Things aren’t always that simple in practice, says Damien Lois, a ten-year veteran of the MTA. He and many other bus operators see this back-and-forth as an escalation: “They want us to state the fare, but that leads to potential situations where a person may feel threatened.” So he says he stays quiet rather than potentially endanger other passengers — and himself.
You can make any kind of policy you want, but people are going to pay what they want to pay. As someone who’s been doing this work for close to ten years, I’m not saying a thing.
The transit authority, they try to present this notion that we’re the reason why, or part of the reason why, there’s such low fare collection. This memo went out asking us to politely state the fare. Why would they put us in a situation where we could get literally assaulted? We don’t know who’s coming on, who has weapons. I’m not enforcing a fare that can lead to me being hurt. People evade fares; it’s a daily occurrence. There’s always something. I don’t say a word. We’re drivers. If anyone is getting on my bus — straight up, honestly — my job is to get you where you need to go as safe as possible. That’s my No. 1 priority.
To do that, I have to think for not only myself but everyone that comes across my path — anyone who walks on the sidewalk, anyone who decides to ride a bike next to my bus, or anyone who tries to run alongside who wants to board the bus. I have to preplan for everything every day.
It always seems our safety is something they say is a priority, but their actions show otherwise. We’ve been lobbying for a full driver partition — an enclosed area that can physically separate operators from passengers — for a long, long time.
READ THE FULL ESSAY HERE
No comments:
Post a Comment