Perhaps a new public awareness campaign might help the clueless. I already have a slogan/catchphrase:
Did you smack his face with the fire extinguisher? Tell us you at least used your Ninja Death Touch on him.
In London: if you are a lunatic who just wants to pick a fight, go to a dodgy bar, boxing ring or, indeed, anywhere other than the damned Victoria Line! I have better things to do than deal with your fake umbrage over the fact that my wife should cut her hair differently.
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I can almost give them a pass on this one (sometimes taking if off and putting it back on is more trouble then it’s worth), if they would stand/move around as if they know they have a heavy/bulky/dense appendage behind them! But this happens with almost anything of any size people carry and leads me to
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Ladies, I know it’s fashionable these days to carry a shoulder bag that’s the size of Lichtenstein, but guess what? (i) If you refuse to take the damn thing off your shoulder on the bus/subway, iit’s up to you to control it and remember where it is. Anytime it’s poking far enough into my back/sides/stomach (even after I move scooch over a couple of times), I’m eventually going to assume it’s something I brought with me and start rummaging for twenties.
While seated, I actually had to say to a woman, “Is this bag yours or mine, 'cause it’s been sitting on my lap for the longest and I know I didn’t bring a purse with me today.”
Lastly, I’ve mentioned this one before but it bears repeating: Guys, you can close your legs a litte – IT AINT THAT BIG.
ETA: Larry Mudd, I got mad too quick and posted, so I didn’t your comment – it bears repeating though and I’m glad to know I’m not the only one who feels this way. Signed, Average-Sized Civic-Minded Citizen.
OP…
THANK YOU!!! Ive been meaning to post a similar thread.
As to drewbert’s post. That goes even if you are NOT at the head of a line of people waiting to get on the bus. I don’t know about other cities, but our busdrivers keep the doors open and the bus stopped until you find and deposit your money.
Which is MISERABLE when it’s 10 below, and are only just beginning to get warm from your own wait in the cold at the bus stop.
And people:…
READ A FREAKING SCHEDULE!!!
It’s not that hard. You pick up the schedule and you see what part of town you’re in, and what part of town you want to go to. There is a phone number where you can get personalized information regarding route planning and “travel training,” (and you’re a special kind of stupid if you’re an adult with normal intelligence that has to get trained on how to ride a bus), and there is an online site with click and point for every route and its destinations and times.
At every bus stop there is a schedule for the routes that stop at that particular stop.
But it never fails, the bus will stop, some moron will step up to the door and mumble “has 7 passed by yet?” or “does this go to the university?”. And that despite the fact that the answers to his questions are on the posted schedule sign behind him at the bus stop.
Don’t stand at the bus stop smoking like a chimney and then get on the bus while blowing out your last desperate gasp of toxic nastiness into the bus for the rest of us to share.
DO NOT act as if I must need your attention and company if I am GASP reading a book. I don’t.
And last, but definitely not least, please do NOT loudly (as in not even earplugs make a dent in the volume level) discuss the sordid details of your welfare account (complete with how you haven’t received your utilities check and you and your family haven’t bathed for 3 weeks), your stay at the woman’s shelter, antics of the various drunken baby daddys of your 16 different brats, your parole requirements and so on.
Lord, I HATE public transportation.
I don’t know what it’s like where you are, but in Halifax I could give a person a pass on this. I’ve occasionally found myself at the stop long before a bus I know will take me home will be by, but I certainly don’t know all the routes by heart, and if I can catch an earlier bus I will. When the only information you have is the sign on the bus stating “20 Hampford Road” or something similar, then yeah I’m gonna ask if it’s gonna stop at the Dartmouth terminal because there’s no other way for me to find out.
Clueless tourists on public transit kill me. Somehow they manage to calculate the exact spot that, if blocked, will cause the most inconvenience to everyone else around them - and stand there waiting for . . . I don’t know, the Second Coming, perhaps.
Yesterday I was sitting in front of someone who 1) talked really, really loudly, 2) insisted on coughing into my hair, and 3) was wearing a vat’s worth of cheap perfume. I wanted to turn around and smack her with my book.
That makes sense, it doesn’t sound as if directions or schedules are very clearcut there. But ours are (or should be if a person uses the teensiest bit of common sense) idiotproof.
The bus schedules, online website and telephone assistance are all very complete. The schedule has set of pages aside from the routes themselves, which contain a bunch of places that are popular destinations, such as the university and many of the malls, as well as the main downtown bus depot and all of the secondary depots.
There is a spreadsheet for each main depot or hotspot, which includes the times of departure, for each bus that goes to that particular depot or hotspot. Each route’s schedule, whether online, in the schedule book or posted at the stops themselves, has a map of that route.
There are several main stops shown on the map for each route. So it wouldn’t take much to look at your start and stop locations to get an approximate idea of where you need to get off of the bus, get on the appropriate bus, and then once enroute, ask the driver what the closest (non-mapped) stop is to your actual destination.
Generally these people I’m talking about are standing (at the main depot) in front of the large sign (complete with pictures and everything), that both shows and states that bus 7, for instance, is the bus that goes to the Airport. The times are on one side, and the pictures that show which route goes where, are on the other. If the damned thing was a snake it’d bite them! They have to actively make sure they don’t look in that direction while they’re standing their holding up drivers of the buses that aren’t the routes they need.
