Over Crowded Park & Ride Buses

[Trae]

"You smelt it, you delt it".

Dumbass rule. And here have been plenty of arguments on my elementary school bus about it.

[cnote]

I have had the unfortunate experience of sitting next to someone who was dealing the whole ride...for an hour!!! It was terrible, but the worst by far is getting on a bus in the morning where someone has that terrible morning breath halitosis...it can stink up the whole bus. What the hell makes someone's breath smell like that??? acid reflux???

[CDeb]

"Whoever made the rhyme, did the crime."

[Vertigo58]

Was once on the Big Blue Bus in LA headed to downtown at rush hour. Bus was packed with mostly workers. There were 2 really intoxicated loafers at the back of the bus seated near me and they started an argument with a group of what must have been friends. Racial slurs were exchanged. It got louder and louder and then fist's began flying. Everyone started rushing/squeezing towards the front to get away from the elee. Bus driver pulls over quickly orders everyone off (they started running off anyway) one of the drunks pulls out a long bladed knife and starts swiping at the driver. I followed the others and did not look back. This is just a typical day in LA.

I kind of miss those bizarro days.

[102IAHexpress]

When I worked in downtown I slugged all the time. There was one time that I slugged with a very tired driver. No joke I thought he was going to dose off. Another time I slugged with a driver who was low on gas. So she decided to detour and fill up, a bit annoying, but not the end of the world.

I

[lockmat]

For those who have never slugged, it's the social equivalent of a really long elevator ride.

Really now? And it's still worth it? How much time does someone in line for the bus save if joining a slug driver?

[102IAHexpress]

Yeah, you do save time, but it mostly depends where you are in Downtown. For the 228 bus riders, the farther south your bus stop is in Downtown the more time you

[MetroMogul]

Metro's bus operation department seems to be in a bit of turmoil right now. There is an over abundance of park and ride buses at the West and Hiram Clarke facilities and not enough park and ride buses at the rest of the bus depots. I have seen a park and ride bus on the 47 - Hillcroft Crosstown, a route that normally uses 30ft. mini buses and seeing the older Neoplan Metroliners on local and express routes out of West garage is commonplace. Even the newest MCIs have been spotted on the 2 - Bellaire route.

This is due to Metro retiring hundreds of buses over the past five years and only taking in a little over 100 in that same time period. 10 of those are not even on the road yet. Metro could be using the retired Ikarus buses to run local trips currently covered by Metroliners and the Metroliners could be used to supplement park and ride service on the most needy routes. Of course, that would not even be necessary if Metro had not retired 54 articulated park and ride buses last year, many of which had received overhauls and were used on some of the most overcrowded park and ride routes.

[JLWM8609]

Metro's bus operation department seems to be in a bit of turmoil right now. There is an over abundance of park and ride buses at the West and Hiram Clarke facilities and not enough park and ride buses at the rest of the bus depots. I have seen a park and ride bus on the 47 - Hillcroft Crosstown, a route that normally uses 30ft. mini buses and seeing the older Neoplan Metroliners on local and express routes out of West garage is commonplace. Even the newest MCIs have been spotted on the 2 - Bellaire route.

This is due to Metro retiring hundreds of buses over the past five years and only taking in a little over 100 in that same time period. 10 of those are not even on the road yet. Metro could be using the retired Ikarus buses to run local trips currently covered by Metroliners and the Metroliners could be used to supplement park and ride service on the most needy routes. Of course, that would not even be necessary if Metro had not retired 54 articulated park and ride buses last year, many of which had received overhauls and were used on some of the most overcrowded park and ride routes.

Time to break out those mothballed Eagles, Flixibles and GMCs at the Polk garage. Any bit helps, right? lol.

Here's the solution to the problem. Buy a few of these 81 ft long beauties and put "suburban" or "coach" style seating in them.