My first 6 months as a trimet bus driver

From a post on reddit. https://www.reddit.com/r/Portland/comments/c2eee6/my_first_6_months_as_a_trimet_bus_operator_part_1/




My first 6 months as a TriMet bus operator, part 1.
u/BridgeCityBus
EDIT: Holy crap, Batman! I was not prepared for this kind of response. I’ve been sharing my work stories with friends and family on Facebook and they told me I should put all of it in one place and/or do a blog. I’m not super savvy with all the options, but I had a Reddit account years ago so this was my go-to. I attempted to put it all as one post, but I guess there are character limits. I have probably two more parts that I’ll get out in the coming week or so.

Your feedback is amazing and super encouraging! It will definitely keep a big smile on my face well past 3am, when I’m driving back to the garage.

And hey, thanks for the Reddit goodies!! I’m gonna have to research what Reddit gold is. I’ve only read about it on others’ posts: “Thanks for the gold!”

So yeah, THANKS FOR THE GOLD!! I’m blushing over here.

Y’all are fantastic!! Have a great day.

12/29/18

I just finished my first week driving on my own for TriMet. A few things that happened this week:

-Naked man at a bus stop.

-Man found sleeping in parked bus for over 5 hours. (Thankfully not my “oops”)

-A fight on my bus--young woman bullying a man with a disability that turned into a shoving match.

-A car cut me off and stopped in traffic so that passengers could board my bus.

-Santa Claus got arrested on Christmas Eve on the Tillicum Bridge.

-Drunk, disheveled man hopped on my bus and then got right off, double flipped me off and yelled obscenities to whoever was listening.

-A grown man yelled terrible things at his elderly mother, as his children cowered next to her and had to say a sad goodbye before leaving with their dad.

-A drunk 20 yr old woman called me fat and middle aged.

-A newly 21 yr old man was celebrating his first week of legal drinking by sampling margaritas around town and going by bus. He was funny and sweet.

-I was thanked and told that I am a very patient young lady by a very sweet older couple.

-A young man came up to me while on break and thanked me for being awesome.

-I’ve been told three times, "Thank you for your service," while on my way to or from work. Kinda awkward, but nice I guess.

I've met some very wonderful, sweet Portlanders from all backgrounds and lifestyles. I love this job!! It's gotta be one of the best people-watching jobs out there.

2/28/2019

Driving the bus through Troutdale last night, I stopped the proper 15 feet back from a crosswalk to let two pedestrians cross the road. They wave at me, I wave back. They just stand there. I sit there confused for a moment. Then I recognize the big, goofy smile of one of my regulars. He’s standing at a bus stop that I rarely stop at, that also just happens to be at a cross walk, probably wondering why I stopped so far back and didn’t open the door. We had a good chuckle about it.

This is my last week on my routes. I’m going to miss the familiar faces and familiar roads. Next week I go full time, sometimes working 10+ hours and driving past 3am. I’m a little nervous about longer hours, new routes, and late, late nights. But I’ll get to see the sunset on the mountain from new angles, I’ll find more familiar, smiling faces, and I’ll get to explore just a little bit more of this awesome city that we live in. I love my job!

3/5/2018

During a TiMet’s bus operator’s probation, there are 6 check rides. A check ride is basically when a training supervisor hops on your bus unscheduled and rides with you for a portion of your shift. They make sure that you are practicing the company’s policies as well as continuing to develop the good habits that are taught in training. It can be kind of intimidating, but it’s also almost a comfort to have as a new driver—if something comes up, you have a resource right there on your bus.

It’s a great opportunity to get feedback and ask questions. The reviews I’ve gotten in the past have been things like: -Work on your braking. Make smoother stops. -Use better judgement when making stops - I had stopped at a bus stop where the back door would have opened into a tree. -Check your mirrors more, especially the right side when pulling into a stop. -Don’t close the door when someone is standing at the fare box. -Don’t be so rude to your customers. (Joking)

So I had a check ride yesterday while I was driving the 4. It was the second time I’ve driven that route and a lot of drivers don’t like it for various reasons. There was a construction reroute that I had somehow missed in the paperwork, so I was super lucky to have a training supervisor on my bus to help me out.

Anyway, I didn’t get any constructive feedback this week!! He gave me the paperwork with a big smile. I’m not sure if he just does this once for each of his students to help us build confidence, but either way it sure worked!! “Good Job” has never felt so good!! Especially since last night ended up being super stressful and the first time that I almost cried...almost. I love my job, but that doesn’t mean that sometimes I wish I could just hide from everyone.

