What’s The Worst Bus Line?
Here’s a good idea. New Columbia Heights has a semi-regular feature where they review Metro bus lines. The blog’s latest installment focuses on the Buses of 14th Street–the 52, 53, and 54. The reviewer lets it rip:
“I’ve taken this bus heading south during rush hour and not during rush hour, and it’s always a pain. They don’t come very regularly, and they make so many stops (often every block) that it’s practically faster to walk. I’ve started taking them for work during rush hour, and it’s terrible - it takes about half an hour to go from 14th and Euclid St NW, roughly, to 14th and F. That’s less than 2 miles. I could roll down the hill faster.”
There has to be better bus lines. There has to be worse bus lines. I really dig the 16th Street-to-Silver Spring bus. The 42 isn’t bad either. I’ve heard from sources over the years that the buses that run along MLK Ave SE are terrible after school lets out.
What are your bus horror stories?
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1:20 pm
The X bus line that runs down H street and Benning Road by far has to be the worst bus line. The bus is always crowded no matter what time of day you are on it. I swear at every stop half the bus gets off and a whole new group of people get on. People are loud and rude on that bus. And the bus drivers are no better! I always walk away from that bus experiencing something crazy.
One comes to mind is one SCORCHING HOT summer day we approached a stop. The bus was filled to the brim, but the bus driver continue to let people on. The last person to get one was this old lady with a grocery cart. Do you know he told that lady that their was no more room and shut the door on her and drove off! I felt so bad for that lady as hot as it was that day. Obviously older people have priority, especially when temps are way in the 90’s and he should have made it a point to get her on before anybody else.
1:30 pm
The G2 can eat a dick, but only because it’s the only line that runs crosstown on P St., and it comes every 30 minutes or so.
If you need to get from Shaw to DuPont, it’s usually faster to walk.
But again, if they added another line to the P St. corridor, I wouldn’t be making this complaint.
Maybe “eat a dick” is a little bit too strong of a prescription.
1:42 pm
The 90 bus lines that run from SE to AdMo are fabulous–EXCEPT for the 96.
Remember when the Capitol Police briefly barricaded several streets around the nabe? They never re-opened First Street NE to anybody but Senate staffers, forcing the poor 96 bus to make this insane detour around the little park between the Capitol and Union Station. It takes an extra 10 minutes!
1:43 pm
I used to take the 62 from Kennedy & 5th NW to the Georgia Ave-Petworth stop. Most days it covers the two miles in about 10 minutes. After 9:30, though, the buses entirely ignore the schedule. I’ve sat around at the stop as three drivers failed to hit their 20-minute intervals.
This is why I’m loving, and I mean loving the bicycle.
1:57 pm
The new 30 buses. I work on the Hill. While I’m waiting at Lafayette Park for a 37. 3 to 5 Archive buses drop by. Why go half-way across town. Plus the escalators at Cap. South are always down and the elevator is one block down.
2:06 pm
I second the G2 as the worst. That bus NEVER comes!! I used to live in Dupont and work in Georgetown. I’d start walking down P Street until a G2 bus showed up. Usually 3 out of 5 days a week, I walked all the way from 16th and P to 34th and P without ever seeing that stupid bus.
2:09 pm
Nikki: Yeah, the G2 is on a horrible interval. I think it’s 30 minutes (or more) most days, and it rarely has anything to do with the traffic on P.
2:10 pm
When I lived at 16th & U, I loved the S2 & S4 buses. They come every 5 minutes or so in the morning, and dropped me off at 11th and H, just a block from my office, in about 20 minutes.
Now that I live a bit further up 16th, near Bell, it takes close to 45 minutes to get to the same spot downtown. Coming home is even worse, because it sometimes takes 3 light cycles to get from 16th and Harvard to 16th and Irving.
I’ve figured out that it takes the same amount of time, during rush hour, to take the metro instead.
And the 42, while convenient to get from Mt. Pleasant to Dupont Circle, is a nightmare if you are trying to get anywhere beyond that in either direction.
2:21 pm
16th Street should have a ski lift. You’d get on via trampline, and get off via little slide/tubes.
2:29 pm
I attempted to take the 42 bus ONE TIME this summer. I was heading from Metro Center to Mount Pleasant and was advised by a friend to take an S bus. I had just missed the S bus and figured the 42 would be fine. And it was, until I reached Dupont Circle. The bus was attempting to turn from the Circle and head up Connecticut but a vehicle was parked in a no parking zone in front of the Starbucks right there on the corner. The busdriver was unphased and proceeded to make a hundred small maneuvers back and forth until the bus got STUCK right there only centimeters away from two parked cars. The bus driver shut off the bus and told everyone that she was going to have to wait until the owners of the vehicles came to move their cars. It was Dupont on a Friday night! We all got off the bus and traffic was COMPLETELY blocked for all cars attempting to turn from the Circle onto Connecticut. It was a hot mess! I then got into a cab. UGH.
2:37 pm
DC buses are the worst I’ve ever seen. 75% of the drivers go as slowly as possible in order to have to drive the least amount possible.
Of the buses I’ve ridden, the D 6 is the worst. The 30 lines going along Wisconsin Ave through downtown are extremely bad. The G 2 is also extremely bad. The D 2 is quite bad.
