This FRIDAY - February 24, 2012 - Detroit Department of Transportation is announcing plans to eliminate late night bus service from midnight to 5am system-wide, increase delays between buses after 6pm, shutdown several routes, and layoff workers. PLUS a new management firm comes in to manage transportation (of course with a price tag attached!). Parsons Brinkerhoff is working with Envisurage who has installed Ron Freeland as the new CEO for DDOT as announced today with Mayor Dave Bing. This multi-layered management consulting arrangement will consume over $4 million. Note, $6 million was awarded by the federal Department of Transportation to DDOT for fleet upgrades last October.

In conversation Mr Freeland says “Detroit is shrinking” and while the population may be doing that the geographic area to serve with mass transit is not. His background in Baltimore Maryland may not serve the sparsely populated city of Detroit. You can’t cut service when families rely on it in their day to day lives.

Realize these facts as well regarding the Detroit Department of Transportation, and the contractors providing service:

• No visibility to plans or working with public 
• These announcements are being made 1 week before enacting the changes
• Not attended city council meetings when requested
• not answered office phone during hours
• have locked the door to the public

This public serving department has not been serving the public! Statistics defy what people encounter on the street - many of these changes are proposed by people whom have never ridden the bus and have no knowledge of Detroit.

Please check the following posts for more information regarding Friday’s DDOT Public Hearings. 

• Occupy Detroit - Feb 21
•  

Memories from 2009 

The video playlist attached above goes through over 60 clips of riders and concerned citizens coming forward in 2009 at the DDOT Public Hearings which threatened shutting down weekend service, closing routes, eliminating night service, and elongating time between runs on a route. These video clips were made at the Rosa Parks Transit Center, which had been recently completed - cost $22.5 million, budgeted $18.3 million - Parsons Brinckerhoff project.

Be Committed to Change 

As a rider of evening buses I can say they are the MOST crowded of any time of day. Scheduling of them has been erratic making 2-3 buses arriving at the same time at stops enroute. That in turn elongates times between buses. People that have been waiting twice as long for their bus are then boarding into crowded buses due to poor scheduling.

Making the time between buses longer isn’t a fix for this situation. Having buses depart on time and stay to scheduled times, traveling at or below speed limit, is how the system is intended to work.

Eliminating late night service jeopardizes those that rely on them for safe passage home. Walking, taking a cab, and hitching a ride during late night hours is going to increase crimes of opportunity. During winter there are also homeless finding warmth shuttling back and forth using the change they have gathered. They keep warm during cold winter nights on the continually running routes. Homeless shelter funding has been slashed to the bone, resulting in many of them closing.

I wish I could take DDOT management and consultants on a few rides of this system and point out a few things.

***Flashback to last Saturday***

Background: It’s my dad’s birthday, and I let my mom know that I got them tickets to see The Pittsburgh Jazz Orchestra. After giving her the particulars (show starts at 8, tickets are under my name, etc), the conversation segued to a surprising place.

Mom: “So, Melo’s coming back soon, huh?”

Champ: “Huh?”

Mom: “Melo.” 

Champ: “Mom, what are you talking about?”

Mom: “Carmelo Anthony. He’s supposed to be coming back soon. Do you think he’s going to be able to fit in with Jeremy Lin?”

Now, my mom never played sports herself, but she has a general understanding of the rules of each of the major sports, and she knows who the stars (and each of the Steelers) are. Basically, she isn’t one of those people who’d say something like “Oooh, nice dunk!” while watching a football game. I mean, when you have a son and a husband who are diehard sports junkies, I guess you can’t help but become a fan as well.

With that being said, I realized exactly how much hype and attention New York Knicks point guard Jeremy Lin has received when I saw that it managed to turn my mom into Stephen A. Smith. A woman who, just a few months ago, asked me to demonstrate for her exactly what “pick and roll” means is now asking me if “Melo” is going to ruin the Knicks’ chemistry and if he’s just a bad fit for D’Antoni’s offense.