3/20/2019

This week in bus driving:

1 high five

1 hug

1 ambulance

1 fire truck

1 attempted pinch for not wearing green

1 adult temper tantrum in a cross walk

1 “I missed my stop because I’m drunk and was playing video games”

2 familiar faces from my bartending days (one came with that hug)

2 “YOU MISSED MY STOP!” Oops.

3 ‘Thank you’s accompanied by pats on my shoulder

3 people I couldn’t wait for and had to pass up (running for the bus after I had already pulled out and there was no safe place for me to stop)

3 crying babies

4 “You’re a good driver.”

4 cars illegally parked at bus stops, not allowing me to pull to the sidewalk

6 times I waited for a straggler to cross the street so they could catch my bus

8 Uber or Lyft drivers being jerks in the bus mall

10 people annoyed because I didn’t pull to the sidewalk and instead stopped in the street

12 honks of my horn

16 free tickets given out

20+ motorists who should probably be riding the bus instead of driving

30+ high pitched hiccups from a drunk guy, making his girlfriend giggle each time

100s of “thank you’s”, “good morning’s” and “goodnight’s”

3/24/19

Well, I cried at work for the first time tonight.

Imagine, if you will, that you’re driving a bus in downtown Portland around 11pm on a Saturday night. Folks are tipsy as they exit all the venues and head home. As you pass a group of people on the sidewalk, you hear a loud yell, followed by some kind of noise to the side of your bus. You look in the right mirror and see a skateboard falling to the ground right by your duals at the back of the bus, but you can’t see a person.

This is my biggest fear. I can’t imagine hurting someone. It’s a tough reality of the job, though. In training they put us in a simulator set up for us to fail. In one version that I did, I hit a cyclist and I could feel the seat move to simulate my duals running them over. It was chilling. They start the day off with safety training including showing awful footage of people being killed by bus driver mistakes, and then send us off to road training. I think everyone was terrified to get behind the wheel on those days.

I THOUGHT I HIT SOMEONE!! All of my passengers went to look out the right-side mirrors, as we were all also curious about what just happened. So I put the bus in park and stepped out. Things are a little hazy at this point, because adrenaline was in full gear. I approached a group of folks on the sidewalk and asked them what had happened, as I couldn’t see anything around the bus. A lady responded with “Oh, some kid was skateboarding and misjudged the sidewalk. His skateboard flew into the road. I bet it gave that bus driver a good scare!” She didn’t realize I was the operator. Haha. Then two teenagers came up with skateboards in their arms and apologized. I told them they need to be more careful and are lucky one of them isn’t wrapped up in my duals.

As I got back on the bus, one of my customers asked “So, do we need to call a mortician?” We were all pretty shaken up and I think everyone let out a stressed chuckle.

A few blocks down the road I got to the end of my line with 6 minutes before I had to turn around and head back to Gresham. I finally felt the full impact of this “what if?” when got out of my seat. I almost dropped my phone while calling Dispatch because I was shaking so hard. I explained what had happened and that I didn’t think I could get my shit together in 6 minutes. I was sure that I couldn’t drive safely in my current condition.

Dispatch is awesome. They told me to not worry about my pullout time and they were sending a supervisor out to “check for damage to the bus”. They immediately sent out a bus to start my route for me and I had two supervisors show up. Of course there was no damage. They were there to joke with me about running over skateboards (not skateboarders!) in their own careers as operators and get me to relax a bit. One of the supervisors called me kiddo. After about 15 minutes or so, I was good to go and sent out to catch up with my replacement down the road.

Right now I’m at home and still amped up on adrenaline. Probably one of the most scary moments of my life. I’m so thankful that nobody was hurt, and so thankful for how hard my company works for its operators. No buses were late. I wasn’t on the road when I didn’t feel safe driving. With the exception of the customers on my bus at the time of the incident, no one would have noticed a change of service. It’s pretty awesome.

Oh, and I have awesome coworkers. A bus behind me saw what had happened and when he caught up to me at the end of the line he offered a hug and encouraged me to call dispatch for some extra time. He also told me where it happened, since I couldn’t remember for the stupid report I had to fill out.

3/25/19

A guy tonight at a transit center was yelling at everyone getting on my bus. “It’s not rocket science! Get on the f-ing bus!” Ugh.

