There is a certain happiness sighted when your bus comes along. It is of course a small specialized form of happiness and will never be a great thing.

-Richard Brautigan, The Old Bus

Friday, May 18, 2007

A short update -- about this tall

Is May "Random Driver Month" at Sacramento Regional Transit? Or maybe May 21 to 25 was "Random Driver Week"?

I miss my regular drivers on the 82 bus from American River College to the 65th Street station. Come back, please.

I have been trying for three weeks to leave for work on the 8:04 a.m. bus rather than the 8:34 bus. I summarized this effort in the Art of Getting Settled post back in April. The problem is that I can't seem to arrive a half-hour earlier.

The earlier bus is a favorite with Sac State students. While the bus a half-hour later races along the final couple of miles of the route, the earlier bus must make frequent stops. And when the bus has to load and off-load a wheelchair rider, as it did today, the schedule just flies out the window. It's a bit disappointing, especially since Sac State's Hornet Express bus service could sweep up much of this crowd.

The first week I had a regular driver who was obviously experienced with the route. More often than not, the bus arrived at Sac State close enough to on-time that I could make the 30 line connection downtown. Then the driver spent several days training someone and now he's gone. This week I tried the early bus yesterday and today. I had a different driver each day. Neither could make the connection. Yesterday, the 30 bus was pulling out as the 82 arrived, and today the 30 was already at the Carlson and J Street light when the 82 finally reached Sac State. At least today I had the presence of mind to stay on the bus until 65th Street, where I only had to wait two minutes to catch the train downtown.

I suppose this takes a little of the rose color tint off the transitarian classes. Darn, it's just not a perfect world.

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