Took a brief break - caught rides to work with my daughter last week. I ride the bus home, but for reasons unknown, the ride home usually doesn't inspire like the morning.This post recounts yesterday morning's ride - quite an interesting event. Grabbed the 7:57am 81N - Roy in absentia - probably his day off. The driver greeted me nicely and I sat in my favorite spot, the right front seat. Every stop had passengers waiting and both spots on the bus rack filled quickly. At the 60 and McClintock a young man waited with a bicycle. He saw the filled rack and backed away as if to wait for the next bus. The driver asked the young man's destination and then told him to get on and stand in the aisle with his bike. A nice gesture by the driver and obviously appreciated by the young man. We continued north on McClintock, and at Southern, a young woman stood with her bike. The bus rack still full, the young woman backed away from the bus, but, as before, the driver asked her destination and told her to bring the bike onto the bus, stand in the aisle and hold it. Since the other bike already occupied center aisle, this put the young woman and her velocipede more toward the front, blocking me into my seat. The driver, watching the young woman get settled, looked at me and asked when I needed to get off the bus. I told him, ASU, same as the young woman, so her bike caused no hindrance for me. We continued on and I wondered what the driver would say if another bike rider hoped to catch the route. Such thoughtful consideration seems a rare commodity these days - we could all use the civility lesson this driver provided.
The image contains, of course, the bicycles. The "Hello?" refers to a man on the bus, talking loudly on a cell phone and constantly asking, "Hello?" He kept telling the person on the other end to move around, the connection seemed bad - apparently it didn't occur to him that using his phone on a moving bus might create problems with the call? Wish people would leave their cell phones in their pockets while riding.
2 comments:
Very few (if any) buses in the UK have any facility at all for cycles...there simply isn't the room...so it was interesting to read about how practises vary elsewhere...
Thanks
I'm surprised that buses everywhere don't have the bike racks. Most stops also have u-racks so bikes could be locked and left at the stop. Our public transportation in Phoenix is certainly lacking, but they do make an effort to accommodate the bicyclists.
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