Of course he is the last one to hop on and ask for a free ride to the next stop. I wanted to say “no” so badly, but instead I said “If you leave your negative energy on the curb, you got it!”

“Yes ma’am. No negative energy. I promise.”

When he got off he said, “I love you, big sister.”

This guy is a mess and every operator has the right to say “nope!” but sometimes it’s just easier to say “yes” and give someone a little grace for a moment.

Also I’m scared of saying “no” in a lot of situations. You never know how it could escalate, or how much time it could waste when your schedule is by the second.

4/1/19

Had to switch busses today. Puddle of pee and undies in a seat, as well as pee running along the floor. The sad part of that is that it was a little girl who had an accident. I complimented her on her pretty princess dress on her way onto the bus. She walked off with it soaking wet as her mom whispered to me that there was a mess. :(

4/3/19

Worst day at work so far. I’ve shared all the happy, sunshiny parts of my job, but tonight was not one of those days.

My schedule for this specific run does not allow enough time for evening traffic, so even when I show up and start working before I’m getting paid for it, I start my first run late. Even if it’s just by 2 minutes (tonight was over 10), it ends up cascading into later and later as the route goes on. Once you get about 4-5 minutes late, you start picking up your follower’s passengers and things really start to drag. In training, they are really great at reminding us that we are paid by the minute, so not to fret when we are late. However all those minutes cut into our break time. Today I worked a good 6 hours with less than 15 minutes total of breaks. I finally got another 10 minutes and now I have a 15 minute break. Not many of the low seniority runs have breaks long enough to use the bathroom and eat a meal or take a walk. If we need extra time, we can always let dispatch know, but that just makes us late on our next run and borrows time from the next break that is already too short.

A short list of everything else tonight:

-Watched a semi truck run a red and hit another semi (no bad damage).

-Guy rode my bus a full round trip and smelled worse than anything I could ever imagine. It’s been an hour and I still can’t get the smell out of the bus. People were dry heaving and I think I will have to burn my clothes when I get home.

-Same guy took 15 minutes to get off my bus, taking all of my break. I had to walk him back to a bench, catching him every time he almost fell down.

-Found a half bottle of Brokers just now. Pretty sure that was his.

-Had about 20 fare evaders who all took WAY to much time to board and get off. I swear it’s the ones that don’t pay that eat up all of the driver’s time. It’s sooooo frustrating!

Ugh. I’m happy it’s my Friday. I have 2 hours left and then I get to drive my little Jetta home. Yay!

4/6/19

There’s this teenager who rides my bus on Saturdays. He dresses punk-alternative and always looks like he’s ready to fight. Never said “hi” back or even looked at me every time I greeted him. A couple weeks ago I had a close call when a Bronco cut me off. I had a full bus and stopped just hard enough for everyone to notice. Down the line, when the kid got off he said “Hey, good job. That guy was a dick!” I nodded in agreement and said goodbye. Today he got on my bus and greeted me with a warm smile. Yay! Making allies over common enemies.

4/7/19

I can’t stop laughing about what happened last night. A guy got on my bus with an open beer in his pocket. I asked him if that was beer and he told me it was an empty can. “Okay sir, but if I see you drinking from it we’ll have to talk again.” “Yes, ma’am.”

A couple stops down the road he gets off and another man from the middle of the bus approaches to tell me that that guy had spilled his beer on the seat. Of course he spilled his pocket beer! I jokingly asked, “Are you sure it’s just beer?!” So this guy slaps his hand into the seat puddle and smells it. “Yep!”

4/9/19

I had two men on my bus tonight who yelled and talked to themselves, in two very different and wonderful ways.

The first man was on my first trip of the day. I pulled up at Lombard TC and as soon as I opened the door he was right there and yelled angrily “NO!!” right in my face. I still greeted him with a smile and thanked him when he showed me his pass. As he entered, he continued to scold whoever was listening. “This is not social hour!! What’s so funny?! Shut the fuck up!” There were two gabbing teenagers who gave him a sideways look, smiled at each other and continued with their conversation. He was just another one of those loud street folk, not a real threat. He continued to yell things every now and then. At one point he had a somewhat normal conversation with someone who boarded for only a couple stops. When we got close to his stop, he stood up and angrily proclaimed “OKAY!” and pulled the cord. As I was pulling up to his stop he half yelled, half sang “Go your own waaaaaaay!” A little ray of sunshine had just shown through his perceived anger and aggression. It was kinda beautiful. I was stuck with that Fleetwood Mac song in my head for the rest of my shift.

