Ride in a Greyhound or a tour bus, and you get a very smooth ride. Ride in a city bus, and every bump and undulation goes jarring through your body. These vehicles are the same size, carry a similar payload, so what gives?
I’d guess there isn’t a difference in spring tension. Highways typically have far less bumps and certainly have less stop/go traffic. Further, the seats on a greyhound are softer than your typical bus.
IIRC I think Greyhound buses are considerably larger than most city buses.
I don’t think it’s either one of those answers. Greyhounds have a very plush ride, whereas city buses jar your bones over the slightest imperfections. And they are about the same size.
Just a WAG here, but maybe Greyhound puts a lot more money into their buses than your typical city transit authority? This could simply be the result of either better maintenance or higher quality vehicles/equipment.
Here’s a quick summary of bus suspension issues.
Most intercity buses use some variant of independent suspension with gas-filled bags (“air-ride”) as suspension dampers, while city buses tend to use simpler leaf-or-coil spring suspensions, on solid axles, for reasons of cost and serviceability.
I have to admit, seeing how interior components literally get shaken to pieces on older city buses, I’ve often wondered myself why the purchasing authorities don’t go for something a little more sophisticated, but apparently independent air-ride systems’ maintenance costs are too high to consider for this application.
and solid-spring vehicles need to be able to carry the maximum passenger load w/o bottoming, so if a city bus has solid springs and a light load, it’s going to be rough.
It essentially comes down to the issue of cost vs. the operating company’s give-a-shit level for your butthurt. Greyhound needs to get people to want to ride their bus for hundreds of miles. People won’t do that if they have to get ass-pounded for hours. Municipal operators only need you to be willing to take an ass-jarring for a couple of miles, because you have to get to your appointment across town, and, hey, it beats walking.
This ^ (Ass-tute insight)