Multi-fare-ious Duties of Bus Drivers
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How Would London Men Like This? THEprize for doing most things at once should go, not to the "oneman band" performer, but to the driver of a New York bus.
I have driven as an ordinary motorist in the densest traffic of New York, and I must pay tribute to the skill of the operators of the new streamlined buses which have now replaced the trams.
The driver is in sole charge of the vehicle. Apart from the constant manipulation of gears, accelerator and brakes, apart from keeping a close lookout for almost invisible signals, apa,rt from the strain of fighting his way to the exiguous stopping-space at the kerb and pulling out again into an importunate stream of traffic, he has to perform all the duties of conductor and guide.
He has a handle at his left which operates, by compressed air, the opening and closing of the doors. In order to know when to use this lever he must keep his eye on an ingenious array of 3338 mirrors inside the bus—for one of the exits is at the rear.
He must see that all persons entering the bus place a " nickel" in a sort of glass box on a pillar on his right. Through the sides of this glass box he must watch each coin as it falls, to see that it is a coin and not a washer. When two or three coins are in the box he must press a lever which drops them down into a larger box out of sight. The driver must also issue change on demand from a quick-change apparatus and accept or issue transfer tickets.
Sometimes in rush periods someone will enter the bus and forget to insert his nickel. The driver will not forget. He will wait until the passenger sits down, watching him in the mirror above his head, and then announce (looking straight in front of him). " Will the gentleman with the newspaper under his arm please pay his fare?" The gentleman with the newspaper will start guiltily, whereupon the driver will say: . " Yeah, it's you I mean. What about your nickel? " The embarrassed passenger will then come forward to put his money in the box In addition, the driver answers questions about routes and tells tourists where to get off for the Rockefeller Centre and so on. At the same time he argues with other drivers, and "reproves" pedestrians who stand out in the roadway at the bus stop.
In certain quarters the question has been raised as whether these men are not required to do too much, but the plea of economy seems to prevail. Complaints have been made, too, that inferior personnel had been chosen, and that the drivers are not so polite as they might be. To me, the mystery is that they manage to be so courteous as I found them. E.S.T.