accessibility_fail | (no subject)

To the driver of the 423 outbound bus last Thursday night,

You tried to refuse service to a guy in a motorised wheelchair and his companion. You were driving one of the very newest buses on Sydney. They have ramps, they kneel, there are multiple wheelchair areas and there is Braille on the stop request buttons. YOU WERE DRIVING THE MOST ACCESSIBLE BUS IN SYDNEY. AND YOU TRIED TO REFUSE SERVICE TO A GUY IN A WHEELCHAIR. There was room on the bus for him and his companion and when the people sitting in the accessible seats saw him at the stop, they all moved so he could park there even before you eventually let him on!

I have submitted a complaint about you on the complaints line and I hope you get in trouble. For fuck's sake.

(Also: I didn't complain about it to him at the time and I felt so bad about this that I had a dream that night that I did complain, resulting in him slamming all the bus doors closed and sweeping me off to the depot, leaving me to make my way home in the dark alone. What the fuck, subconscious.)

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I'm glad you submitted a complaint. The idea that disabled members of the public are just too much trouble for public fucking transport is vile.

I was refused entry onto a bus a couple of days ago, because the driver couldn't be bothered to ask the parents to move a baby buggy.

The bus "just behind me" wasn't accessible and there was a 20 minute wait for another bus. The second driver gave me the first driver's details to report him!

This happened several times to my SO when he was using a walker due to illness. Once, he stood there and waved his bright-green bus pass at the driver, who zoomed right past him.

I also have far less patience for people who don't clear their sidewalks of snow in winter. I've seen people unable to get on a bus because there was an uncleared snowbank on top of a curb cut. And I've stopped doing business with one place that doesn't ever clear their sidewalks at all.

I'm glad you submitted a complaint! When the buses are specifically designed for that, USE IT! I had a substitute bus driver on my regular route one time, and it happened to be a severely bad walking/knee-bending day for me. He refused to kneel the bus until the other riders, all regulars who recognized me, shouted for him to drop the bus because they all knew I had troubles climbing up.

Never feel guilty because you didn't have it in you to defend yourself in that exact moment, because you shouldn't have to!
All the more awesome that you submitted a complaint once you were able to get things straight.

Good on you for complaining about him. I don't think there's anything wrong with not complaining to him at the time, especially if the guy in the chair did get to get on the bus anyway. Confrontation is hard, and if he's that much of a dicksplash already, he probably wouldn't listen to you directly. Better to report him to his superiors.

So I got a message from State Transit today from an actual real person! She said they've passed my complaint onto the driver's boss, I guess someone at the depot, and someone will be in contact with me within five days. I'm sort of stuck on the fact that wow, someone actually reads their complaints emails :-) Now to see if anything actually comes of it. I know that State Transit get far more complaints than compliments every year (I applied for a job with them once, so I read the annual report) and I'm really curious to see how this goes.