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The problem with buses is that nobody wants to be on a bus with the people who are regularly on buses.
by daseiner1 2y ago
The problem with buses is that nobody wants to be on a bus with the people who are regularly on buses.
- taurknaut 2y agoReally? I take the bus all the time. It's just normal people. Unless this is an obscure reference about drug use in your neighborhood or something that's completely going over my head.
- daseiner1 2y agoTo be clear, the majority of bus takers in my experience (several large cities on the West Coast of the US) are perfectly nice people. But often enough as to be a nuisance there are individuals who are: severely mentally ill, openly using drugs or intoxicated, blasting music on their phones, hostile or aggressive, lecherous and intimidating towards female passengers.
- nradov 2y agoThis varies widely by area. In the SF Bay Area due to public policy failures in housing, mental health, and substance abuse, some of the main bus routes have turned into rolling homeless shelters. You don't always see that but it's pretty obvious on certain routes at certain times. This makes some normal people uncomfortable — particularly women traveling alone. Regardless of whether that reaction is rational or not, it's another factor that discourages normal people from riding the bus and causes them to vote against public transit funding.
- whimsicalism 2y agowhat public policy would you suggest?
- whimsicalism 2y agothere is pretty often someone crazy on the buses i take, both in SF and DC where i grew up. generally i dont feel unsafe but i also dont enjoy being in an enclosed space with someone losing their mind
- ToucanLoucan 2y agoAnd who exactly are you picturing would be riding a robo bus then? Or is this going to be an expensive bus for tech workers so they needn't rub elbows with the poors?
- daseiner1 2y agoCounterintuitively, I would be likelier to take the bus if it were more expensive. My original comment is not about “the poors” and I am not a tech worker nor do I make “the big bucks”. Lower the pitchforks, please.
- cozzyd 2y agomaybe in some places, but usually the problems with buses are insufficient headways and lack of traffic priority.
- seabass-labrax 2y agoThe bus stops themselves are also a large consideration. Depending on the local climate one really needs a rain/wind shelter to make waiting comfortable enough, and it is obviously beneficial to have bins, seats and electronic departure boards. A very enlightened transport network would provide free Wi-Fi, but that might be asking for just a bit too much! All in all, I feel that the 'waiting' phase of catching a bus is often neglected, yet vitally important to the total experience.
- cozzyd 2y agoThe best way to improve the waiting component is to make it shorter, but indeed, most stops should have shelters (and they do, at least most of the ones I use in my city...) Wi-Fi might have made sense years ago, but there is good cell service everywhere.