Ditch The 66

This one has been on my mind for some time and after checking the route of the 66 Quintara bus. I think it’s time to put it out of commission. It is the shortest bus route beating the old winner the 37 Corbett and runs from 30th and Vicente to 9th and Judah now. If you need to get anywhere along that route there are other buses that can serve the need in a better way.

There was talk some time ago of making the 48 Quintara run all day and not just during rush hours which I have been in favor of since I first heard it. I have to note that I do live on a street where the 48 Quintara stops at my corner, but the 66 Quintara is only a couple of blocks away and I have had a reason to ride it in over 30 years. When I do see the 66 there’s hardly anyone on it in either direction so it’s not filling a need for riders. It used to have a longer run and my Grandmother who used to work as the secretary to the Dean of Medicine at UCSF used to take it to get to work every day. When I was a kid I used to take it with her to go to the swimming and trampoline lessons I was taking at UCSF, but it doesn’t go that far anymore. I believe it used to run down Parnassus and then somehow mysteriously continued to downtown, but it’s been so long I can’t remember anymore.

I’ve ridden the 48 to get the West Portal and have even had to ride it down to the Mission a few times. It’s interesting how it will be packed until West Portal and then it empties out [except for the few kids staying on to go to McAteer High School] and stays empty until you start to get close to 24th Street when all the Mission hipsters get on and most dump out at 24th and Mission. This is a well used route that could use more service. Work is no longer a 9-5 sort of thing. My last two jobs I would sometimes have to go in at 10-12 to start work so I’d have to walk down to Taraval and hop on the L. Granted four blocks isn’t a lot [it’s actually equal to .32 miles], but the 48 is one of the most ruthlessly on time buses coming every 10 minutes with very little variance. I can get down to 4th & Mission in about a half hour for a bus in San Francisco, that’s impressive.

The 66 has done it’s time, but I think it’s time to move those drivers over to the 48 line and lay the 66 to rest and make the 48 full time, or maybe they could move a couple of drivers over the 29 Sunset so that you don’t have to wait a half hour during rush hour to get one.