smokeyjoe
New Member
Last night, while sitting in the dark on a broke down hybrid bus in downtown Toronto, I had the opportunity to speak with the driver.
(I'll not state the route for fear of repurcussions made to the driver who was a very friendly fellow)
He revealed some very interesting points:
TTC drivers are not properly trained. Basically what he was told is that when something odd happens, turn everything off and 'reboot.' He admitted that he didn't understand what half of the lights were on his control panel were for.
He, and many other drivers, was extremely frustrated with the operation of the busses.
The busses themselves are horrible to operate when full. The suspension is extremely poor with a full load -the shocks easily bottom out- and the passenger bottlenecking at the front entrance is worse than on any other bus.
Although equipped to accomodate wheelchair passengers, he described how they had to back onto the bus from the front, and subsequently back down the aisle, or try to turn around once they got on to see where they were going, which as anyone can imagine is not a simple thing on a reasonably crowded bus.
When I asked him how these busses could have made it onto the road without proper testing under various conditions he felt as though it was because someone in the business was 'lining their pockets.'
I went on to ask him a couple of other things about the busses themselves. (As a life long transit rider, I've never noticed too much to complain about until these abominations appeared upon our streets)
I asked him why it was necessary that the busses make a horrible farting sound when lowering to the sidewalk? Wasn't it possible that someone could have spent an extra .50 per unit to solve the problem?
Also, the rear doors are particularly difficult to open. I'm a healthy adult male, and even I find them difficult sometimes. Imagine what an elderly person with a bag of groceries must have to go through!
He basically didn't have much to say about either point other than that the busses just aren't that poeple friendly.
As I spoke to him, I actually started to sympathize. He's got to try and operate a faulty product with a bad design, and he's the one who is on the front line of dealing with the public.
So..... not only does this waste of your and my money NOT do what they were promised to do, they're also poorly designed, don't funcion properly half the time, and are unfriendly to the riders they are supposed to serve.
(I'll not state the route for fear of repurcussions made to the driver who was a very friendly fellow)
He revealed some very interesting points:
TTC drivers are not properly trained. Basically what he was told is that when something odd happens, turn everything off and 'reboot.' He admitted that he didn't understand what half of the lights were on his control panel were for.
He, and many other drivers, was extremely frustrated with the operation of the busses.
The busses themselves are horrible to operate when full. The suspension is extremely poor with a full load -the shocks easily bottom out- and the passenger bottlenecking at the front entrance is worse than on any other bus.
Although equipped to accomodate wheelchair passengers, he described how they had to back onto the bus from the front, and subsequently back down the aisle, or try to turn around once they got on to see where they were going, which as anyone can imagine is not a simple thing on a reasonably crowded bus.
When I asked him how these busses could have made it onto the road without proper testing under various conditions he felt as though it was because someone in the business was 'lining their pockets.'
I went on to ask him a couple of other things about the busses themselves. (As a life long transit rider, I've never noticed too much to complain about until these abominations appeared upon our streets)
I asked him why it was necessary that the busses make a horrible farting sound when lowering to the sidewalk? Wasn't it possible that someone could have spent an extra .50 per unit to solve the problem?
Also, the rear doors are particularly difficult to open. I'm a healthy adult male, and even I find them difficult sometimes. Imagine what an elderly person with a bag of groceries must have to go through!
He basically didn't have much to say about either point other than that the busses just aren't that poeple friendly.
As I spoke to him, I actually started to sympathize. He's got to try and operate a faulty product with a bad design, and he's the one who is on the front line of dealing with the public.
So..... not only does this waste of your and my money NOT do what they were promised to do, they're also poorly designed, don't funcion properly half the time, and are unfriendly to the riders they are supposed to serve.
