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As you probably know, vehicles are built so that the driver's side is closer to oncoming traffic, and the passenger side closer to the side of the road. For this reason buses usually only have doors on the passsenger side.
However, when making a turn that will cross the oncoming traffic lane, a bus,
like any other vehicle, has to wait for an opening in the traffic flow. Frequently this means the bus will be stopped for a short time adjacent to a "median" that separates the opposite flows of traffic.
THIS is when it could be useful to have a driver-side door, for any passengers who want to exit the bus onto the median.
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I'm not sure that this would be considered a safe practice to encourage. Those medians are there to keep the traffic separate, not for use as footways. |
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I thought that busses (in the UK) were legally obliged to stop at only recognised bus stops or by pedestrian areas.
(Similarly I am pretty sure that licenced cabbies are only supposed to let you out by the roadside for passenger safety) |
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I don't know about them being legally obliged, Jb, but it is certainly true that the vast majority of Glasgow's bus drivers are carnaptious types who will only let you off the bus at an unauthorised place if you are wearing a short skirt. |
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Seriously, you should try it. Calum recently sported a kilt which was about 6 inches too short for him, and it certainly affected both me and the now-traumatised shop assistant. If he'd been on my bus, I'd have dropped him off ANYWHERE. |
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Here, for public liability and insurance reasons, buses will only let passengers off at marked stops, when the bus is stopped, at the side of the road. Letting passengers off in the middle of the road would be a nightmare of public liability. |
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The only exception to this is that after 10pm, some services will let you off anywhere along the route, if it's safe. |
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You're also going to lose seating space and, unless you have the driver "justfied centrally" at the front of the bus, the roadside door, the door of danger, no less, is away from the driver's beady gaze and authoritative bark. |
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Incidentally, in the end, I opted for an even shorter kilt, for maximum impact. |
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No disrespect intended, but speaking of short, are we certain this is a [Vernon] idea ? :] |
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At risk of sounding unnecessarily nasty, which isn't at all the intention, somebody always says that if Vernon's idea is less than about six paragraphs... |
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This is as useless as it can possibly get, so this definitely IS a Vernon idea. |
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hang on a sec.. this would definitely be useful in countries where buses go from driving on the right side of the road to driving on the correct (left) side of the road. Currently, for instance, a bus coming from France to the UK alights its passengers onto the 'dangerous' side of the road with no choice. a (+) from me. |
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Ought one not, therefore, simply insist
that the French give up their foolish
national habit of driving on the wrong
(i.e. right)
side of the road? We have indulged
them in this respect for far too long. |
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Part of the reason I wrote this Idea down was because I've seen quite a few medians which were connected by well-marked crosswalks to the sides of the road. So, a passgener who would normally use the usual bus-door and cross the whole road could instead start off already half-way across, if only it was possible to directly exit the bus onto the median. |
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Yes, I know that a seat or two would probably be lost if a new door was added. I suppose it would depend on the bus -- they do get made in differing lengths. A longer bus could "afford" such a door more easily than a shorter bus. |
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Finally, a bus waiting to make a turn across the oncoming-traffic lane is a bus that is already stopped. It inconveniences nobody to let someone off at that time. |
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Original idea is interesting, but it
misses the mark. Driver-side doors are
fundamentally dangerous, and therein
lies their charm. Busses need driver-
side doors to better deal with
obnoxious passengers. Most people get
to leave the bus via the safe door, but
that guy with the loud boom box, the
girl who always sticks her chewing gum
under the seat, and the loud-talking
suit on an endless mobile-phone call all
get to leave via the Discipline Door.
Other passengers get to determine
which door you leave by, but the driver
has override authority. |
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Captain Spock one said, 'Even logic must give way to physics'
Well i say as much of a good idea it may be, convenience must give way to safety.
As a bus driver, I can identify one main problem with this, Front & rear door brake interlock, with Mercedes taking control away from the driver and putting it in the hands of its electronics, you can press the accelerator flat to the floor and it anit gonna do swat. If you are turning right, and some fat-biatch is taking her sweet ass time to get her ass and her 4 kids off the bus at a green arrow... You're stuck there for five sections after you hit close. How many cars can get through a green in that time?
How much more abuse would we cop for doing so. |
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It's a Vernon idea, dear bus driver. |
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In Boston (USA) The trackless trolleys,some trams, and possibly even some busses have off side doors. They are used for loading in a tunnel.(Harvard Square,I think) I have never been there, but I would suspect that off-side doors are a better deal than squeezing sideways between the bus and the wall. |
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