The second man was on my last trip of the night. He was a young, professionally dressed, handsome man who greeted me with a smile and his fare. He had large headphones on but I still said my usual “Hey there, thank you!” At some point in his bus commute he started to have physical and vocal tics, making guttural noises and jabbing his arms out in front of him. I’ve known enough people with Tourette’s to safely assume that this is what he was displaying. For the next several stops until he got to his destination, he would respond to every one of my “thank you”s with a loud, “MUCH APPRECIATED!!” Just so you can understand this better, I say “thank you” to each person as they enter by bus, as well as when they exit. Often it goes unacknowledged, even without eye contact or a shrug, but I still say it with a smile....for my own sanity. For these five or so stops I made, it tickled me to have a loud, happy echo to each of my “thank you”s. I felt acknowledged and it felt good.

4/10/19

Another loooooong Tuesday at work.

On my very first run, I pulled up to a stop and did a perfect job of aligning my back passenger door right up to a utility pole. It’s hard to find a reference point in the mirror for that back door. I try to avoid bushes and puddles, and some stops are front door only stops. This particular stop was one of those weird ones and I failed miserably. As a passenger tried to exit, the back door opened right onto the damn pole and the rubber flaps just stuck there, open.

I tried turning the bus off and turning the air on and off, as well as the door switch in every possible combination. I had about a dozen passengers excited to get home from work, who tried to make some suggestions. Two men were trying to muscle the doors closed as one lady suggested that I should pull up about 6 inches to remedy the problem. I had to ask the men to stop, as I knew that wouldn’t work and I didn’t want to be responsible for any damage. I also had to explain to the kind lady that as a safely measure, the buses are designed to not budge whenever a door is open. Sooooo....I had to call dispatch.

While we were standing on the sidewalk and watching 82nd back up behind the bus, a lady explained to me that she was on her way to meet her niece, who was always late. She had lectured this 15 year old earlier in the day about how she had to be on time today, no matter what. Of course now this woman was going to be the late one to the rendezvous and was not happy about it at all. I told her to pass on my apologies. That was quickly answered with, “She’s a teenager. She will hold this against me no matter what!” We both kinda chuckled about it. She asked me how long I had been driving. I said I was new, and she gave me that all-knowing sideways look.

The mechanic showed up in about 8 minutes. He looked at the issue at hand and then started up my bus, triggering the doors to close on their own. Ugh. Of course it was the one thing that I did not try. We all gave him a round of applause as we got back on the road about 10 minutes late, with me feeling a bit embarrassed. I heard the lady quietly tell a few of the other passengers that I was new.

Unfortunately, this can be considered an “accident” by Trimet standards, so I had to fill out a company report AND a DMV accident report. I find this kinda silly. There was no damage, and I was only about 8 minutes late by the time I finished my run. Trimet, however, takes everything very seriously (as they should!), and I may get a bad mark on my record. Whomp whomp.

Exciting things always seem to happen on my first and last trips. My last trip of the night I had a sleeper who, when I got to the end of my line, I had to wake up. He was no older than 19 and looked like he had been living on the streets for some time. He was pale and glassy-eyed. I’m guessing he has been using whatever mind-numbing drugs have been available to him. I told him our location and asked him where he was headed. He said he wanted to get downtown. My bus didn’t go downtown and I think he knew this. I watched him throughout the ride and I saw that he had been awake about 10 minutes before, when we were clearly in Oregon City.

After confirming that he had no phone and no one to call from my phone, I called dispatch and got permission to drop him in Milwaukie on my way back to the garage. That was as close to a safe place for him to wait a couple of hours until the early morning buses came along. He moved up from the back seat into a seat right behind me and fell fast asleep again. When we got to Milwaukie I had to jostle him awake. I gave him a day ticket for Wednesday so he could at least get to his destination or ride the buses for shelter. I gave him a packet of crackers that I hadn’t yet opened. He didn’t say a word to me, but eagerly grabbed these items and then held out his skinny, pale hand and gave me a very weak handshake before he disappeared into the chilly night.

I had another operator tell me later that they would have just left him at the end of the line. It made no difference where he was if he didn’t have a place to go. And who knows? Maybe it didn’t really matter. But I did the best that I could with the resources that I was allowed to use.

