Passenger Quota on Muni?

This came from Muni rider Joey:

Tuesday evening on the 45 headed from Cal Train station. Apparently the bus driver thought the 45 was some sort of shuttle bus. I was a bit late for the 5:37 p.m. bus but at 5:43 p.m. it was still there and  pretty full. I grabbed one of the handful of seats left and figured we would be moving momentarily. But we sat there for another 10 minutes, while the bus got fuller and fuller.

By the time we left people were already yelling to those in the back to “MOVE to the back of the bus.” Maybe the bus driver thought if she crammed as many people on the bus as she could that she wouldn’t have to make many stops for the rest of the route. I too hate the bus constantly stopping, but it’s public transportation not the Google shuttle, it can leave the terminal with seats available.

Anybody else encountered this? Seems like another big reason the buses aren’t on time — and as Jeff commented yesterday about the Muni Wish List, there are some definite improvements that won’t really cost us any of that stimulus money.

4 comments

  • Erik

    How do you know the bus waiting at 5:43 was the 5:37?

  • eugenia

    Hmmm hard to tell – the 45’s supposed schedule is every 10 minutes so could this have been the 5:47 bus but early? I’ve been in buses near the Cal Train station where they were waiting too, but hard to tell which bus we’re on when it doesn’t come or leave on its schedule.

  • Erik

    Or the previous one had only left a few minutes before and the driver didn’t want to end up bunched up behind it.

  • This shows why the on-time requirement was a good idea but not quite the right one. What matters isn’t so much that the 5:37 is there at exactly 5:37, if that means that if the 5:47 bus breaks down no bus at all comes until 5:57. What would be better isn’t service at precise times, but for riders to know that regardless of when they get to the stop, it’s only going to be X minutes until the next bus comes. The way the on-time requirement is written, it causes as many problems as the long dwell times created by prohibiting all-door boarding. Plus it creates a looking-through-a-straw measure of whether Muni is doing its job.

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