SCOTT LUDWIG: Breezing our way through Atlanta

I’ve lived south of Atlanta since the summer of 1979. However, I rarely venture downtown. In fact, I’ve only had four reasons for ever doing so:

· The first reason I’ve ever had for going into Atlanta was work-related. However, since I retired a few years ago, scratch that one.

· The second reason was to run a foot race, but since I retired from competing in those a few years ago, that eliminates reason No. 2 as well.

· The third reason is to watch the Florida Gators compete in the SEC championship game, but since they retired from that a few years ago as well, there goes the third reason.

· That leaves reason No. 4, musical concerts. Cindy and I will never stop listening to good classic rock. Which brings me to our latest excursion into the Gates of Hell: to see Black Jacket Symphony perform Led Zeppelin IV at the Atlanta Symphony Hall. (Side note: If you want to hear some classic rock performed to perfection, go see this band!)

Now, about that trip into Hades …

We decided to park at the College Park station and take MARTA. We arrived shortly after 5 p.m., leaving us enough time to catch dinner and allowing for any unforeseen delays. Our biggest fear was getting our Breeze passes, because the last time we used MARTA, we needed help. Lots of it.

This time getting our round-trip passes was, ahem, a breeze. The instructions on the machine were easy to follow, much unlike the last time when I would have had better luck trying to understand an X-ray. I inserted my credit card for payment, and a paper receipt was produced showing that our money was collected. But the message on the machine indicated we would not be getting our Breeze passes. In other words, the machine willingly took our money and then refused to spit out our tickets. (You can relax; the company that manufactures them for MARTA does not make voting machines. I checked.)

So we had no choice but to take the receipt to an attendant to let him know what happened. He said it “happens all the time,” and all we had to do was take the receipt to the customer service office and we would be issued a refund. Then he added, “The office is open Monday through Friday, 8 to 5, so you’ll have to come back Monday.” I noticed the time was 5:08. Cindy said we didn’t want a refund; we just wanted our passes so we could get to our event. Plus, it’s not like we go to the MARTA station on a regular basis. Once every other year, maybe, but certainly not three days from now.

The attendant opened the gate for us (the Breeze pass has to be scanned to open the entrances and exits) and said when we got to our destination, all we had to do was find another attendant “wearing a blue shirt like mine” and all would be well.

You can probably figure out what happened next. There was no attendant in a blue shirt once we got there. However, we saw a number of people exiting through the emergency exit gate. Since we didn’t hear any alarms, bells or whistles, we followed their lead. Two down, two to go.

We actually got to the Symphony Hall earlier than expected, giving us enough time to chat with some of the roadies, eat dinner, and meet some friends in the lobby … and still make it to the concert in time. (It was fantastic, by the way.)

Later, on the return trip …

We found two policemen outside the MARTA station. Cindy explained our dilemma, and I could see that one of the officers wanted to cut her off. (She can be a little long-winded.) I could tell because he had the same look on his face that I have when I think her stories should have been over by now.

The policeman said he had no jurisdiction over MARTA, but there were white phones inside the station. “Pick one up and someone will help you,” he said. He wasn’t being facetious, but he should have been.

As we left the men in blue (not the MARTA blue; the police blue), I mentioned I knew they probably wouldn’t be able to help but said that I just wanted them to know what we were doing. What I actually said was, “I don’t want you to shoot me in the back if you see me jumping the turnstile.” Sometimes I crack myself up. I can’t say the same for the police, though.

We took the down escalator to the train and found the aforementioned white phone. Cindy picked it up and got a dial tone that was followed by the wailing sound you get when your iPhone warns you of an Amber alert. I expected as much: The mouse that ran across our feet when we got to the bottom of the escalator sort of tipped me off.

We got to the entrance gate and a security guard – not for MARTA, but for the local Pizza Hut – saw how pitiful we looked and used his Breeze pass to let us through. After a l-o-o-o-ng 45-minute wait and the clock about to strike midnight, our train finally arrived.

Three down, one to go.

When we got to our final destination, we had one more gate to get through. Of course, there wasn’t a blue shirt — MARTA or police — anywhere in sight. There were also no white phones, and this time the emergency exit was locked. So we just stood there, intentionally looking helpless so someone would come to our rescue. Lucky for us, a gentleman wearing a blue shirt — no, not that blue shirt, silly rabbit — opened a gate for us with his Breeze pass, and we were on our way.

Blanche DuBois – you may remember her from “A Streetcar Named Desire” – perhaps put it best when she said, “Whoever you are, I have always depended on the kindness of strangers.”

Out of curiosity, I looked up MARTA’s 2025 budget, specifically to see how much money they were expecting to generate via passenger revenue: Turns out it was $82 million. I can’t imagine what that number would be if everyone paid for their fares and followed the rules.

However, if that were the case, MARTA might have enough money to hire more blue shirts, and maybe put someone on the receiving end of the white phones.

A word for MARTA: We threw away our receipt, so there’s no need to worry about a refund. Just don’t let it happen again.