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Idling Winnipeg Transit buses draw criticism


suburbanite

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Heard this on CBC radio this morning. You can hear it yourself at the following link.

The reporter could have determined how many high-floor buses are remaining in the fleet by checking out this board...

http://www.cbc.ca/ne...g-winnipeg.html

I'm hoping some bus drivers here or mechanics can comment on what the reporter had to say. Are most of the buses really so unreliable as to not easily be restartable?

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The CBC seemed to focus the report on the idling units on Young Street (outside the CBC studios). Transit replied that they are reserve units waiting to go into service at the U of Winnipeg terminal during weekday rush hour. Transit Tom's reply also included that "high floors" (D40's I guess) don't reliably restart after being turned off for short periods. The MTHA observed the same rule with #814 in Headingley on Sunday. We left it idling for about 20 minutes while we visited a museum.

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Got to love CBC and their one sided news stories. I wonder if they compared the idle times to that of their own trucks? Or maybe the Post Office trucks, Hydro Trucks, UPS, Purolater, Beaver, Greyhound, Greygoose, First Canada School bus, Vital, any of the school divisions or any other company.

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Got to love CBC and their one sided news stories. I wonder if they compared the idle times to that of their own trucks? Or maybe the Post Office trucks, Hydro Trucks, UPS, Purolater, Beaver, Greyhound, Greygoose, First Canada School bus, Vital, any of the school divisions or any other company.

They should walk a few blocks, BBL leaves them running for up to an hour!

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  • 2 weeks later...

Yikes... some bad feelings seems to have arisen because of my posting of this article. Sorry about that. It also wasn't my intention to see anyone be too negative toward the CBC, Winnipeg Transit or any other public and private corporations out their burning fuel.

I personally think it's good for an article like this to come out. It gives those at Transit a chance to defend their position and at the same time educate the public as to why they do things. It also might poke the City and Transit, to helping improve the situation a bit more in the future (reducing the amount of air and noise pollution, including CO2 output, related fuel costs, etc).

It also keeps the public interested in our public transit system, which can only be a good thing. I'm more interested in seeing that at the coffee table, instead of indifferent shrugs. Those shrugs we see are almost always from those who never use transit.

@amorand: I doubt a 'secret' CPTDB member is the reporter of this article. As I said at the start, they could have looked at the Wiki to see the fleet stats, but they didn't.

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Yikes... some bad feelings seems to have arisen because of my posting of this article. Sorry about that. It also wasn't my intention to see anyone be too negative toward the CBC, Winnipeg Transit or any other public and private corporations out their burning fuel.

I personally think it's good for an article like this to come out. It gives those at Transit a chance to defend their position and at the same time educate the public as to why they do things. It also might poke the City and Transit, to helping improve the situation a bit more in the future (reducing the amount of air and noise pollution, including CO2 output, related fuel costs, etc).

It also keeps the public interested in our public transit system, which can only be a good thing. I'm more interested in seeing that at the coffee table, instead of indifferent shrugs. Those shrugs we see are almost always from those who never use transit.

@amorand: I doubt a 'secret' CPTDB member is the reporter of this article. As I said at the start, they could have looked at the Wiki to see the fleet stats, but they didn't.

Don't worry, we always poke fun at the media.

Theres alot of lurking posters on CPTDB, you never know if they can be whoever does transit reports for the media or anything. "Transit Tom", if you do exist, coming out here now would spare us from having to search maniacally through a billion pages... :P

If its the lady from the CBC that interviewed me about Rapid Transit though, no issues with her what-so-ever! She recorded and apparently broadcasted my interview from one of the buses on Route 162 early in the morning, and actually asked me more than one question. Global and CTV, those guys approached me and didnt seem to give a rats ass that I was present at both the RT shuttles, first revenue RT bus and the first RT rush hour day...

Eva Kovaks (Global): Hi, got a minute to talk?

Me: Sure!

Eva: First time on the Rapid Transit?

Me. No. (she stops interviewing me)

(Eva walks away, even know I had a Canon Rebel in my hand, signifying I'm not an office worker heading to my desk at 6:30am and showing I might be different than the other busriders)

...which is why I never watch their newscasts. Especially Global, it hit the drain after 2005-2006. They must be pursuing the negative stories so much, that they've forgotten that there ARE some bus/transit enthusiasts in the City of Winnipeg other than the MTHA and Harvey Smith/Jenny Gerbasi, the councillors (to their point of view, if they dont search the words "canadian transit" on the Internet)

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