanded metro which can attain relatively high speeds out to the far-flung banlieus and prefectures. And like the RER in Paris it can run inderneath existing subway lines, or on aerial structures, or surface tracks. In the case of rail lines criss-crossing Los Angeles, the stops should not be LESS than three or four miles apart. And then communities can develop smaller neigborhood rail systems. Such as the Griffith Park an Silverlake Railroad which I'm proposing for my neighborhood.

The guys at the LA transit advocacy table were not hearing a word of what i was saying. What was I to expect. they've already got their consensus. A little tincan fucking subway clickety-clacking making a million stops on the milk run. It would get you ou to Venice and Snata Monica eventually. After all the good times were gone. Enjoyed by the car drivers.

All the ideas I put out on mass transit and trains seem far-fetched, but California should be able to do this stuff. Or at least put money aside for it. Every ten years another little subway line is built. But they are not part of any larger scheme from what I can tell.