New buses leave Berkeley vendors in dust
Rapid line goes too fast down Telegraph Avenue, critics say
By Doug Oakley, MEDIANEWS STAFF
Inside Bay Area

BERKELEY - Philip Rowntree says every time AC Transit's new express bus speeds by his T-shirt stand on Telegraph Avenue, he gets covered with dust and filth kicked up by the vehicle's exhaust.
And, Rowntree also notes, he and other street vendors fear the new speeding buses are going to slam into someone on the crowded four-block stretch from Dwight Way to Bancroft Way.
AC Transit added an express 1R bus line that runs from San Leandro to University of California, Berkeley, and back. It has fewer stops and generally goes faster than the one line that runs the same route.
"It's disgusting," Rowntree said Wednesday. "Something happened about three or four months ago, and it's not the pollution they are kicking out but the air from the exhaust blows all this filth off the street onto me."
Russell Chatman, who sells jewelry next to Rowntree, said the buses dirty him too and go way too fast.
"I realize it's a rapid transit because the drivers have their deadlines to beat, but for them to come as fast as they do, it's only a matter of time before someone gets hurt," Chatman said.