Once again there is a controversy emerging regarding public buses on the streets of Seal Beach. Some people writing to this newspaper have expressed very intense negative feelings about the presence of buses near their homes. I appreciate their position, but want to express a different opinion.
I love our buses.
I have been a resident of Seal Beach for eight years and my home is on the bus route. Until last year, when the buses were lost to Seal Beach, I could hear the noise from the buses that began at 5:30 every morning and continued on the half hour throughout the day. Now that the bus service has resumed, I again am aware of the noise. However, my response to that noise has been strongly affected by my deep appreciation for the availability and convenience of public transportation. Even though a car owner, I frequently have taken the bus to get to work, medical care, and shopping. Nevertheless, my appreciation of the bus service is not based on purely personal reasons.
The current controversy is about bus routing and noise. It is easy to understand that there would be a variety of thoughts and feelings about ambient city noises and inconveniences.
It is not so easy to understand why some would be happy to solve the problem by just doing away with the buses. Bus service is a public resource, to be viewed in the same way as we view our libraries, schools, and police services. We live in a city of 25,000 people. Bus service provides an option even for those residents who don’t regularly need it.
Bus service also is important to the commercial functioning of our city. Regularly scheduled buses allow people to easily travel into Seal Beach and access the businesses on Main Street without worry about parking.
During warm weather, the same buses bring people into the city for the beaches. These people spend money in the local shops and restaurants as well. Equally important, bus service provides transportation for many of the people employed in those shops and restaurants who cannot afford to live in Seal Beach.
In order for buses to come into the city they must have a way to leave. As in the past, some people always will be less happy than others with the routing.
I would hope that our City Council members could magically find a route to please everyone.
My own preference would be to add a few streets and stops to the route in order to make the bus service more convenient for even more Seal Beach residents.
I welcome the return of the buses to Seal Beach and hope that others who feel the same will be willing to speak up so that we do not lose our buses again.
Georgie Winter is a longtime resident of Old Town, Seal Beach.
