A recent column in the Daily Breeze, a newspaper in Torrance, Calif., opened with praise for the sleek new hybrid buses rolled out by Torrance Transit, the local bus operator. The columnist, Renee Moilanen, said she was tempted to try riding the buses.
But her past bus-riding experiences were so horrible that she soon thought better of it. Turns out that Ms. Moilanen commuted for two years from Redondo Beach to Westwood, a distance of approximately 20 miles. The experience forever altered her perception of public transportation.
During my commutes, I witnessed physical altercations, suffered through the most unholy odors, and was - on one occasion - personally accosted. Worse, I started to act like a bus person, muttering to myself, glaring at other passengers, carting old shopping bags aboard. The commutes left me haggard and anxious.
I, too, have ridden local buses, and can attest to the odor problems, especially during the summer. Although I didn't ride daily for two years, I haven't seen any altercations between passengers or death threats against the driver. I've just been lucky, I guess.
My concern about these types of articles is that they can convince people to never try the bus. Although I'm confident that Ms. Moilanen has penned an accurate depiction of her trials aboard the bus, I think many people would have a less repulsed reaction.
I have a friend who rode the bus from Torrance to his office in downtown Los Angeles (about 25 miles) for two years and never saw the types of altercations that Ms. Moilanen describes. Nor did the commutes leave him "haggard and anxious." On the contrary, he boasted that his non-auto-dependent commute was a great perk because he was a federal employee (now retired) and had a full transit pass. The rides also gave him time to listen to the hundreds of songs he had loaded onto his iPod.
So, I guess the moral of this story is that people have a different level of tolerance for city bus travel. It's definitely not for everyone, as Ms. Moilanen makes clear. But other folks, especially those with no travel alternative, learn to make the best of it.
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