A Wet and Slow Ride

Monday, May 09, 2005, at 06:56AM

By Eric Richardson

I hopped on my bike today after checking the weather report. It said it would be fairly cool, so I put a long-sleeve on and a t-shirt on top. Of course then it turned out to be misting rain in Pasadena, so I got a little wet. Oh well.

What really annoyed me, though, was the Gold Line. I got onto the train to find that they were doing construction work installing a fence on the LA River bridge. All week trains are going to be running every twenty minutes from 9am to 3pm. Apparently, "work can only be safely accomplished during daytime hours." Perhaps they had notice on the trains at the end of last week, but I last rode a week ago so I don't know. I got there today twelve minutes after the last train had departed, so I only had to wait eight.

Another oddity -- We pulled into the Heritage Square/Arroyo Station and came to a stop. It seemed to be a little longer than normal, and then I noticed that the operator was coming (I was in the rear car). He came in the front door, walked along the car, walked out the back door, and then walked back to the front of the train and we started back off (after a little jerky stop still along the platform).

A pair of fare inspectors got on the train at Union Station and rode to Memorial Park without checking anyone's tickets. At Memorial Park they started talking to another pair of inspectors that were at the station. I never saw any fares inspected.