SHERMAN OAKS : Funding OKd for DASH Bus Service

Community activists who waged a four-year battle to get a shuttle bus for Sherman Oaks won a bittersweet victory Tuesday when the City Council voted to approve funding for the buses.

The City Council voted to appropriate $1.1 million to provide the shuttle buses, which will begin rolling Friday, for three years.

That should have been welcome news for a community plagued with traffic and parking headaches. But community leaders’ elation about the decision was muted by their disappointment with the type of buses the city transportation department chose--DASH buses, which the activists say are cold and uninviting.

They had hoped the city would instead approve minibuses that resemble old-fashioned trolleys, whose charming appearance, they say, would attract more riders and add ambience to the community.

“I’m glad that we got our shuttle, but disappointed that it’s not the trolley bus we wanted,” said Jeff Brain, who led the fight for the shuttles. “We will continue to work with the (Department of Transportation) to convince them that the DASH bus doesn’t fit our community.”

Richard Close, president of the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Assn., applauded the City Council’s decision.

“We wanted a trolley because we think it would make it more pedestrian- and commuter-friendly,” he said, “but a DASH bus is better than what we have, which is nothing.”

The Sherman Oaks Chamber of Commerce endorsed the DASH bus concept, but Executive Vice President Barry Wegman said it did so only after the city convinced chamber officials that a trolley would be much more expensive to maintain than the natural-gas-powered DASH (Downtown Area Short Hop) buses.

Alisa Katz, chief of staff for Councilman Zev Yaroslavsky, who pushed to get the funding for the buses, said that the expected costs of operating and maintaining trolleys--based on bids from shuttle-bus operators--were 40% to 90% higher than for DASH buses.

However, Brain, a candidate for the council seat being vacated by Yaroslavsky, said his research indicates that the cost differential between the two options is much narrower.

The buses will run along a route that roughly follows Ventura Boulevard from Haskell Avenue to Fulton Avenue with a loop up to Sherman Oaks Fashion Square mall. Shuttles will be in service Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m., Saturday from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. and Sunday from noon to 6 p.m.

The city will kick off the start of the new service with a celebration at 9 a.m. Friday in front of the La Reina Fashion Plaza, in the 14600 block of Ventura Boulevard.