Now, in the past couple weeks I’ve had various people ask for my take on Linsanity. I didn’t really want to write about it though, because, well, everyone else is, and I just couldn’t think of an interesting and unique angle I could take.

But, after thinking about it for a few days, there are actually a few things I haven’t heard anyone say about him yet. Not to say that they haven’t been said. I just haven’t personally seen or read them.

Here’s five of them.

1. The person who has the most to lose with Linsanity? Either Derrick Rose or Dwyane Wade.

Although the NFL is the undisputed king among professional sports in America, once you leave North American soil, the NBA is the American sports league that travels the best. China is a perfect example of this, as the NBA is the most popular sports league in the world’s biggest country.

Where do Dwyane Wade and Derrick Rose fit into all of this? Well, when the NBA decided to allow fans to vote for All-Star starters online, Chinese fans took advantage of this, stuffing the ballot boxes so that Yao Ming and his Houston Rockets teammate, Tracy McGrady, were starters for the West every year. Since Yao Ming and Tracy McGrady happened to be the Western Conference’s best players at their respective positions (center and small forward) at that time, it was no big deal.

But, while it’s too late for Lin to be voted in as a starter in this year’s All-Star game, there’s absolutely no chance in hell that he won’t be picked as a starter next year. And, since he’s starting, either D. Wade or Derrick Rose won’t be. In fact, even if he starts sucking, you could probably pencil Lin in as an All-Star starter for the next four or five years.

Hmm. In a league where star players are obsessed with their legacies  — and “How many All-Star games did he start when he was in his prime?” is a question people ask when trying to determine a player’s legacy — I wonder how guards clearly better than Lin are going to feel when realizing he’s going to be starting ahead of them for years to come.

2. This could not have happened anywhere other than New York City.

People have argued that the Linsanity craze wouldn’t have happened if he happened to be in a city like Milwaukee or Memphis or Cleveland or Detroit. I agree, but for different reasons. I don’t think he’d be playing as well as he has been if he was in one of those cities. 

It’s been repeated ad nauseum that the Knicks were a perfect fit for him. Perfect coach for him to play for, perfect offense for him to run, perfect group of teammates for him to play with, and even a perfect time for him to play (His start coincidentally happened when Carmelo Anthony sat out a few games due to injury. If Melo never gets injured, Linsanity never happens)

But, as much as each of those things have helped him succeed, him being in New York F*cking City matters even more. Lin is clearly a guy who feeds off the crowd’s energy when he’s playing. Not to say that he doesn’t have genuine confidence, but the type of fearlessness (and occasional recklessness) he plays with gets a boost when you have 20,000 raucous people anticipating your every move. Madison Square Garden is the only NBA arena where 1. he’d get that type of environment and 2. the fans are knowledgeable enough to know that he needs it.

It’s obviously carried over. He has played well on the road since he became a starter. But, I just don’t think he’d have built the type of confidence to do this in Toronto if he didn’t get his initial boost in New York…and I’m sure he wouldn’t have had Raptors fans cheering for him.

3. 2011-2012 has seen a resurgence of “natural-born basketball playing” point guards. 

While they’re all great basketball players, you can argue that Derrick Rose, Russell Westbrook, and John Wall are athletes first. (You can also argue that John Wall is far, far, far, far, far away from being a great NBA player, but that’s another discussion for another day) Each of those guys are so athletic that they would have been great at any sport, and each of them, even MVP Rose, are still learning how to play point guard.

Yet, as Rose and Westbrook have made many assume that you need to be an amazing athlete to be a top-notch point guard today, with Jeremy Lin, Kyrie Irving (who I told y’all about two years ago), and Ricky Rubio, you have a trio of new to the NBA point guards; natural born basketball players who are succeeding despite not being world-class athletes. Of the three, Irving is (obviously) my favorite — a 19 year old (!!!) who literally has no offensive weaknesses — but I see pieces of each of them in each of their games, and this excites me as a basketball fan.