Someone mentioned smell above. I think I’d gladly and forever forgive the holder-openers of doors during below zero weather, if only we could keep the reeking ones off of the bus. The ones who’ve obviously worn their clothing for many months without laundering (and while drinking, smoking and peeing and worse while wearing them). Yeah, I’d be able to cheerfully stand the cold if I could avoid the stench.
I’ve never lived anywhere where that was the case. Some stops, yes, but those are in the minority.
Yup, they’re contained in flat little view boxes with plexiglass over them to protect them from the elements and they’re fastened to the bus stop sign. They must be fairly condensate-proof too, the schedules never seem to get oogy when it’s damp out, the plexiglass gets frosted over when it’s cold though.
Every once in a blue moon, one has been removed (presumably to be replaced with an updated one), or damaged by vandalism, but that’s pretty rare.
Here’s an example of the online site, as you can see the map is there along with all times for the entire day. The tabs can be clicked on for weekdays, Saturdays, or Sundays. You can also calculate based upon time of day that you’re riding.
There is a separate site at Muni.org which has a “my neighborhood” section in which you can look up the stops in your vicinity. The ones that aren’t listed as main stops on the schedule map, that is. Then you just calculate the time from the main listed stop nearest yours and guesstimate your buses arrival time based upon that. After catching it a few times, you know their routine.
The phone assistance system is a automated telephone assistance program. You know, “press 1 for the route you want” “press 1 for outgoing, 2 for inbound”. Press 1 for Dimond Center Transfer Station, Press 2 for Lake Otis and Tudor…etc. Next 4 arrival times at your stop are:…
It’s not a bad system, there needs to be a lot better scheduling to allow for catching connecting buses, and more buses available per hour, but for all of my grousing above, other than some of the nastier, smellier, least considerate riders (and a few drivers who need to go into a line of work with no contact with other humans), the system itself is not too bad.
Unfortunately, the pain in the ass part of public transport is that it can double or triple the time of your commute. Especially when you’ve got idiots who won’t have their bus passes or change ready, or else they want to have a long drawn out conversation with the driver even when they’re not even planning on getting on that particular bus. Those inconsiderate and rather stupid actions hold the bus up even more, multiplied times several stops along one’s route…ARGH!
I imagine that even without the perks of online schedules etc, with a little bit of beforehand research (mapquest, talking to experienced bus riders at the main depot, asking at the fare window etc), a person wouldn’t have that much trouble figuring out how to get from point A to point B.
It probably shouldn’t, I should be more tolerant, but people who practice learned helplessness (not just in this example, but throughout society) bug the dickens out of me! I’m not all that bright, and I suck at navigation. If I can do it, anyone can.
And after you take that last puff in the doorway of the bus, do NOT flip the rest of your still-lit cigarette over your shoulder into the face of the person getting on behind you. (I swear, this happened to me once.) For that matter, dropping your hand to waist-level and flipping it back into someone’s crotch isn’t such a great idea either.
Riders - let me get on, and let me get off. Surprisingly, once you enter the bus/train, you can continue to a space away from the door (back of the bus / middle of the subway car). If you won’t, I will, and if you complain, I will (and have) call(ed) you on it. The same goes at the exit to the escalator. MOVE DAMMIT! Everyone behind you cannot stop while you figure out which way you want to go. Lastly, let me exit before you get in. I’m fairly big and broad shouldered, and I have no problems squaring them as I get off the subway car. If you care to make a case of it, fine, but you’ll miss the train then. Smarter move is to stand to the side so people can exit.
Me too, and that’s about the only time in my adult life that I’ve ever used my size. After years of being pissed off with people not letting me get off the train, one day I had a brainwave: “Hey, why not just get off anyway?”
Works a treat, and I haven’t looked back. In fact, I don’t remember even ever having made contact with anyone. They just part like the Red Sea when they realise I’m not stoppin’.
Damn straight. As I sometimes mutter to these people, as I sit myself, “Gee, it’s almost like there’s other people in the world”.
Actually, although the aisle-sitters piss me off too, I have heard it given as advice that women (or anyone worried about personal security) travelling alone should in fact do this so as to maintain an escape route. Of course, this means that you should be positively helpful in moving aside for anybody who wants to sit down.
I have trouble seeing how the “escape route” theory means much when we’re talking about a Toronto subway car at rush hour, or that some of the big louts I see doing this have much to fear (not doubting that you’ve heard the advice, just that it doesn’t inspire much pity in my cold, black heart).
Question-is it okay to keep my bag on the seat when the bus is near empty, but move it to my lap as it starts to fill up?
(And another one whose bus schedules are fucked up. This morning, for example, for some reason my usual bus had 11D on the top crawl instead of R. What the fuck?)
Why is the Rapture a lie?
The Used Bus Superstore
Jobs in Public Transit
Is there a God?
Google ads for this tread are strange
Sure. My atheist version of WWJD – WWAOSDPD --“What would an ordinary, sensible decent person do?”
Stop trying to get on the express bus. It says, right on the front, “EXPRESS - SCHENECTADY”. We are here, in Schenectady, dropping people off. You cannot get on. Yes, we realize we are going “your way”. We are aware that the regular local bus sucks, and is probably late. The reason this bus doesn’t suck, and isn’t late, is that we don’t have to pick you idiots up every block.
Every day this happens. I really do think people don’t understand the concept of an express route. They must think express buses just drive faster.