Yesterday...

Yesterday, I had a meeting to attend to in Downtown so I thought it would be a good time to go get some pictures at the Intermodal Hub, Central Station.

I started off on the 213 getting one of the 2006 Opus buses which is the perfect bus to be assigned to this route. I then took TRAX to the Intermodal Hub.

On my way back I took TRAX to the Stadium Station and onto the 220. I cannot wait until they build something at the Stadium TRAX station. I just hope it has something like a convenience store because yesterday I was getting pretty thirsty waiting for the 220 but of course I would have missed the bus if I had to walk over to stores on 1300 East and 200 South.

But then came the 220 with bus 9214 assigned. One of the last of the Orion V buses still on the road for UTA. The bus itself is better than any of the low floor buses built today, but what was really irritating was the wrap. Now anyone who has read my blog for any length of time knows how much I despise wraps but this one was even worse than most. As you can see from the picture you cannot see a thing out the window. This is why I hate wraps so much.

UTA Wraps Brand New Bus

Ft. Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport (Tri-Rail station)
Originally uploaded by gilligguy

I walked out yesterday to get my mail when either the 307 or 320 flew by me on Van Winkle. It was one of the brand spanking new Gillig Advantage BRT look buses and I was disgusted to see that the bus had a full wrap on it.

Now anyone who has read my blog for long knows that I despise them because they are so anti-customer. Just try to look out of a wrapped window (go down to the June 25th entry).

Not only that, but they have wrapped a brand new bus. Transit systems such as the Spokane Transit Authority will wrap buses that need to be repainting because of the damage that can be done to the paint but I guess UTA doesn't care about our expensive capital resources enough.

Bus Wraps: Great for UTA not for its Customers

Over the last few years Wraps have become the rage in the transit industry. Wraps are when buses are wrapped completely including the windows.

The transit agencies have fought tooth and nail in various communities that have tried to put a limit on wraps. What the transit agencies is the money that comes in from the wraps.

What wraps truly show is just how much transit agencies only look to riders as numbers and not as customers that are there to be treated with respect. For anyone who has ridden on a bus with a wrap know that you can barely see out the windows and if you try to look out the windows for more than a minute it will give you a headache and blurry vision.

It also shows that bus riders are second class citizens in the eyes of many transit agencies. While you see buses all the time with wraps, when is the last time you saw a TRAX car with a full wrap that covers the windows? That's different because they consider TRAX riders more important than bus riders.

I have no problem with wraps so long as they do not cover the windows. A couple of years ago GTE I think it was had a wrap but it did not cover the windows. You could still clearly see who paid for the wrap so GTE did not loose any exposure even though the wrap did not cover the windows.

Message to Transit Agencies: Wraps are fine, but treat your bus customers the same way you treat your rail riders, DON'T WRAP THE WINDOWS!!!!