Bus riders should be the priority

6/28/2010

During my several years of riding Toledo Area Regional Transit Authority buses, it seems as though customer service has gotten continuously worse. We have had some outstanding drivers, but most drivers act as if passengers are a major inconvenience.

Recently, I've heard rude remarks directed at passengers. Drivers ignore requests for stops and only stop where they choose. But my biggest pet peeve is when buses arrive at a stop too early. Since there are a limited number of buses, I have told drivers that they cannot come early because there are no later buses riders can take. I was met with rudeness.

I have complained to TARTA, but nothing ever is resolved. And when I try to contact dispatch when a bus doesn't show up to see if I need to drive or catch another bus, I get an ignorant response when I just need to know whether the bus is on its way or has broken down.

Through the years, I have tried to convince my family and friends to ride TARTA buses to save money and because friendships can be formed while riding buses. I can no longer recommend TARTA, nor will I vote for any levy for TARTA, until it can make customer service a priority again.

Teri Clement

Holland

I thought part of the job of Toledo Area Regional Paratransit Service drivers was to assist clients. On June 17, I watched as a lady in her wheelchair fought to get into her building as the TARPS driver played with his lift. It would had taken seconds for him to open the first door of her building to help her get inside. Instead, I and two wheelchair clients helped her into the building.

I also am a driver for an ambulette service. If you are paid to assist, go all the way.

D. Hutchen

Yates Street

The Center for Science in the Public Interest took it upon itself to say that McDonald's is breaking the law by giving away a colorful, usually movie-promoting toy in its Happy Meals. What is the CSPI? I did not vote for its members, yet it seems to think it knows what is best for Americans. It says that McDonald's is illegally using the toy to market to children.

Why stop at McDonald's? Let's go after Burger King, Wendy's, and Arby's too. Then they can turn their sights to Kellogg's, Post, and companies that have been marketing to children for years by promoting programming and the promise of a cool prize in the box. Then go after all of the companies that make juice drinks that may contain 10 percent actual juice. They sell colored sugar water and call it fruit. At least the Kool-Aid guy never pretended it was juice.

Perhaps a better solution would be for CSPI to direct its efforts to educate children and their parents about better nutrition and warn them of the dangers of eating too many high-fat, nutrient-low foods. Children do not drive to McDonald's to purchase the Happy Meal with their own money.

Of course, education, rather than litigation, would not get the sort of media coverage that CSPI wants. This is still America, and McDonald's should have the right to promote products any legal way it sees fit.

Andy Duplay

Monclova Township

I had the privilege of working at St. Luke's Hospital for many years and I felt honored to be a part of its family of caregivers. Six years after retiring, when I needed care, my family took me to St. Luke's. I met so many new angels and many old and dear friends who made me feel as if I was in heaven being cared for by true angels.

I believe St. Luke's Hospital is the best care center in the area. I know they brought me back from a terrible illness with professionalism, great care, and much love. Praise God for the angels who care for patients at St. Luke's Hospital, and also for friends and family.

Carol Schaupert

Holland

Doesn't the Ohio Department of Natural Resources Division of Wildlife have anything better to do than to investigate Toledo Police Sgt. Mark Fry for saving a newborn fawn (“Officer rescues fawn, but ends up in trouble,” June 5)? Sergeant Fry and his wife should be commended for doing what was right. The ODNR will open a firestorm if they don't back off.

Bud McLaughlin

Holland

It's unbelievable that Lucas County Commissioner Tina Skeldon Wozniak has time to worry about Arizona and to make a resolution on behalf of the county and its residents to attack Arizona. Don't we elect these people to take care of business right here in this county?

As a Lucas County resident, she does not speak for me. In fact, I doubt that she knows much about Arizona and its laws.

I lived in Arizona for 40 years and moved back to my hometown partly because of what is going on in Arizona. Arizona couldn't care less about your petty resolutions.

Barbara Meyers

Heathervalley Place

The last time America faced a convulsion as profound as the current one about oil was in the 1850s at the time of slavery and westward expansion.

Today, our ramped-up living arrangement has no future, just as slavery had no future. We are uncomfortable with the mandates of reality, which tell us we have to live differently. Americans don't want to hear this. Leadership from President Obama and others is absent.

Our extreme oil dependency is a fundamental car-dependency problem. The mandates of reality should get trains running. Tell General Motors to get into the business of making railroad cars so we don't have to import them from Canada.

Reality is telling us to downscale fast, but we have no intention of doing that. There is no techno-miracle in alternative fuel. Oil has no substitute. No research and development program can make it happen.

I admit that contraction is a hard reality. The inability to face comprehensive contraction will only ensure that its side effects will be debilitating.

Fred Kutz

Genesee Street

In response to a Readers' Forum writer, I was stopped several times by Ottawa Hills police for going 27 or 28 mph in a 25 mph zone (“Village cops stop black motorists,” letter, June 10). The officers were polite. I am white, so my being stopped had nothing to do with color.

R. Schad

Violet Road

Many who live in Ottawa Hills are tired of your negative editorials regarding our police force (“Flagrant lack of respect,” June 24). There have been many diverse nationalities in my home and none has ever had a problem with the Ottawa Hills police.

People make problems when they disobey the law. It's a sign of the times when parents refuse to set rules for their children, teachers struggle with students who refuse to obey the rules, and police are left to struggle with the lack of respect and honor for the laws.

These police have always been of utmost assistance to me and my family. It is because of them that I can sleep at night.

This is not a community of just rich, white folks. There are people of all economic levels and all nationalities living here.

Jane H. Switzer

Ottawa Hills