Seeing mostly empty buses on my route every day challenges the green transit narrative

I used to agree that buses were the best eco-option, but my commute shows they're often less efficient than a full carpool.

3 comments

3 Comments

emma_dixon701mo ago

Ugh, that's so true on my street too. I actually stopped taking the bus because it felt pointless, just me and the driver rumbling along. The schedule is so bad that it forces everyone into cars anyway. It kind of makes the whole green argument fall apart when the system itself isn't working.

ellis.leo1mo ago

Funny how the "green" bus system can end up burning more fuel per person than cars when they run empty like that. What gets me is the tax money quietly going down the drain for those ghost bus routes, which means less cash to actually improve the schedule where people need it. It becomes this hidden cycle where bad service kills ridership, then low ridership becomes the excuse to cut service more. They never seem to use the empty buses as proof they need to change the times or the route path.

janarivera1mo ago

It's like a lot of public stuff where the plan looks good on paper but doesn't work for real life... When @emma_dixon70 says the schedule forces people into cars, that's exactly the problem. You see this with other services too, where they keep doing things the same way even when it's clearly not working. Like community centers that are always empty because they're open at weird hours, or recycling programs that are too complicated to use. It ends up wasting resources and making people lose trust in the system. So those ghost buses are just a sign that someone isn't paying attention to what people actually need.

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