School buses are a public nuisance. Why do we allow these obnoxious yellow monstrosities to have free reign over our roads?
Of all the things I’ve bitched about on the road, school buses are probably the thing I hate the most. In fact, let’s take it a step further. If I were to make a list of things in general that piss me the fuck off, school buses would be in my top five, right next to swipe-to-type keyboards.
There’s nothing more frustrating than encountering a fucking school bus on your commute. I think I figured out where the idea for The Magic School Bus came from. School buses apparently have magical protections that allow them to do anything they fucking want on the road. Especially stop traffic for no reason for several minutes while some half-retarded brat fumbles his way to or from the bus.
I’ve bitched about school buses several times across various articles (most notably in “Rage Against the Road, Volume 2”), and I’m honestly surprised it took me this long to make an entire article about it. These things are more than just a minor inconvenience, they’re a public nuisance and we need to stop pretending they’re not.
My biggest peeve is that they can just stop all traffic on a whim for no reason other than “muh kidz”.
I completely understand stopping traffic if you’re letting off a group of kids and some of them have to cross the street after getting off the bus. I don’t mind waiting a moment to ensure the child makes it across the street safely. What I do mind is when you’re picking up a kid curbside and you not only decide it’s necessary to stop all traffic in all directions, but you leave the stop sign out while you have a chat with the kid’s parent for five minutes. The moment I see you doing this, I ignore your retarded stop sign and go, no matter how angry you or other drivers get. Yes, I’m aware your bus has a camera and what I did was technically illegal. I’m also aware that I have footage of you needlessly obstructing traffic to chit-chat for several minutes, and I fully intend to bring it to court with me when I dispute your bullshit citation.
It’s even more frustrating when the bus drops the kid off, then sits there and waits to make sure the kid goes inside their house, all the while lights and stop sign flashing away. The kid is on the sidewalk and half way up his steps, why the fuck am I still required to be stopped? I’ve even seen kids stop to play around for a few minutes before going inside while the bus sits there and stops me from going. One bus on my route years ago would routinely do this, so eventually I began disregarding the stop sign once the child was on his steps. The bus driver caught on and began spitefully stopping their bus at an angle, forcing myself and oncoming traffic to wait until little Jimmy was done farting around and went inside. And I’m the asshole?
Why do we accept this? Why aren’t school bus drivers held to any kind of regulations or laws that prohibit this kind of behavior? I’m not allowed to idle my car in the middle of a one-way street when picking someone up at their house, so why do these big yellow assholes get cart blanche?
I’ve got another story.
On one of my routes years ago I would regularly encounter a bus letting off a crippled kid in a wheelchair. The bus had one of those platform elevators that takes a moment to set up and another moment to lower to let the person in the wheelchair off. I’m not mad about that part, as much as it sucks having to wait a few minutes for the kid in the wheelchair to be let off the bus I understand that he doesn’t have much choice and would probably rather be walking off the bus like a regular non-crippled person. What I AM mad about is that the driver continued to stop all traffic while the kid’s mom wheeled him up the handicap ramp and into the front door of the house. You can’t even argue that the driver is ensuring the child makes it inside safely here, the kid is already with his parent. What right do you have to obstruct traffic for an extra three minutes just to watch this kid’s mom wheel him up the ramp and into the house?
This is where a lot of you will tell me I’m just an inconsiderate and impatient asshole. You’re absolutely right. If I’m out on the road, that means I have somewhere to be. Unlike most of you slack-jawed lifeless idiots, I actually value my time. There are plenty of better things I could be doing instead of sitting around waiting for some brat to dawdle his way inside his house. I don’t have the time for your slow-placed bullshit, I’ve got a life to live. Why should I be forced to put my life on hold for several minutes because some school bus driver wants to sit and make sure a kid gets inside their house? Okay, maybe they don’t want to see some poor eight year old get locked out and have to sit outside until God knows when. Fair enough, there’s nothing wrong with prioritizing a child’s safety. But do you really need to stop traffic in all directions while you do that? No, you fucking don’t. The kid is already away from the street, it’s not like some car’s going to come flying in out of nowhere, drive up the steps, and take the kid out. Close your damn stop sign and let the rest of us go about our day.
There needs to be some sort of accountability for school bus drivers with no regard for other vehicles on the road. If I catch you sitting there talking to a parent for five minutes while you continue to stop all traffic I should be able to report your self-centered ass and have you slapped with a traffic violation in the same way a cop would do to me if I blocked traffic to chit-chat with someone on the side of the road. You don’t get a pass to do whatever the fuck you want just because you’re transporting kids. If anything you should be held to an even higher standard. You sitting there talking or blocking off traffic for ten minutes while Billy and his retarded mother take forever to get to the bus not only impedes on my day, but it also impedes on the children’s day, because now you risk making them late for school. Won’t anybody think of the children?!
I’m the inconsiderate one because I don’t understand why I have to sit around for several minutes after you’ve already dropped a kid off or when you’re picking them up directly from the curb? No, I’m sorry, that’s bullshit. Don’t give me that shit about safety, that argument is completely invalid when the kid has to literally take one single step from the sidewalk to get onto the bus, or when the kid is on the sidewalk already. Is the child going to suddenly say “LOL SIKE” and go running into the middle of the street or something? Does the bus driver think Ted Kennedy’s ghost is going to come flying around the corner up onto the sidewalk and plow into the kid? Get real, this isn’t about safety, it’s about the bus driver being an ass who gets off on messing with the flow of traffic.
Pick up/drop off your kids and keep it fucking moving, you big yellow asshole.