4/14/19

A cute story from last night. I got stuck in the holding pattern with a Max through downtown and over the Tilikum Bridge, which set me about 6 minutes late by the end, as I had to stop beside the max about 6 times before it moved along and I could take my turn. This happens quite often through the bus mall, but rarely does it happen for so much of the route.

So I got stuck alongside the Max and watching the same faces go by stop after stop. After about the third stop, I see this huge grin of recognition from one of the Max passengers. He’s sitting next to who I assume is his wife, and is surprised to see that yes, this is the same bus that has stopped right next them at the last two stops. I wave back. At the next stop, I could see that he had been waiting to pass as he gave another eager wave. He started nudging his wife who was on her phone and had no interest in this silly moment. The waves and smiles escalated into two handed waves and weird looks from passengers around him. By the last stop, his greeting resembled an old friend who was elated to see you for the first time in years. Then off he and his wife went to wherever they were headed.

I love these micro human interactions. They brighten an otherwise mundane drag. And boy does it just drag sometimes.

4/15/19

Bus broke down tonight. I called dispatch and got a guy who sounded like he had a mouth full of bubble gum and talked way too fast. Eventually I was able to get him to repeat what he said enough times to finally figure out what to do, which was a battery reset. Problem is, the battery is in different places, depending on the series of bus. So I looked stupid for the next several minutes, opening up every darn compartment with a station agent on the other line until I found it....with a big sticker that said “BATTERY”. Ugh. I probably had a good 20 people on board, two of whom used wheelchairs and were totally stuck without the ramp.

No problem though. Thankfully no one was in a hurry to get to work or make a connection. It was just about midnight, so it was a quiet, sleepy crowd with a few funny remarks. One guy hollered out, “Lets all order grub hub. I’m hungry!” That got an overwhelming laugh as another guy decided to start playing death metal on his phone. Once we got up and running there was an applause and the music was turned off. I joked that I this was when they should all ask for their money back. But no one complained and one lady said she’s calling TriMet tomorrow to let them know I should get a gold star. I guess we get little certificates when someone calls in to say something nice about us. So I got that going for me.

4/15/19

I forgot my snacks today which led to a very serious thought tonight: “If I rearend that Dominoes delivery guy, will he let me eat the pizza while we wait for the police?”

4/22/19

Worst customer EVER! Not because he was mean or scary or smelly, but because he had zero bus etiquette whatsoever!! A list of things he did:

-He took way too long to board.

-He didn’t have his fare ready and spent a whole minute looking for it.

-He then finally confessed to not having fare, asking for a free ride.

-He took forever to get seated and decided to switch seats at least 3 times.

-He ended up taking up 6 seats!! His butt in two, his feet (shoes off and nasty socks) up on two others and then his suitcase in another seat isle blocking two seats. I confronted him about his feet on the seat.

Unfortunately I didn’t notice this until a while down the road, and I didn’t notice his suitcase until much later when someone mentioned it. My passenger mirror was broken because I was in an old bus (the precious one had broken down earlier in the day) and everything is broken in the old busses.

-He pulled the stop signal for the wrong stop.

-When he finally got off the bus, he walked right in front of it, while I had a green. By the time I was clear to go, the light changed.

The one and only thing he did that I was thankful for, was tell me at the beginning of the line whereabouts he wanted to get off so I could wake him up if he fell asleep.

A shining example of what not to do on public transit!

4/24/19

BOLO (be on the lookout) out for lost teen who was last on my bus. I am totally beating myself up over letting him go off into the night on 82nd by himself. He was a bit confused and lost. He said he thought it was the right stop, and left on foot after I told him that if it wasn’t, to head back to the same spot and catch the bus behind me. 30 minutes later dispatch comes through with a BOLO on him. It’s been an hour and still he hasn’t been found. I hope he is found safe. I feel like I fucked up majorly. I thought about calling dispatch and seeing if they could get someone out to just drive him home, but at this hour there are sometimes only two supervisors out and about in the area. Next time I need to trust my gut. Super worried about this sweet kid.

Update: I’m guessing his parents called TriMet. It sounds like he didn’t have a phone and it was his first time taking the bus. He ended up walking home quite a long way. I guess he has dyslexia so he got the wrong bus and the wrong street number. I just called dispatch to follow up and he made it home safely. Whew! I was so worried.