4. Jeremy Lin is handsome. This matters. 

As any sociologist will tell you, we’re hardwired to give attractive people certain advantages we don’t extend as easily to others. We assume they’re smarter, stronger, more confident, and more worthy of our trust and support. It’s no accident that most NFL quarterbacks would be considered attractive men even if they weren’t football players. In many cases, they were groomed to be quarterbacks at a young age in large part because they “looked the part” and coaches assumed they’d have the charisma and confidence to lead the rest of the team.

Why am I bringing this up? Well, there are many parallels between Jeremy Lin and Tim Tebow. Both have experienced unexpected success, both captivated the nation, and both will tell you that their success is in large part due to their Christian faith. And, just how I’d argue that Tebow wouldn’t have been as popular if he looked like, I don’t know, John C. Reilly, (In fact, I’d even go as far as to say that if Tim Tebow looked like John C. Reilly, he wouldn’t have been Tim Tebow: Star Quarterback at all), the fact that Jeremy Lin looks like he could be an American Apparel model has given Linsanity a boost that may not have occurred if he was plainer looking.

5. It’s been interesting watching people try to find parallels for Lin’s unexpected ascent. But, everyone seems to be missing the most obvious choice.

He’s been compared to Tim Tebow, Flip Murray, Billy Ray Bates, Fernando Venezuela, Tiger Woods, Yao Ming, and pretty much any other athlete who either 1. came out of nowhere to play at an all-star level for an extended period of time, 2. succeeded at a sport despite not having the racial makeup and background of the people who usually succeeded at that sport, or 3. became a national craze.

But, there’s a (seemingly) obvious name I haven’t heard yet, a person who managed to captivate the nation in a historic fashion despite having a funny name, an unusual background, and a chorus of haters who maintain that his success is only due to his race.

Hmm. Who could I possibly be talking about? I’ll give you one hint: They went to the same school. 

That’s enough Linsanity for me. People of VSB, what are you thoughts on the Jeremy Lin phenomenon? Do you think he’ll be a short-lived flash in the pan, or do you see his success continuing?

—Damon Young (aka “The Champ”)

"You sure you don't want some Kool-Aid? I'll even get you some ice. And a pickle."

We’ve all been there before.

Girl invites boy over for movies, lukewarm purple Kool-Aid, and the unspoken assertion that, unless Boy shows up smelling like pickles or dressed like Chris Brown, Boy and Girl are going to have sex that night. Boy manages not to mess things up, and, lo and behold, the night ends with Boy and Girl making the beast with two backs. Boy and Girl have had sex with each other before, so this is no big deal. But, for whatever reason, sex seems to be a bit more intense tonight. The “mac and cheese” sound¹ is in full effect as moans are a little louder, growls are a little deeper, and the concept of time is a complete non-motherf*cking factor. Boy has a laser beam-like focus on Girl’s various spots, making Girl speak languages that have been dead for five centuries. When Girl eventually climaxes, the earth will shake, the moon will blush, and the ghosts of Ikea will place a phantom order to replace Girl’s soon to be broken bed. Girl enthusiastically lets Boy know that she’s 32 to 47 seconds away from orgasm, a statement that excites Boy and forces him hit spots with even more precision. Unfortunately, Boy becomes a bit too excited, and Boy climaxes right when Girl has hit the 5 to 8 second mark. Boy, realizing Girl’s thisclose to a cop calling orgasm, tries to finish the job, but isn’t erect enough to hit Girl’s spots anymore. Seconds later, Boy is completely flaccid. Boy rolls over, says “I’m sorry” and offers to get Girl some lukewarm Kool-Aid while Girl lays in bed and wonders if a female judge would acquit her if she happens to kill Boy but tells the judge her reasoning for the murder.

Regardless of age, color, creed, and feelings about Linsanity, every sexually active man reading this has “stopped short” before. We can’t help it. Even though we know that if we can hold off for just 10 more seconds your body will turn hot day fire hydrant, sometimes we’re just unable to stop.

