Yesterday, May 31, was Memorial Day in the United States--a public holiday for honoring war dead, wherein it is customary for families of the fallen (and others who wish to honor those who died in combat) to visit cemeteries and such.
Given that, one would think that TriMet would make special service arrangements for Memorial Day observations around town--especially given that many people were off work.
And in at least one case, they did--they truncatd the 19-Woodstock/Glisan away from Willamette National Cemetery, one of the largest cemeteries in the city (and one containing the remains of many a dead soldier). Because of "traffic".
Amazing.
In fairness to the transit agency, it may well have been the case that they figured that a) few people would be using the bus to reach the Memorial Day observations, and b) attempting to serve them would result in busses stuck in traffic, and affect the reliability of the rest of the line. The cemetery in question, after all, is only reachable by some rather hilly two-lane roads, which were likely parking lots yesterday.
But TriMet provides special service to other special events in town--refusing to provide service to this particular event, or to make other arrangements (such as shuttle busses meeting with the 19, so the 19 itself isn't impacted by traffic jams), does not make the agency look particularly good.
Thanks to Al for pointing this one out.
From what I understand they 'used' to provide shuttle service on memorial day.
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