My Travels on the Sprinter…

Please note that I was asked, by those who coordinate my work's employee newsletter (called the City Scene- I really don't like the name but I cannot change it) to write an article on my Sprinter travels. For those who do not know, NCTD, North County's public transportation district, opened a new light-rail train called to Sprinter. It travels along the old 1800's industrial rail line that really does not go to any popular destinations but the track was there so, let's save some money. The line, originally estimated to cost $85 million dollars swelled, like most government projects, to a price nearing half a billion dollars. I was very skeptical about this train but decided to give it a week. The post below is what I wrote for the article. It is a little bit of a puff piece but the incidents mentioned actually happened. I will expand on those in a different post but here it goes… (Oh, those comments in parenthesis are my edits for this blog to provide some additional background).

I feel as though I should begin by disclaiming that despite my claims in the glorious Dive Day (this will need explaining, later though) e-mails, my reasons for trying the newly opened $478 million Sprinter had little-to-nothing to do with being "green". In fact, I am not really a "green" person (I am, after all, a Republican ha-ha), seeing that I drive a SUV that on a great tank gets a little over 18 miles per gallon. With the exception of traveling to other large metropolitan areas and the fantastic San Diego Trolley, which seems to favor only a small geographical portion of the County, I do not use public transportation. For me, there really was no incentive or desire as like many Californians, I like my car and I like to drive. So, why my desire to all of a sudden try the Sprinter?

That is a good question. I guess the simple answer was that I wanted to see how much money I would actually save. In the past, I have to fill up every 6 days and with a 20-gallon tank and the current skyrocketing prices at the pump, there was a little extra incentive to try this new contraption. So, I figured I would see what the $478 million was all about and give the Sprinter one week. In addition to the Sprinter, I would also be taking the bus. Now, the last time I took a bus, other than the Red and Black at San Diego State University (Go Aztecs!), my last experience was in middle school when I rode on the Poway Transit (which, let's face it, has a very different clientele than Escondido, San Marcos, Vista, and Oceanside) once or twice. Okay, back to the story at hand, my journey to work was going to take three times longer than if I were to simply drive myself to work. I would also have to wake up significantly earlier than usual and let me just say that I am NOT a morning person (in fact, I often wake up angry at my alarm clock for not pausing the space time continuum). This was going to be a very interesting week.

Despite the early mornings and the occasional interesting characters that ride the '356' bus, you know the arguments and the coffee throwing incidents, the bus has not been bad at all. It picks me up the same time everyday and, when I do not play follow the leader and get on the wrong bus (yes, this happened), it takes me to where I needed to go and with plenty of time to catch the Sprinter. For the Sprinter itself, it was very smooth, clean and comfortable. Although my journey on the train only lasts for just three stops and for just 10 minutes, I have found myself wanting to stay on but somehow I do not see the City liking that idea. There have not been any delays, when I have been on the train (the second day of operation, a guy got ran over and lost part of his legs, ouch), and even though the morning commuters seem to be dwindling, the evening train remains packed. I have been pleasantly surprised and I am saving money every day. The all-day passes, good for unlimited bus and sprinter rides, cost about $4 or you can purchase the monthly pass for $54. If you ride 13 ½ times in a month, you will have paid for your ticket. With the 9/80 structure here, each month we average between 17 and 19 workdays, so you are bound to save money. Since I do not have my car here at work, I am not tempted to drive around, wasting more gas, during my lunch hour. It has been two weeks since I last filled up my car and it still has over half a tank left. All and all, I have been impressed and saving money to boot. Despite the longer trek and my early mornings (damn you time), I will continue to take the Sprinter and the bus to work, and I encourage all of you to at least give the Sprinter a try. See you on the Dive Days!

SimCity My A**

I would like to take a break from my usual blog entries and discuss a matter of grave importance. Well, maybe not grave importance but a good rant nonetheless. I recently purchased the latest in the SimCity phenomenon called SimCity Societies. In this version, you do have to build roads and the occasional power plant but after that, there is very little essence of SimCity, or at least the game that I fell in love with. I am what I call a Government Junkie. I majored in government, I worked in government in high school, my career is government, my masters will be in government, and I love the government style city planning game. The first SimCity was revolutionary and, back then, considered a hard game to play and master. The second release, called SimCity 2000, brought upon the world the super-duper buildings called… I forget. But they were way cool and could hold tens of thousands of people. Water was first introduced but to a limited scale. The next installment, aptly named SimCity 3000 expanded on the new versions, although the super-duper buildings were lost to time. Trash and neighbor deals were created but really no way to build a region. In comes the best version of SimCity in the confusingly named SimCity 4. This game is just awesome as you not only build a city but a region as well. If you have too many residents in one city, they will find work in the nearby municipalities and the game is intertwined with everything else. This version was actually the basis for several tourism rich cities/nations to calculate where they need to spend money so they can attract more tourists. In these games, the creator built in actual city effects and principles that we study in school. Transference is a big one but nothing compares to the multiplier effect. Cities must grow, to some degree, in order to survive. Although with the modern day set-up in real life, this is more along the lines of counties but the basis is the same.

Multiplier effect:

It works like this. Company A makes 5 widgets a year and Company B buys 2 per year in order to make their product for their customers. They have a great year and the customer (residents) base grows and they must order 5 additional widgets the next year for a total of 7. Company A must now make more widgets to bring their total up to 10 so Company B can have their 7 total. In order to do that, A must hire more staff, buy more supplies and is now producing 10. B has a good year and continues to expand but this time they must order only 3 additional for a total of 5. Now A has capacity to make 10 but is only selling 8. Even though B is still growing, the multiplier effect dictates that A is too big and must downsize, thus reducing the supplies they order and the number of staff, which will snowball out of control. This, of course, is a way simplified version of what actually happens in economics and cities but as you can see, any slowdown can lead to disaster for cities.

Back to the issue at hand:

SimCity Societies is nothing more than a new twist on the Sims. It does not deserve the name of SimCity. I would be fine if it were SimSocieties but no, Sim fucking societies.