sean's place

On Buses and Transit

I love riding the bus…

I have recently taken to chatting up the bus driver on my daily (sometimes twice daily) trips between school and home. Today was a little different: there was extra bus riding. When I get excited about something, I tend to share it with everyone.

I don’t know what it is, I just find bus drivers to be interesting people and they are fun to talk to.

Today, I rode to school on route 1 and 6b to school, but was a little too tired to drum up conversation. Fast forward a bit. At 10:30A, I was done with lab so I walked out to Mott Gym and saw Alice in command of bus 141, route 6B. Alice and I have developed a bit of a rapport – she greets me by name (way cool) and we chat amicably if the bus isn’t too busy. Mid-day is a quieter period for the bus system, so it’s usually a given that the seat nearest to the driver is open. So I chatted with Alice ’till the transit center and waxed disappointed that I had to wait 20 minutes or so for my transfer (it’s easier to get home if I leave school on the hour). Route 6B works on 30 minute headways, so I opted to ride around again to wait for route 1. More time to chat with Alice.

I transferred to route 1 after the next go ’round, and chatted with Jen (who I’ve ridden with, but I never knew her name) until my stop at Orcutt and Laurel. It was a bit grim for my taste, but Jen is a nice person and quite lively early in the morning. (She drove route 6B when I went to school this morning).

On the way to school again at 4PM, there was a new face on route 1. He went on to tell me how he’s studying PoliSci and was transferring to Cal Poly. He also told me a bit about his weakness at math and asked if I knew any math tutors. So, call out to the math majors out there: want to tutor a bus driver? Think logarithms…

Unfortunately, route 6b didn’t hear his call for me to transfer over so I took route 5 to school. The driver of route 5 is one of those stolid, don’t talk to the passengers, type. So, no luck there. Same on the way back from school at 6: I grabbed Route 6B…

At 6PM, the transfer to route 8 (route 1 turns into route 8 at night and follows an abbreviated route) is nearly impossible. The traffic out of Poly is stifling and there is just no way 6B can make it from school to downtown before route 8 exceeds its maximum hold (scheduled departure + 5 minutes) time. Oh well.

I get to the transit center to see an empty route 7, and lo’ and behold, captained by the PoliSci driver from earlier in the day. I board his bus and gab with him for a bit – I even opt to ride around with him for a few stops while his route follows route 8′s. I learn that this fellow’s name is Aaron and we talk this time about various taverns and bars in downtown SLO. He lets me off at Nipomo and Marsh… I ask him kindly to let Alice aboard route 8 know that I’d be waiting for her at Marsh and Broad.

So I get on route 8 and share greetings with Alice (who is, by the way, quite a nice driver) and talk with her on my way home…

This school year, I have ridden all the SLO Transit routes but 1. I have found a lot of interesting conversations with the drivers, props to Alice, Steve, Aaron, Sam, and Jen for being fun to ride with. These folks get the opportunity to meet a lot of interesting people on their travels (city-confined though they may be) and they are just interesting people in general.

I spent a lot of time on buses today and enjoyed it all.