I didn't have the best of journeys home yesterday. For some reason the bus that I take at Shepherd's Bush didn't turn up for half an hour and some people had already been waiting for 25 minutes before me.So you can imagine the free-for-all scrum that ensued when the bus did arrive. It made me realise that perhaps a rich man could easily get through the eye of an needle so long as there was a bus that they've been waiting almost an hour for on the other side!
Once on, my twenty minute journey was akin to being squashed into a sardine can with the added bonus of there being a singing drunk, a praying Muslim and two crying babies in close proximity.
Incredibly people were still polite as they disembarked, actually saying "Excuse me" rather than barging their way through as happens sometimes on the Tube. It's probably because we realised that we were all in the same boat, having waited so long, and that agro wasn't really needed when all you wanted to do was get out to the relative fresh air of the streets.
It's amazing that each year my travelcard costs more and more but the service I get from Transport For London gets more overcrowded and less pleasant. Lots of people on the bus were obviously not too bothered by this as I could clearly see and hear that they hadn't touched the Oyster Card reader to pay for their journey. Bus drivers are unperturbed by this as they also don't want the agro that asking people to pay or get off would entail.
Basically, the bendy bus that I take to and from work is a free service for a large majority of the travellers on it. It was raining yesterday, so the bus made a convenient one or two stop shuttle service for a lot of people. In particular, I noticed that although we waiting absolutely ages for the bus, the number of people getting off within the first three stops was incredible.
I breathed a big sigh of relief as I got off the bus but the fun didn't just stop there for me either. There was a huge crowd at the bus stop blocking the pavement as I got off and straight into that crowd came a bloke on his bike, riding the pavement like he owned it and pushing people out of the way.
I reached out and put my arm out to stop him running me over and the next thing I know he's pointing at my leg to a pit bull behind him in the crowd, and shouting "shake!"
The momentum of the guy on the bike had carried him past me and I was still in a crowd so the dog didn't know whose leg to lock onto and "shake" so I briskly walked off and crossed the road away from him without looking back and until I was well clear.
Am now starting to realise that perhaps I need to move to a nicer area.
*sigh* If only I could afford it!
4 comments:
The reason most people won't have touched the Oyster readers is that they don't have to - You only need to touch it on a bendy bus if you have a pay as you go card - Travelcards don't need to at all, and that's the vast majority of us.
You'd think so wouldn't you?
But apparently, even if you have a period travelcard, you MUST touch in and will get fined if you don't should an inspector make a rare appearance.
It explains this all on leaflets and posters that were up a while ago. I guess it's a useful way of knowing how many people actually travel on the bus (discounting the multitude that don't touch in and travel for free.)
I never used to bother either but now I know better.
my journey to work used to involve a large amount of travel on a "wonderful" bendy bus and of the many hundred journeys or so that have been made, I think i've had the pleasure of an inspector looking....perhaps three times?
Being a cheapskate I use Oyster PAYG (but have no money so have to be a cheapskate!) and always, no matter what, touch the card on the reader. When an inspector gets on and people realise, there are suddenly a large amount of people going "beep". And an even larger amount of people trying to explain why they've not beeped - a large amount of whom don't have an oyster card, don't have any money on them, haven't purchase a paper ticket at the machine, and see the bendy bus as a "free" route...
rant over...sorry! how many inspectors have you experienced?
About thrice too, though twice recently.
A bloke sat next to me on the bus suddenly jumped off VERY quickly the other day....guess why! :)
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