Why is it, that every few months Metro Transit decides to switch up their regular driver’s schedules? It throws everything into complete chaos. Up until a week ago I could rely on the bus getting me to the bus terminal so I could make one of three connections. Then you changed drivers and each and every one this week has been between 5 – 10 minutes late causing me to miss all three connections, which makes me late for work. It’s 6:30 in the morning! There is no traffic, no construction and therefore no excuse to be up to 10 minutes behind schedule! Why should I have to change schedules completely to try and accommodate this horrid variability in bus drivers?! It’s this kind of stuff that makes people hate on Metro Transit all the time. —Waiting for Metro Transit to get it’s sh*t together
This article appears in Aug 18-24, 2016.
‘…variability in bus drivers…’ – now, I’d like to see the instrument that could measure that.
Well, you need to leave one go-time early and take the first bus of the day. Seriously. Why put so much control of your life in the hands of someone else. Three buses is just asking for trouble. An earlier start doesn’t guarantee you will arrive on time but it will lessen the stress in the mornings. Oh yeah, what would you do should they go on strike like in 2012? Their contract will soon be open for negotiation. Gonna be a long walk!
If a bus is late on the second run of the day a more prudent person would deduce that the problem lies in the scheduling. I am unfortunate enough to have to rely on transit on a daily basis. If you ever peruse the scheduling you will notice in scores of instances that some routes do not give the driver enough time to get to point B from point A. The amount of time to get between checkpoints is physically impossible. Example: the route 35 leaves Lacewood terminal and has only 10 minutes to go down Lacewood to Farnham Gate on to Dunbrack then down Flamingo to the Bedford Highway to MSVU. You cannot do that it a car let alone a bus that has to stop every 50 metres to pick up people. By the time the bus reaches MSVU it is anywhere from 10 to 15 minutes late so then that driver may be late for the rest of the day as he/she struggles to make up the time. This is just one example on one route. You have a right to be angry with Transit but getting angry with a driver is the same as getting angry at a cashier in a supermarket over the price of groceries. Call 311 and complain about the scheduling and it’s ineffectiveness on keeping buses on time. As an enlightened gentlemen once commented on this site, “be the change that you want it to be.”
I’d like to see all bus drivers take the bus to work. Ì’ll bet the city would get pissed off when they start arriving late for work.
I”d like to see Transit Management and City Council, including the Mayor take the buses to work, during the Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter and taste and see how it is good! Can you see the Mayor jumping over snow banks and avoiding slush/ice as he gets on and off the buses? That would be a sight that may give some of us hope. But don’t count on seeing any of that in the near future. If the Union had any brains they would make this an issue during the negotiations. You want to see a bunch of entitled assholes scurry like cockroaches? The public should be demanding they take the bus. Just sayin’.
And FYI some bus drivers do take buses to work.