As someone who has yet to learn how to drive and relies on public transport to get to and from work and social activities I can whole heartily say that I've spent at least one fifth of my life waiting for a bus or train. It's not that I think their bad, on the whole the public transport system in London is pretty good. Every day I catch a train at 4PM after work, 10 minutes later I'm at another station waiting for my connection which is usually around 4:20PM. This gets me to the end of my train journey an leaves me ample time to walk down the road to bus stop, at which I catch the 4:55PM bus which takes me home. Well that's how most days it work anyway.
Today I arrived at the station just before 4PM in time to catch my train as per normal to find out that it was delayed due to a malfunction on a previous train further up the line. That's fine, I thought to myself, I can afford for it to be 10 minutes late before my connection train. 4:10PM came and went. It wasn't until 4:25 that the train finally pulled into the station. Now a late train in itself doesn't really bother me, it's the expected time show on the electronic timetable that annoys me. It initially said that the train was expected to arrive at 4:03, then each minute it would just go up a further minute. It gave up at 4:18 even trying to expect a train at all. If you don't know when a train is coming just simply put these initials on the timetable; WDK (We Don't Know), maybe with a sorry at the end. Then it would read WDKS, which may mean something to you radio listeners Indiana.
So anyway, I got on my train but even then I wasn't too worried, there was a later 4:40PM connection that would get me to the end of the line. If only it were that easy! Pulling in at my connection station I find out the on the other line all trains are delayed indefinitely. I notice they took my advice about not putting a time if they genuinely don't know. This time a voice over the tannoy kept apologizing for the delay and, apparently, the reason this time was trespassers on the line on both of the lines heading north, where my trains where coming from. I kept my ears pricked so any news of a train at a train station but it wasn't going to happen so after a further 20 minutes I decided to get the bus from the station to about 2 miles from my home. I'd have to walk the rest of the way but by that point I didn't care to be honest.
Fortunately, a family member offered to picked me up from the end of the bus line and save me the 2 mile walk at the end so I agreed thankfully. I exited the station and remembered to cross the road (I'd made the mistake of going the wrong way previous, ended up going halfway back to work on a backstreet bus) finding that the bus I wanted, the 213, didn't stop there so I walked a little further down and turned a corner and saw somewhere I reconfigured, the Police Station. Now I know what you're probably thinking, but I assure you they don't know me there. Not because I'm clever enough not to get caught, but because I don't work on that side of the law. Anyway, I found a bus stop where the one I wanted passed and it came within 5 minutes.
By this point I was quite hot and that is not usually a good thing on the top deck of a double decker bus but because it's still the school holidays there was practically no-one there which meant that the pathetic air blower they call air conditioning actually tried to do it's join with minor success. I've been getting buses for many years and really do value them, they provide a good service for London, but the moment you know someone's waiting for you somehow enter a mental state whereby getting through every green light become a life and death situation. Luckily, the journey itself was quite quick. Too quick. There comes a time when the bus stops, usually two stops away from your destination, and no-one gets on or off and you think maybe the traffics not letting us out or something. Then, you here the following message and your blood begins to boil; To even up and provide you with an efficient service the bus has temporarily stopped to even up service times. Really? That's providing me with an efficient service, I don't think so because you're making me later than needed. What you're saying is, sorry we're going to make you later and hold up you and your family's lives because the bus driver on this service drives at proper road speeds to get you to your destination and is catching up with the bus in front.
Having said that, I do think buses on the whole are better than trains for a simple reason that they are usually on time, I give a few minutes either side of that, or are consistently late so you can think ahead and you can trust them. Trains are, for the most part, excellent as well but the difference is when something small happens the locomotive leviathan grinds to a painfully ill informed halt. Maybe I am just an old man at heart, or maybe that's what happens after a certain time of commuting. Just give me a pie and slippers and log fire and I'll be happy right now.
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