Metro keeps saying it will put GPS system to keep track of the buses but then just comes up with one excuse after another to avoid doing so. The buses are ridden mostly by city people, so the DC rep on the Metro Board gets out-voted by the MD & VA commuter reps, but until the buses receive more money & more supervision, the DC rep should vote no on everything.
I guess it fits in a way - DC is a third-world cesspool with third-world government “services”, police, & buses.
3:17 pm
Sarah.H - The S buses are good unless you live down 16th and need to go up to work instead of starting north and going south. When I started working in Adams Moran I’d take the bus from 16th and P up to Euclid street in the morning, I would see 19485924385 buses heading south across the street but where do they all go! You would think there would also be 19485924385 buses coming right back up but its not the case. I guess they get lost in the Bermuda, I mean Federal, Triangle.
3:47 pm
The guy’s guess about the 14th St buses is right. Several times I’ve walked from U St south and gotten to Thomas Circle before the bus because it stops so much. I wave to the driver every time I pass him at a stop again.
4:41 pm
I’ve noticed one thing about the 42 buses. For several years, waiting at the Mt Pleasant st and Irving stop, the 42′a all arrive 1..2…3…4…5…6.. one after another going the other way. So you’d think that 7 buses would be coming your way upon return. No such thing. They all turn around and you’ve got 7 buses all saying NOT IN SERVICE.
It’s been like that for years.
5:48 pm
Having been a morning commuter on the 42 for several years, I have to say that it has to be among the most frustrating experiences in the world. In the morning you will have 3-5 buses coming in clumps, and then no buses for 10, 15, sometimes even 25 minutes.
Getting back at night from Farragut Square is a disaster as well. You stand there for 20 minutes while 10-15 buses head to Georgetown and up Wisconsin pick up the lucky 1-3 passengers actually waiting for that line. Meanwhile, the bus that services the most densely populated area of the city has one unreliable bus that comes seemingly at random. I especially love fighting for cover a with the 20-40 other people waiting for the 42 to meander on over when it is raining out. Makes for a really enjoyable experience.
7:07 pm
Right on, Jimbo. A good friend swears he saw six! 42 buses bunched up on Connecticut Ave one day. The most 30 buses I’ve seen bunched up is four.
This is where the GPS system would help. A dispatcher gets on the radio, tells the six 42 buses to stop, move all passengers in the first two or three buses, then start them going again, with that other buses leaving in ten minute increments. What we have now is anarchy, ruled by the bus drivers’ whims.
During rush hours the D 2 runs three buses on a loop between Glover Park & Dupont Circle. I’ve seen all three buses bunched together several times, & once I went off cursing the bastards. Nothing helps - rational explanations as to the inconvenience, pleading as a fellow human being, cursing - nothing helps.
A GPS system & one supervisor for each line would fix the problem. Immediately.
10:40 am
I ride the L buses, which are decent for the most part. But once last winter, I was on the L2 (which of course had come ridiculously late), and noticed an appalling smell. It became clear that the old-ish lady sitting towards the front had shit her pants. She didn’t make a secret of this, although she seemed somewhat embarrassed. It was so late and I was so tired, and thought I could survive with my scarf over my face for the 20-min ride until my stop. I gave up when the bus driver pulled over and got off the bus to make a phone call (presumably to his supervisor to ask what the protocol is for customers who poo themselves). I was starting to gag from the stench, and also was close enough to the metro that I could walk. What a crappy ride (ha. sorry.).
10:48 am
has anyone else seen the lady who preaches in spanish on the bus?
1:09 pm
The 14th street buses can be pretty speedy during rush hour, but by the time they hit Thomas Circle they are mobbed. One reason they are occasionally so slow is that there are for some reason an enormous number of people in wheelchairs who use them, and it takes forever to load the chairs on and off the bus, especially if people won’t move out of the flip-down seats. (Nothing against wheelchair users, mind you.)
Also, I have frequently seen the bus drivers on this route spray air freshener after particularly smelly homeless people get on or off, spray that’s nearly as toxic as the homeless people themselves. And one day riding one of the 14th Street bus, a kid in the back started barfing, and his family didn’t even bother to get him off the bus to finish his business. Needless to say, everyone ELSE got off the bus lickety split. The joys of public transit…
2:28 pm
Hey, thanks for the link!
2:52 pm
I ride the G8, 80, and G2 frequently. The G8 always gets stuck in gridlock in the morning once it gets to 13th & I Street, taking 10+ minutes to go the last 4 blocks of the route to Farragut Square. However, the 80 can take just as long to get downtown, because it picks up so many wheelchair & elderly & crazy/homeless passengers. My favorite G8 experience had to be when nothing came for 15 minutes, then two buses arrived — the empty one sped past our crowded stop while we all had to cram onto the already-packed bus. The G2 is never there when you need it.
3:39 pm
I’m cool with the G2, it’s been there when I need it– most of the time. The 70 series, on the other hand, is ridiculous in it’s non-express form. When I’m in Shaw and I need to get down to the mall where I work I usually just take the circulator. 9th street is quicker, you never have to worry about schedules, it’s cheaper and you don’t have to fight mofos to get a seat.