City of Calabasas will install trolley stop schedule boxes for $2,000 a year

By Michael Picarella Acorn Staff Writer

MICHAEL COONS /The Acorn TOO MUCH?-- This is a trolly schedule holder at a bus stop in Calabasas. City Councilman Michael Harrison thinks $2,000 per year is too much to spend on them.

The Calabasas City Council last week authorized an annual $2,000 expenditure for a new transit stop maintenance account, which will pay for custom Calabasas trolley schedule boxes, their installation and ongoing maintenance at each trolley stop.

The Calabasas trolley is a free service provided by the city that transports riders around town on Friday nights, Saturdays and Sundays. For more information about the trolley or to obtain a schedule, go to (via the Internet) www.cityofcalabasas.com/trolley.html.

"I think there might be a better way to spend $2,000 a year than on maintenance of (trolley schedule) boxes," said City Councilman Michael Harrison at last week’s meeting. The schedule, he said, "… can be posted, put on the Internet, this could be put in our quarterly newsletter, it could be put in our parks and recreation brochure to be posted at the markets ... I don’t think it’s common to have schedules sitting out in the street."

Harrison said $2,000 annually seemed like a lot to spend on schedule boxes. The fee, Harrison said, seemed more appropriate as a one-time cost, combined with the initial installation.

"We don’t anticipate using all of that money," said Calabasas assistant transportation planner Thomas Gdala. "We just want to cover ourselves," he said, in case of vandalism or routine wear and tear.

Regarding normal maintenance, Mayor Lesley Devine asked about servicing and cleanups of the transit stops in general. For two years, she said, residents have complained about the lack of trash receptacles at transit stops.

The city is planning to build new bus shelters, according to officials.

"Rather than just having a uniformed stamped cement concrete-type of fence and shelter, we want to see if we can customize it a little bit," said Calabasas community development director Steve Craig. Trash receptacles will be incorporated into the design, he said. Craig added that he would take responsibility for the delay of trashcans at transit stops for aesthetic reasons.

Devine pressed for rubbish containers as soon as possible, even if they’re temporary. "Two years is a little too long to wait for a trashcan by a bus stop," Devine said.

Some trashcans were previously placed at stops, but they must have been removed, staff members said, because some of them are gone.

City Councilman Michael Harrison said he saw a trashcan chained up near a stop. "But it looks pretty tacky," he said.

Funds for the transit stop account, however, will only go toward schedule boxes and not trash cans and transit stop clean up, officials said. The money comes from Proposition C funds–a measure passed by the county of Los Angeles in 1991 to improve transit–which come from sales tax. That revenue is earmarked for transportation projects.

Temporary trashcans will be placed at transit stops within the week, Gdala said. But the money will come from another account. Permananet cans will replace the others in the next couple of months, he said.

The city council approved, 4 to 1, the allocation of $2,000 a year to the transit stop account. Harrison was the sole opponent.