Editor's note: If you have had issues while aboard a Double Decker bus, drop me a line
cj@thiscrazytrain.com
Read Parts 1 and 2 and 3
Photo from GO Transit's official Facebook page
Special to This Crazy Train
Ain't No Business Like GO Business!
by Ali Gator (not his real name)
The 15:07 Niagara Falls to Burlington
bus – #8102, a double-decker (DD) – rolled into St. Catharines almost ten minutes behind
schedule. Not bad, I thought,
considering it was the Friday afternoon of the Thanksgiving weekend; passenger
volumes would be high.
As I tapped on with my Presto card, the driver explained she
was late because the bus had lost power on the QEW. I had no sooner settled into my seat when I
was summoned back to the front of the bus.
Apparently, the Presto POS terminal thought we were still in The Falls;
the cost of my trip would be inflated.
Our driver tried to reverse my tap three times – all attempts were
unsuccessful. Since time was becoming
critical, I was instructed to tap off.
As I walked back to my seat, I bowed my head and recited, “Our Father
who art in heaven …” You know, praying for patience and all that jazz.
We resumed our trip and were cruising nicely along the QEW
approaching Grimsby,
when I heard the engine die. Our driver skillfully
maneuvered the bus to the shoulder and brought the vehicle to a halt.
Here we are dead on the side of the highway:
After a brief radio conversation with the Hamilton
supervisor, our driver apologized for the delay and advised us we would proceed
to Grimsby
where we would switch to another bus.
The rescue bus slipped in behind us within minutes of us
arriving at the Grimsby Park & Ride. This is
because GO Transit operates “shadow buses”, i.e. empty buses, that are in close
proximity to DDs, because the new $800K+ buses are so prone to failure (CJ says, "This is true. I've seen this happen in Oshawa.").
Weren’t we led to believe the new
double-decker buses from Alexander Dennis Ltd. were supposed to save us money? I volunteered to help move the suitcases of a
retired couple from Japan
who were in Canada
vacationing. The transfer took but a few
minutes, and we were on our way again.
The rescue bus – #2260, a standard coach from MCI – was not
the quickest in the fleet; it was a sluggish 12-speed. Those of you not familiar with this model of
bus, it does have an automatic transmission, but the herky-jerky motion gives
one the impression the driver is a neophyte learning to drive a stick-shift.
Here we are lurching along in “
Old Faithful”.
By the time we pulled into the north bus loop at Burlington
GO station, the 16:42 train, which we were scheduled to meet, had
departed. Not a problem you’re thinking,
because the Minister of Transportation promised a train every 30 minutes on the
Lakeshore line. Wrong! After 16:42 at
Burlington, the next train departure is at
17:37 – a 55 minute wait. To make things
worse, that train was delayed (because of a switch problem near
Aldershot station) to 17:42, and then to 17:45; it
finally arrived at 18:00.
The trip proceeded without incident until after we left
Exhibition station, whereupon our CSA announced that the train would be out of
service upon arrival at Union station.
Passengers needing to continue their trip had to descend into the bowls
of the GO Concourse to wait for the next eastbound train, which had a 19:17
departure. I finally arrived in Pickering at 19:55. I was over 90 minutes late for a dinner
engagement that had been planned for some time.
My missus was not amused!
It occurred to me on Saturday morning that no e-mail alert had
been issued for the delayed bus trip, even though Customer Relations had assured
me on September 8 that “we will continue to work with our Operations team to ensure
all delays are reported”. Obviously,
someone is not working hard enough to keep that promise.
I realized, too, that I should get a refund for the train
portion of my trip. There is no service
guarantee for bus travel regardless of the cause of the delay; bus passengers
are treated as second class customers by GO Transit (CJ says, "More like third-class..."). I checked first whether the trip was eligible
for a refund and was presented with the following:
What do you mean you’re “not sure yet”? I checked again on the evening of Thursday,
October 17 and I was presented with the same status.
Are you kidding me?
Undaunted, I submitted my refund request which was
acknowledged as follows:
I received the adjudicator’s decision the following evening,
and it said the following:
What do you mean “does not correspond to your PRESTO card’s
trip history”? Let’s take a look at the
transactions for October 11, shall we?
Here they are in reverse chronological order:
We can clearly see the following:
·
03:36 PM – Tap on for bus trip. Remember, the Presto POS had reset itself to
the start of trip location when the bus lost power after leaving The Falls.
·
03:38 PM – Tap off for bus trip as instructed by
the driver.
·
05:10 PM – Tap on for train trip. My card has a default trip between Pickering and Burlington,
so there is no tap off for the train trip.
For this stellar service and others like it, GO Transit is
the 2013 large system winner of the Outstanding Public Transportation System
Achievement Award from the American Public Transportation Association
(APTA). Read all of GO Transit’s
self-adulation
on
their web site. I’m beginning to
wonder if “favours” were paid in order to receive this award!
Remember the couple from Japan who were here on
vacation? I received a lovely e-mail
from them saying they arrived home safely and they thanked me for my assistance
through all the turmoil on Friday afternoon.
Knowing that Japan
has one of the best public transportation systems in the world, you can’t
imagine how ashamed and embarrassed I was trying to explain GO Transit’s level
of service.
There you have it folks!
Another award winning performance by the cast who proves time and again
that there’s no business like GO business!