Sure, there are certain ways to prolong things when this happens (i.e.: think about Kurt Cobain, switch positions, scream “Don’t move a gotdamn inch!!!!”, etc), but sometimes things reach a point of no return, and the woman’s near climax will be forever lost to the deep, dark, surprisingly damp, and surprisingly angry space in space where “close, but not quite orgasms” eventually settle.

Anyway, “stopping short” is just one of the many legitimately f*cked up things all men do to women, and here’s four more. 

2. Eat all of your food, and drink each of your beverages

Out of all the things on this list, this one isn’t really our fault. You can’t say things like “Make yourself at home.” and then get pissed when we take you to your word and eat all of your leftover pizza, half of your Cheetos, each of your lettuce wraps, and a full slab of your turkey bacon. 

3. Pretend like we did absolutely nothing to encourage women to continue flirting with us

It’s usually nothing too disrespectful or too egregious. But, despite how much we feign ignorance, we know when women are flirting with us, and we also know that all it takes to dead the flirting is to act indifferent, apathetic, or even occasionally annoyed. Despite this knowledge, we’ll still return the smile or the hug or the lunch invitation or even ever so slightly laugh at her attempt at “Ok, I’m going to say something that’s supposed to be funny. It’s clearly not, though. Let’s see if he takes the bait and laughs” humor.

4. Intentionally give awful dating advice

My favorite is when men suggest that, since it’s the 21st century, chicks need to “woman up” and start approaching guys.

Nevermind the fact that no man in the history of mandom has ever been in a happy and healthy relationship with a woman who approached, bagged, and pursued him. We’re generally lazy motherf*ckers who just enjoy when women put in some of the work…even though these “working” women probably aint ever gonna make it past the 2am Wendy’s drive-thru.

5. Pretend like we’re completely unable to remember birthdays, anniversaries, plans, shopping instructions, and any other information more important to you than it is to us

Admittedly, I probably do this more than anything else on the list. I can tell you exactly what Michael Jordan’s average PPG was in the 86-87 NBA season without googling it (37.1), but if a woman I happen to be seeing asks me to remember to pick up some eggs and celery from the store before I come home, my brain all of a sudden turns Tyga as I’ll faux-try to remember those difficult-ass details so hard that I’ll start drooling; a elaborate subterfuge with a clear and precise goal in mind: She never asks me to do that again

Anyway people of VSB, I’m sure I’m forgetting a few. Can you think of any other legitimately f*cked up things all men regularly do to women? Also, fellas, can you think of legitimately sh*tty sh*t that all women do to us?

¹When sex is very good, it sounds like a pot of mac and cheese being mixed with a wooden spoon.

—Damon Young (aka “The Champ”) 

Today, Wednesday, February 22, 2012, Panama Jackson from Very Smart Brothas and Rahiel Tesfamariam from Urban Cusp will be moderating a panel discussion on Black Identity & Culture in Mass Media from 6-8PM at the Washington Post Community Room, located at the Washington Post buildling (1150 15th Street, NW).

From the flyer, here’s the intro and purpose of the event:

Panama Jackson of Very Smart Brothas and Rahiel Tesfamariam of Urban Cusp will moderate a Black History Month dialogue led by a panel of dynamic artists, bloggers, journalists, and filmmakers on representations of Black American identity and culture in the media and entertainment industries. The discussion will seek to inspire guests to have greater individual and collective impact on the shaping of Black American “popular culture.”

If you’re available and in Washington, DC, tonight, come on through and join in on the discussion and if we’re lucky, it will be like a real live VSB post in action. Complete with comments and the whole 9.

See you tonight!

-VSB P

1. Beverly Hills 90210: Kelly Taylor

2. Saved By The Bell: Kelly Kapowski

3. My So Called Life: Angela Chase

4. Melrose Place: Amanda Woodward

5. Full House: DJ Tanner

6. Blossom

7. Married With Children: Kelly Bundy

8. The Cosby Show: Denise Huxtable

9. The Fresh Prince Of Bel Air: Hilary Banks

10. Boy Meets World: Topanga Lawrence