Do you ride the bus in Jacksonville?

[fieldafm]

http://jacksonville.com/opinion/blog/403455/larry-hannan/2010-09-14/do-you-ride-bus-jacksonville

The possibility of bus service being shut down in Jacksonville remains a distinct possibility with JTA and the bus drivers union negotiating a new contract.

The bus union has voted to strike, but pledged not to walk out while negotiations are occurring.

The Times-Union wants to talk to people who ride the bus to work. What will you do if there is no bus service? Where do you take the bus now? How often do you ride the bus?

People can contact staff writer Larry Hannan by calling (904) 359-4470 or by e-mailing him at larry.hannan@jacksonville.com.

Please include your name, age and where you live on all e-mails.

[ChriswUfGator]

My favorite part of this whole thing was when Channel 4 was at the Rosa Parks station interviewing people about the potential strike, and everybody was talking about how the drivers are rude & nasty and always late, one lady said the way things runs now "you'd think they were on strike already..."

[Bativac]

My younger brother walks the mile and a half to work, even in 90 degree weather, because it's both faster and more reliable than taking the bus.

My wife took the bus to UNF from the Kernan and Arlington areas back in 2002-2004... the bus was either late, early, or just blew right past her (especially if it was raining). She gave up after a driver asked her "damn, you been putting on weight?" and bought a beat-up old Honda.

I took the bus back when I worked at AOL in 1998. At that time, it was a 2 and a half hour journey from my home near Empire Point to the Imeson Park AOL call center. The driver regularly flew thru stops, missed turns, drove into curbs, etc.

The bus drivers should be thankful they haven't all been fired and replaced with trained howler monkeys, who would be both more polite and more reliable.

[KenFSU]

If you can afford a car, there is absolutely no compelling reason to ever ride a Jacksonville bus. It's a shame.

[hanjin1]

i ride 10 miles to work on my bike, which takes about 45-50 minutes, because it's faster than riding the bus.

[urbaknight]

I have no choice but to ride the bus, I'm legally blind. I'm lucky though, I moved to the riverside/Murray Hill area last year. Although I had lots of bad experiences when I lived on the Southside, The route I live near now has decent bus drivers, I get downtown in 10 to 15 minutes, they're late but it's consistently 5 to 10 minutes. Now if you have to take two or more buses, you're screwed. I'm in no way defending JTA, I'm just giving credit where credit is due. However, I'm siding with the general consensus against JTA, They do suck and I stand by all of posts regarding the matter.

[uptowngirl]

No way in heck will I take a JTA bus, made that mistake once and only once!

[CS Foltz]

I have ridden the bus, from Southside to downtown, several times just to see what takes place. Bus was basically empty to downtown.....had a total of 3 riders till arrival! Have ridden the Riverside Trolley once just to experience how it differs from regular bus service and have ridden the $kyway twice, once again just for the experience..........not impressed.............two riders in one direction and 1 rider in the other! Got on at the Prime Osburn end and returned to the start point! Riverside Trolley was atleast half full in both directions!

[Shwaz]

Hell no!

I mentioned this before but... during a year of high school I rode the city bus everyday from Mandarin to San Marco and back. It was generally on time even though I secretly hoped it was late keeping me from first period.

What I hated was the duration of the trip. I had to get up so much earlier than everyone else to catch that early bus.. an hour ride for 20 minute trip.

The positive was I learned early how to get anywhere in town using the bus which kept me from bumming rides and killing myself over not having a car at 16.

[Non-RedNeck Westsider]

I take the bus between 2-4 times a week.  From the northside to the westside.  In rush-hour traffic (my normal commute) it takes: Car - 25-35 minutes.  JTA - 1:15.  Bike - 55 min.  (It's about a 17 mile trip)  I do it either of the three any given day - depend on my meeting schedule.  They each have their upsides and downsides, so my thought is - it's another service that's provided, that's cheap, but it takes a while.  BUT - when i'm on the silver bullet   i do get to catch up on my reading and podcasts.

[lewyn]

I rode the bus pretty consistently over the past month; now that my car is in town I probably will ride it about half the time (since that's what I did the last time I lived in Jax from 2006-09 when my car was in town- sometimes it is with my parents in Atlanta).  Its definitely much longer than driving for me (40-60 min., as opposed to 15-25 driving), but it does give me a chance to get some exercise and/or catch up on reading.

Generally I was pretty satisfied; it is usually late but not ridiculously so, and I generally had OK experiences with drivers.

Buses are usually more crowded than I remember them being in 2006-09, perhaps because JTA has merged some bus routes.  I have actually had to sit next to someone rather than having two seats to myself- very rare a couple of yrs ago.  (The "empty buses" claim even then often  wasn't quite true; buses may start empty but they may fill up along the route, or vice versa).

[CS Foltz]

Just out of curiousity......unless you have a problem with answering this..........which route number do you ride? I know that the Philips Hwy run, don't remember the number since it has been awhile, usually would have 3 to 6 and that was about it all the way to downtown......it was also early in the AM, like eightish!

[Cliffs_Daughter]

I actually ride it maybe once or twice a month. The husband rides it at least 8x a week.
Mostly on the BH-1 (arguably the most popular for ridership), sometimes on the WS-2 or P-4. I think he now catches one of the CT's since it runs more frequently, but I don't always ask him.
Used to ride the L-7 a few times a week but his job changed locations.
One car between us all right now, and not likely to get the other one any time soon, so if there isn't a bus to run him to/from work then we're more than inconvenienced.

A side note: I actually ride the skyway between San Marco and Rosa Parks when I have to visit the Dr @ Baptist. I get a nice little walk outta the deal as well.

[fieldafm]

I would encourage you to email Mr Hannan... the majority of the people who emailed about the skyway were people that just complained about what a waste of money it was, but yet have never ridden it.

People in this city are pretty good at complaining, but not so good about doing something about it.

[Non-RedNeck Westsider]

I catch either the L7-8 from DT to my Job & Back & the WS-2 from my house to DT. 

Driving - 7am to 6pm
JTA - 6:30am to 7pm
Bike - 6am (to avoid the heat and shower when I get to work) to 6:30pm