‘I’m worried’: With TriMet cuts arriving, some riders face an uncertain commute

By Gosia Wozniacka | OregonLive.com (TNS)

PORTLAND, ORE. — Just after noon earlier this week, Eva Solares and her daughter Shanel Fernandez climbed aboard the Line 19 bus at Southeast 60th Avenue and Duke Street, settling into a routine Solares has followed for years. By Sunday, that routine will be gone.

The Portland office cleaner rides Line 19 downtown nearly every day and back home after her shift ends close to midnight. She’s been riding the bus from outer Southeast Portland to downtown for work for more than 20 years, she said.

TriMet’s sweeping service changes salvaged part of Line 19’s route after an outcry from riders, but the Southeast Portland segment Solares depends on is being eliminated and shifted to other bus routes, leaving her unsure which bus she’ll take home to and from work.

“I’m worried,” said Solares. “I depend on the bus and I don’t know how it’s going to run.”

Over two days this week, a reporter with The Oregonian/OregonLive rode the portion of Line 19 that will disappear, speaking with riders about how the service cuts could reshape their daily routines.

In January, when TriMet proposed changes to 35 bus lines and the MAX Green Line along with historic staffing reductions prompted by a roughly $300 million structural budget gap, the service cuts prompted alarm. The agency’s own survey, shared online and at 16 virtual and in-person open houses, received 8,138 responses. So many people showed up to give testimony at a TriMet board meeting in May that more than half had to wait outside due to fire safety restrictions.

The elimination of Line 19 was one of TriMet’s most controversial ideas. Many survey respondents and in-person commenters voiced concerns about losing access to Providence Portland Medical Center, Fred Meyer on Northeast Glisan Street, disability programs and senior housing on the route, according to comments submitted to TriMet and reviewed by The Oregonian/OregonLive.

Service on the route pre-dates the 1969 formation of TriMet, said agency spokesperson Tia York, tracing portions of former Portland streetcar routes along Glisan Street, Milwaukie Avenue, Bybee Boulevard and Woodstock Boulevard. Those corridors were later served by separate bus lines that merged into the cross-town Line 19.

During its outreach and feedback period, TriMet received more responses regarding Line 19 changes than any other line, with 55% of respondents noting the change would affect them ‘a whole lot,’ said York.

(Other frequently cited concerns included service reductions on the MAX Green Line, cuts affecting geographically isolated communities, longer commutes and reduced accessibility.)

Michael Ridenour, an organizer with Bus Riders Unite, a group that advocates for Portland riders, said changes in any one bus route have ripple effects on the rest of the system. And sweeping cuts like the ones going into effect Sunday can lead to even more cuts, he said.

“There’s concerns that this will prompt a death spiral where TriMet cuts service and fewer people use transit as a result, and that causes a decline in ridership, which causes TriMet to cut more service,” Ridenour said.

After the outpouring, TriMet adjusted its proposal for 12 of the bus lines, including its plan to eliminate Line 19. Instead, the northeast segment of the line will keep running along Northeast Glisan Street, combining with the Line 58 route but with significantly less frequent service. Buses will stop running after about 9:30 p.m. on weekdays and arrive only once an hour on weekends.

The southeast segment will disappear. Part of its route will shift to Line 10 to continue serving students from Portland Public School’s Community Transition Program for youth with disabilities whose campus lies along the Line 19 route. Along Southeast Woodstock Boulevard, Line 4 will take over another portion of Line 19 and will be extended between Southeast 52nd Avenue and Lents Town Center to serve a growing area.

On Wednesday, the Line 19 bus rolled west through Southeast Portland carrying office cleaners, hotel workers, retirees and students making trips they had made countless times before.

Most riders said they were aware of the coming changes, thanks to ample alerts posted at bus stops. But many also said they were confused about which bus they would need to take instead, including riders like Solares who had accessed TriMet’s website describing the changes. Paper routes were not available on the buses; TriMet no longer prints them because they were not widely used and became wasteful, the agency said.

Several riders — including a security guard at OHSU and a cook at a downtown restaurant — said the changes would add at least 30 minutes to their commutes and likely force them to buy a car or use a bike to reach a different bus stop.

Solares’ daughter, who commutes during the school year to Benson Polytechnic High School, will also need to figure out a new bus route as the lines she currently relies on are also changing.

David Osorio, who boarded the bus one stop after Solares, also doesn’t know which bus he’ll be taking to work. He relies on Line 19 every day to reach his job at a downtown hotel. Starting on Sunday, Osorio said he plans to try different lines and routes to see which one is faster.

“I need to get up extra early to make sure I get to work on time,” Osorio said.

A few seats away, a white-bearded man sat on the bus clutching a carefully folded plastic bag. Ron ‘Goober’ Gudmundson said the changes will upend his carefully constructed routine. A retired delivery driver who gave up driving in 1992, Gudmundson takes several buses every day – including Line 19 – to get his coffee and shop for groceries.

“I have a good thing going and someone has to mess it up,” he said.

TriMet should increase fare prices instead of reducing bus lines and eliminating jobs — which only goes to reduce options for people who don’t own a car, Gudmundson said.

“Fuel and other prices are rising and TriMet is just chewing it up, they’re not passing it on,” he said, then hopped off the bus at Southeast 46th and Woodstock.

As the bus neared the river, Maria Giddings, wearing black pants and a pressed white shirt, boarded at Southeast Milwaukie Avenue and Powell Boulevard. She works in the kitchen at OHSU Hospital, distributing meals to patients, and takes Line 19 every day to work. Giddings said her commute will remain the same because Line 4 will be extended to take over Line 19 at the stop where she boards.

But, said Giddings, her weekend routine will be interrupted as she typically takes Line 70 — much of which will no longer operate as of Sunday — to the Sellwood/Moreland Fred Meyer. She’ll now have to figure out another way to get to the grocery store, she said. (Line 17 will now serve part of that route.)

“It’s going to be a challenge,” Giddings said. “It’s not just one line, it’s more than 30 lines. It will take some time to figure out.”

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