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Comment by vondur | Hacker News Reader

People don't want to ride public transit in Los Angeles, its not safe. Los Angles wants to anything but crack down on crime and the homeless. A major problem with the LA light rail system is the homeless taking over trains and harassing passengers.

https://www.cbsnews.com/losangeles/news/a-timeline-of-violen...

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Two months ago, LAPD began doing its job again and patrolling the stations and trains. Early estimates are that property crimes and violent crimes dropped by over 75% in August. It only took a few murders and LA Metro revoking[2] the security contract[1] for LAPD to start doing its job.

Because LAPD and LA Sheriff almost exclusively assigned officers who had already hit their 8/40 for the day/week, almost all of the time on the LA Metro contract was billed at overtime hours. With its own internal police force, LA Metro can actuall field a security force almost 50% larger for the same amount it was paying LAPD/LAS.

[1] In the 1990s, in order to increase the size of the police force, the LA City Council shut down the LA Metro police force and forced LA Metro to contract security out to LAPD and LA Sheriff. Security in the system started worsening immediately, reaching rock bottom earlier this year. https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2024-06-26/editorial-w...

[2] https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2024-06-27/metro-ok...

https://abc7.com/road-rage-incidents-los-angeles-lapd-data-l...

looks like cars aren't safe either in LA, and that's not counting accidents

As a driver, I have a lot more control of what scenarios I find myself in when driving vs when taking the metro.

How exactly? On a bus you’re surrounded by people who (more or less) have no way of really hurting you. On a highway the opposite is true, a small mistake by a well meaning fellow driver could mean death. While the incidences of crime sit atop our mind they are drastically infrequent (daily public transit taker here) which is what warrants the wall-to-wall news coverage. Meanwhile “guy on TikTok on the highway, wipes out whole family” barely makes the print edition.

Feels like one of those vibes issues, you feel safe but aren’t safe (statistically)

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