By GABRIELLA BOCK | Reporter
On Sunday, Sept. 3, Tiffany Hu was driving to her home in upper Marquez Knolls when she spotted a woman struggling to walk up one of the neighborhood’s steepest streets.
It was still early in the day, but by 8:30 a.m., the temperature had already reached a sweltering 90 degrees.
Hu, worried that the woman might fall over from heat exhaustion, pulled over and offered a ride to the stranger, who she later learned was a housekeeper for a family nearby.
And this wasn’t the first time that Hu had given a ride to a neighborhood housekeeper.
“In the past, probably more times than I can count, I have offered several housekeepers rides to their destination,” Hu told the Palisadian-Post. “They get off their bus on Sunset and walk, sometimes over a mile, to their employer’s home.”
In an effort to bring attention to the issue, Hu took to the social media site Nextdoor to encourage others to pick up their housekeepers if they travel to Pacific Palisades by bus.
“If you’re too busy, there’s always Uber,” she wrote.
Other neighbors chimed in and offered appreciation, some even suggesting that the community look into asking the city to restore the former LA Department of Transportation shuttle known as the DASH Bus—or, at the very least, something like it.
A reliable transportation source among area metro riders, funding for the Palisades’ DASH Bus was cut in 2010 after LA City Council voted to shut down the area line as a way to tackle a growing city deficit and because “only housekeepers and kids were using it.”
But now, with Rick Caruso’s incoming Palisades Village positioned to open in August 2018, the community’s demand for the DASH could attract LA City Council into revisiting the route.
Or, as other residents, such as Lou Kamer, proposed, a town shuttle to run from The Village into Marquez Knolls and the Highlands—a program that would need to be met with widespread community support as it could include an annual resident fee of $250 or more per household.
In other communities, such as in the town of Acton, Massachusetts, the Massachusetts Department of Transportation answered residents’ call for a community shuttle with a $1 fare, “dial-a-ride” shuttle service where travelers can phone in and schedule a pick up. The service runs from 8-11 a.m. and 12:15-6:15 p.m. Monday through Friday to accommodate regular business hours.
It’s a potential solution for our seniors and housekeepers, but such a program would fail to cater to patrons seeking a safe ride home following an evening of wining and dining in the Palisades Village.
Perhaps Caruso will be the first real estate developer to offer an electric shuttle system for his consumers (such as the one Google and Motiv Power Systems are currently testing in Mountain View), some residents have wistfully suggested, however unlikely.
Until then, “there’s always Uber.”
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