Originally Posted by
chewybrian
If the bus ran door to door, every ten minutes, a lot of people would still not use it. There is a stigma to being on the bus, and it puts you in close contact with a 'different' slice of humanity. I don't know how you could ever solve these problems.
The most frustrating issue to me on my local line is that being allowed to bring your bike along is 50/50. If the rack is full (often is), then the driver has discretion to allow you to carry the bike into the bus (which is not hard). So, you might wait for the bus only to be shot down.
Another big hassle is transfers, which are sometimes required for us even though we stay on one route. If the first bus is more than five minutes late, the second leaves without you. This may mean a wait of an hour most days, or THREE HOURS on a Saturday for the next bus! The drivers will not even tell you this is happening--enjoy your unscheduled, unannounced stay at city hall, folks.
A slightly different take on what you refer to with late connections. I catch a ferry to and from work. A bus service is
supposed to co-ordinate with the ferry service. It would get really frustrating to see the bus from the ferry 100 yards from the dock, and for the bus then to negotiate the roundabout, and head off to the city before the ferry has even docked.
The ferry is owned by the state government but operated by a private company that simply doesn't have a clue nor care about customer service and running to published timetables when they are supposed to link with other services. I don't think I have ever seen in the past four months anyone get on the bus at the ferry terminus.