By Mahlon Meyer
NORTHWEST ASIAN WEEKLY
Metro plans to remove a bus shelter in the heart of Little Saigon, citing safety and sanitary concerns, but many in the community think it won’t make a difference.
A bus pulls into the bus stop with a sign indicating the shelter will be removed (Photo by Mahlon Meyer)
“They’ve already moved out the seats,” said a 74-year-old man waiting at the stop for the bus, who gave his surname as Chen. “And people have still come back to sell all sorts of things.”
According to residents, business owners, and riders, the bus shelter, on 12th Avenue South between South Jackson Street and South King Street, has become an emporium of drug sales and other stolen goods and a congregating spot for unhoused people.
In response to questions from Northwest Asian Weekly, Metro said the bus stop would remain at the location and all routes would continue to serve the stop.
But the glass and steel shelter next to the stop “has become a location of frequent illegal activity. Unfortunately, this activity has created a safety issue that has already rendered the bus shelter and bench at this stop mostly unusable for riders,” wrote Elaine Porterfield, a Metro public information officer, in an email. “In order to be responsive to the concerns raised by riders living and working around this stop, Metro is now temporarily removing this shelter.”
Porterfield said Metro would return the shelter when it was considered safe to do so.
In the meantime, transit ambassadors would be on hand to help riders while the shelter was absent.
“We do understand how disruptive even the temporary removal of a shelter can be,” she said.
Photo by Tony Au
Same problem—different views
The manager of the Hau Hau Market across the street said he thought many of those congregating at the bus shelter would simply move down the street.
Providing only his surname, Lam Quach, 33, said the city needed to solve “the root problem,” which he said is drugs.
“If it were simply a problem of homelessness, many of those out there would take advantage of the services nearby,” he said.
On Thursday, during an interview with him at the market, the types of problems faced by merchants in the area seemed fully on display.
As Lam Quac stood in front of vast bins of fruit and vegetables, a staff member in the back of the store shouted to him, pointing to a woman in flip flops who was carrying a large purse. She had just hurriedly exited the store.
Lam Quach ran out onto the street, in pursuit. Outside the chain link fence surrounding the store’s goods, he stopped the woman and pointed to her purse. After a few moments, she pulled out a transparent bag of fruit. Lam Quac then walked her back into the store where she fumbled out a floppy purse to pay.
“This happens 3 to 4 times a day,” he said.
Shoplifting hasn’t just become more common, but aggressive and sometimes violent.
Lam Quach and his staff have at times have had to defend themselves against shoplifters and some “mentally unstable” individuals who congregate at the bus stop. Lam Quach “just wants customers and staff to feel safe at the market.”
At the Asian herb shop next door, a clerk was also on guard against shoplifting. But, for his part, he thought the removal of the bus shelter would help improve safety.
A man with disheveled clothing walked into the store and lingered in front of a refrigerated section of drinks. As the man looped back to the exit, the clerk asked him to lift up his loose and heavy clothing to show him he hadn’t taken anything.
The clerk, who declined to give a name, but said he had worked in the store for four to five years, said confronting shoplifters was a regular occurrence.
But he said there used to be a bus stop in front of his store, on Jackson Street, which made things worse.
“After it was removed, all the people that used to fill the sidewalk went away,” he said. Removing the bus shelter from 12th Avenue South, which runs along the side of the herb shop, “would make a difference,” he said.
Inconvenient for older riders?
Down the street, a checkout clerk at the Dong Hing Market said removing the shelter would not be too much of an inconvenience for riders if it rained.
The 41-year-old clerk declined to give her name but said she had immigrated from Guangdong three years ago. While taking the EBT card of an older customer, she said most senior citizens who used the stop had rain gear that covered their heads.
“I use that stop every day, myself,” she said. “We wouldn’t mind the inconvenience.”
Chen, the 74-year-old rider, said he lived down the street. He and his wife bought food at the Hau Hau Market every day then took the bus home.
“It wouldn’t be ideal, but we could manage,” he said.
Police presence
During several hours Northwest Asian Weekly spent in the vicinity of the bus shelter, the area emptied out when police appeared on the scene.
The shelter emptied out after a police cruiser pulled up down the street (Photo by Mahlon Meyer)
Around 1 p.m., a police vehicle, its lights flashing, stood parked about 50 feet from the shelter. During that time, the shelter was empty except for several riders. After the vehicle left, an assortment of people came back.
Two tall men in bulky clothing that residents identified as “drug dealers” came back and stood beside the shelter. But even those who identified them, who for safety reasons chose not to be identified, said they were “simply trying to survive.”
An hour later, two transit police came and stood inside the shelter. Again, the individuals who had remained for long periods of time standing around the shelter left.
Northwest Asian Weekly later saw them standing amidst a crowd around the corner, several hundred feet down Jackson Street, while the police were in the shelter.
Diane Ung, one of three sisters behind Phnom Penh Noodle House, a Cambodian Restaurant in the neighborhood, said, “It’s true there used to be a big congregation in front of the herb shop on 12th and Jackson before the bus stop was removed,” she said. “But at the same time, they had a police mobile unit across the street.”
The Phnom Penh Noodle House in mid afternoon on a weekday (Photo by Mahlon Meyer)
Still, Ung and her sisters would be grateful for any improvement.
The family has weathered a series of hardships in keeping their business going. In 2017, her nephew was hit by a car and now suffers from severe traumatic brain injuries. They closed the restaurant on King Street in May of 2018 to focus on the family. In March, 2020, the family reopened in the current location with the “miraculous” support of the community, on Jackson Street near 12th Avenue, but then the pandemic hit. They temporarily converted to mostly take-out.
“In the past few years, we’ve had three cars broken into and one car stolen. While our contractor was putting up our outside sign, his truck was stolen!” said Ung. “New and former customers are slowly discovering our restaurant at the new location. We love that they keep coming back and convert to regulars.”
It’s not always smooth sailing, though.
“But sometimes interesting characters will come in off the street in their underwear and parade around, or they’ll grab a bottle of sauce, or take someone else’s take out order and we’ll say, ‘just take it and go,’” she said.
When Ung and her sisters were kids, they would run freely around the Chinatown-International District (CID). Now she cautions her young sons who take Kung Fu lessons in the neighborhood.
“I wish the CID was the neighborhood I grew up in,” she said. “I just don’t have answers on how to get there.”
Ung does not know if the removal of the shelter will make a difference.
“But we’ll take it,” she said. “As long as there’s some focus with city leaders doing something, rather than doing nothing at all.”
To learn more about Metro’s transit ambassadors, go to: https://kingcountymetro.blog/2023/05/02/people-need-us-out-there-metro-ambassadors-engage-and-inform/
Mahlon can be reached at info@nwaweekly.com.