9to5 (dot cc)

I ride the bus nearly every day to work and  on my way home. I’ve been on buses in many other major North American cities. I wouldn’t consider myself to be a bus expert but I do like to think of myself as least an experienced bus goer. If you’ve never been on a bus I feel the need to warn you that I’ll be using some very bus-specific terminology in this piece and maybe you should brush up on your bus lingo (or “busingo” as we say in the bus biz). Complex bus words like “driver”, “seat” and “the back” will be popping up all over this article and if you’re not familiar you might miss out on some of the nuances of what I’m trying to get across.

What I’m here to write about today is general bus behavior when you get on the bus.

Here’s how I understand the process is supposed to work.

1. Get on the bus.
2. Pay your fare and nod to the driver.
3. Move as far back as you can since there are people behind you, if there aren’t people behind you, more people might get on later.
   1. This doesn’t just apply to sitting, even if all the seats are full, you still move all the way to the back to stand.
   2. No, this doesn’t mean to the steps at the back, it means all the way back.
   3. Listen, if you can get to the back of the bus, that is where you should be going.
   4. Oh, you’re near the back door and you want to stop? Keep moving, there’s still a bunch of space at the back.
   5. No seriously, there is space at that back what is wrong with you?

You might (especially as a non-bus traveler) think that the 5 sub-points of step 3 are excessive but if you’ve ever been on a crowded bus, you know that those sub-rules exist for a reason and even with 5 clear clarifications about moving all the way to the back, many people on the bus will just get on the bus, look to see if there are any seats and if there isn’t, they will just stand there. Near the front of the bus. Everyone who gets on after them will have to push past them to try and get further into the bus. Most of the people that make it past will stop somewhere in the middle anyways, too tired from pushing past the people in the entrance of the bus to to make it all the way to the back.

What happens then?

Well, you end up with a big ole crowd of people at the front, jammed up against each other and being touched all the time. At the back of the bus maybe a handful of people stand, looking on at the rabble at the front, shaking their heads in disappointment. Even worse, sometimes people at the back actually get off the bus, vacating their seats. Because the throng of people is so dense at the front, nobody can actually make it far enough back to get to those precious, precious seats. It’s a terrible tragedy that befalls many of the public buses I’ve been on. Not even the angry calls of “pousser vers l’arrière” from the driver have much of an impact. Sure, a few people wedged in the front of the bus will press up against the person closest to them,but no real progression “vers l’arrière” is ever made.

This is the sad reality that we on the bus deal with every day. Perhaps most tragic is that this doesn’t seem to be a local issue either, I can say first hand that I’ve seen the same behavior on busses in Boston, Toronto, Calgary and even overseas in France and Spain. What is so terrifying about the “back”? Why doesn’t anybody want to go there? There’s more room to stand, there’s often even more seats, so why the avoidance?

I took to the streets to find out why people didn’t move to the back, and the answers were quite shocking.

“I’m not cool enough for the back”

This was Andy, a 30-something who likes coffee. His main concern with heading to the back was that if he did so, he would be bullied. Initially I scoffed at the idea, this was 2015, you don’t need to worry about getting bullied on the bus. But old habits die hard it seems. You remember in grade school that the rules were very clear: cool kids at the back of the bus, nerds up front with the teachers. It seems that a lot of people have kept this rule around in the back of their mind on the city bus too. In an age of constant scrutiny thanks to social media many think, like Andy, that they are simply not cool enough to merit a place at the back of the bus. Andy doesn’t even have 100 followers on Twitter, it’s easy to see why he thinks that he would not be welcome in the classic zone of coolness that is the back of the bus.

Well, worry no longer. I scoured the code of conduct of several public transport organizations and found that there exists no formalized ruling in terms of how cool you need to be to go to the back. In fact, most don’t even mention coolness at all. If you’re worried that maybe the restriction is a socially enforced norm I have a solid tip for you to overcome that fear: pretend to be cool. Nobody knows how many Likes you get on Facebook or how many upvotes you have on reddit, so just act like you’re supposed to be there. You’ll be safe.

Now, when you get on the bus you should feel free to confidently make your way all the way to the back without worry.

“It’s too far to get back there”

This was the claim of a student from Dawson named, I can’t make this up, McFlurry. McFlurry said that when she got on a bus, even when there was nobody in her way preventing her from making it to the back of the bus, the idea of walking all the way to the back was just much too daunting.

“It would take what, ten, maybe fifteen steps to get back there? When I get onto a bus I’m pretty sure that the portion of travel that I’m directly responsible is over. I walked all the way to the bus stop and now I need to walk to the back of the bus too? Maybe I would head to the back if there was like a conveyor belt to get there or something.”

Now, I’m pretty sure we all agree with McFlurry that a conveyor belt to the back of the bus would be pretty sweet, but unfortunately, it just doesn’t seem realistic. I reached out to our contacts at the STM to see how feasible it was and they declined to comment. However, I felt that I had to do a little research to see if McFlurry’s complaint (which was echoed by many of the people I polled) was warranted. A normal bus is about 40 feet long. At a moderate walking pace, most people walk at about 3.7 mph (or 6 km/h). How long does it take to walk 40 feet at that pace? You’re walking about 5.5 feet per second. That means it would take about 7 seconds for you to walk to the back of the bus.

Sorry McFlurry, I think you can spare 7 seconds.

“I like the comfort of being close to the driver”

This was a common complaint of men in their 40s. A man by the name of Micro USB Charger told me that he liked being near the bus driver. In the same vein he also felt a kinship with the bus pass scanning machine. Being close to the driver (and the machine) made him feel safe and secure while on the bus. He especially liked it when he had to move even closer to the bus driver to make room for the bus door opening up. This was his favorite.

I’m no psychologist, but I do know that overcoming some of these irrational dependencies can be a real struggle. I don’t want to make light of your difficulties, but maybe I can offer you a little information? Bus drivers are just regular men and women who are doing a job. Other than the fact they perform the extraordinary feat of driving a bus each and every day, they’re just like you and me. They are going to do the best damn job of bus driving no matter how near or far away from them you are. Whether you’re standing all the way at the back, or are right up in their personal space at the front, the fact remains: They are going to eventually take you to where you’re going. Provided that where you’re going is somewhere on the bus route.

Trust me. I know it’s a hard leap of faith, but maybe next time don’t stand so close to the entrance of the bus. You’ll be surprised how you still get to your stop.

So Montrealers (and other public transport users): The next time you get on a bus, try to remember this little article. Head to the back, there’s room there.

Images from Wiki-Commons. Interior photo and exterior photo.

Keith does all sorts of things here on 9to5.cc, he works with the other founders on 9to5 (illustrated), co-hosts our two podcasts: The 9to5 Entertainment System and Go Plug Yourself and blogs here as The Perspicacious Geek.