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Wednesday, March 11, 2015

How's this going to work? GO bus drivers have enough to concentrate on and don't need to start breaking up fights

GO Transit talking Quiet Zones on buses

GO Transit is quietly exploring the possibility of adding no-talking sections to its buses. The transit agency hasn't formally decided to go ahead with the idea, and there's no timeline yet. But GO has been surveying customers on whether they would like to see Quiet Zones, introduced on trains in 2013, added to the bus service.…

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I guess it works on double deckers, but for the other buses it's kind of like a smoking section in a restaurant.

GO Voyageur said...

I took the survey after I had chatted with a number of my drivers. The "no electronic devices in first 5 rows of seats behind driver" has validity. The train-like QZ is untenable. I'd rather GO Transit found ways to bring the ambient noise on their DD's down to that of MCI's.

Michael Suddard said...

GO Voyageur on Twitter brought up a valid point.

Anne Marie Aikins, Metrolinx's own Comms Manager, had tweeted about a year ago the Quiet Zone on buses was not feasible.

A year or more later Metrolinx & GO Transit are now looking into it. Apparently, as Aikens points out also on Twitter, that they have had several customer requests to investigate.

While I agree they could do it on the top floor of the Double Deckers (thereby ruining the fun of a bunch of kids who score the front seats on the Double Deckers from squealing in excitement ) the traditional single floor buses are a bit of conundrum. Some have floated the idea the first five rows would prevent the bus driver from being distracted. But what happens if I sit in row 6 to enjoy a conversation about whatever strikes my fancy? Do I get shushed from row 5 because I'm infringing on their rights?

I think this does warrant some investigation to see if it is possible and hat the downfalls might be. As well, and perhaps easily forgotten by Metrolinx, how it will be enforced by existing staff that already can't keep up with ticketing the "butt heads" and "parking donkeys".

TomW said...

This was through the 'Let GO Know' survey panel thing. I took part, saying I loved the Quiet Zone of the train, but thought it was a terrible idea on the bus.

The new double-deckers have no ventilation mode between 'off' and 'hurricane', with the latter drowning out all noise anyway. (The older buses would vary thought several levels - much more sensible)