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Friday, June 8, 2012

Caught Same Muni Driver a Year Ago Continuing to Treat Passengers Poorly


If you recall back in late August 2011, I mentioned about a Muni operator on the 18-46th Avenue line that continued to treat passengers poorly.  In one incident, he pulled over to the front end of a very long bus stop at La Playa and Cabrillo instead of the middle of the stop where the bus shelter is located; but with no passengers requesting to exit the bus, he sped off while I noticed passengers in the shelter grabbing their groceries and starting to move towards the bus.

So did the driver learn his lesson all these months?  Nope.

Just yesterday, I just finished my medical appointment and went down to my local Safeway at LaPlaya and Cabrillo (also known as "Safeway by the Beach") to pick-up something for dinner.  When I walked back to my car, I heard the familiar sound of the 18-46th Avenue inbound bus to Legion of Honor come by.

When I took a look at who was driving, I noticed the familiar cap the driver of the previous incident wore.  Thinking he might pull that unfriendly trick on passengers again, I quickly pulled out my iPhone and started recording video.  You can view the video at the top of this blog entry.

The short video you watched shows the same driver pulling all the way in front of the bus stop, instead of stopping near the cluster of passengers waiting next to the bus shelter.  The 'regular' size Muni buses are 40 feet long, and the back end of the bus was as the front end of the shelter, so I'd estimate the driver pulled 40 feet too far forward (as usual) to discharge and pick-up passengers.

Akit's Opinion:
I personally feel this is totally rude and disrespectful.  He knows the shelter is where all the passengers wait for the buses and nearly all the other drivers stops in front of the shelter, but decides to go all technical and pull to the far forward end of the bus stop.

I'm also concerned about the elderly passengers.  I normally notice many older passengers riding the 18 from that particular stop, and forcing them to haul Safeway groceries an additional 40 feet while worrying if the driver is going to close the doors and drive off is not a great feeling.

Lastly, wouldn't you think the incident back in August I blogged about and calling it in to 311 solved anything or disciplined the operator for being discourteous?  It seems like he hasn't learned his lesson.  Perhaps this blog entry doing some public shaming will teach him a lesson.

For the record, this most recent incident happened:
Thursday, June 7, 2012
5:07PM
LaPlaya and Cabrillo
Bus #8439
Route: 18-46th Avenue
Destination: Legion of Honor

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