Transit Transplant

Today was my first day on transit in a new city: Seattle! I've only been on 2 different buses so far, but perhaps not surprisingly, it's not much different from Vancouver. Get on, pay, try to find a seat, don't make eye contact, watch for your stop, get off. There's the usual collection of characters: the average folk, the weirdos, old people, children, and a bus driver who also comes in a variety of flavors.

Of course, there are some differences. The local buses seem quite old. They still have stairs to get on them; I felt really bad watching old people trying to get on the bus. There's no skytrain equivalent going to where I'm living, but they do have what are called RapidRide buses. They have a dedicated lane on the road to avoid traffic; they stop every 5 or 10 blocks; the buses are more like the ones in Vancouver - only one step to get on and wheelchair ramp equipped; AND ...here's the best part ...they have free wifi on the bus! No travesty there.

All in all, getting from my place to the university was pretty simple and even without a skytrain, it took less time than it used to take me to get to SFU. There was only one small hiccup in my day. During my trip I had to transfer from bus 1 to bus 2. The google instructions told me to get off bus 1 at the corner of X and Y and to get on bus 2 at the corner of X and Y. Simple, right? Get off bus, cross street to other bus stop, board other bus...Wrong! How it actually went: Get off bus, realize there is no cross street because you're standing on a highway overpass, walk down set of nearby stairs, still no sign of said cross street, walk along parallel street which forms strange triangle with 2 other streets - neither of which is one you're looking for, cross the road and head towards underpass, breath sigh of relief when you finally see a bus stop. I'm sure it won't be the last time I have no idea where I'm going, but for now, I think I at least have that intersection figured out.