Bus Culture: The person next to you on the bus just might be.....

Vice-President-elect Joe Biden has given newfound notoriety to commuting by train, with his nearly three-decade long daily commute on Amtrak from Delaware to participate in the U.S. Senate in Washington, D.C. National Football League commentator Tiki Barber has recently given a bump to the subway system in New York City by saying he's given up his gas guzzling vehicle in favor of commuting by the subway.

It has gotten me thinking that bus mass transit systems need a little high-profile, good press so that people might find commuting by bus just a little hipper. How hard can it be to find culturally significant people, or just plain old interesting people, on a bus? Despite all the hot press that heavy rail, high-speed rail, light rail, and subway trains have been getting lately, it is a little spoken fact that of ALL the transit trips in the United States, bus trips made up 57.5% of the total transit trips taken through the third quarter of 2008. That is 4,699,270,000 (that's billions) trips by bus between January 2008 and September 2008. Those bus trips are being taken in regions with populations above 2,000,000 all the way down to areas with populations below 100,000. That percentage split isn't unique to 2008 either. Bus transit trips made up 57.6% of total transit trips taken through the third quarter of 2007. More trips are taken by bus in New York City than are taken by subway.

Some of us here at CityBus have been talking about some of our more interesting regular passengers (and when I say interesting, I mean accomplished, not just quirky). We are going to try to bring you some of their stories in the near future, but in the meantime, I thought I'd try to dig up a few high profile personalities that are bus riders.

Mick Jones, formerly of the British rock band The Clash, loves to write music on the bus. In recent interviews publicizing his latest album he says about his music "It just comes to me. I’ve been lucky to be able to do that, maybe just while sitting on the bus or something. The rhythm of the bus might inspire a tune, and then I’ll start sticking some words onto that. Or maybe I’ll just walk the streets, taking things in, and that will inspire something. I feel lucky to be able to express myself creatively."

Eminem's character was shown writing his lyrics and creating his music while riding the bus in the movie 8 Mile. Spike Lee created the 1996 movie Get on the Bus to reflect a certain current moment in American history. The 1998 Destiny's Child song, Get on the Bus was a success in Europe and never released in the U.S. An even less mainstream cultural figure ties his notoriety to a transit grounding: the rapper Busdriver (the son of the man who wrote the 1985 movie hit Krush Groove).

But beyond that, there are not many modern (say in the last 20 years) bus transit references in popular culture. Jackie Gleason played Ralph Kramden (a bus driver) in the relatively short lived The Honeymooners in the mid-1950s. A popular British sitcom with a bus driver as the lead character, On the Buses, lasted far longer, from 1969-1973, and was patterned on a trio of On the Buses movies, the first of which drew a larger audience than James Bond's Diamonds are Forever. Of course, the iconic bus riding moment is highlighted every year on December 1, when, in 1955, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white man because she was told to do so by the bus driver.

Hopefully the lack of enthusiasm for buses in American popular culture will change over time. Certain bloggers in the United States have proudly identified themselves not only as transit riders or artists, but BUS RIDERS. There are a bazillion bloggers and other web contributers who are pro-public transit or environmental sustainability or smart growth or bicycling or transit oriented development. There are only a few who identify with buses, or seem to actually like (or at least engage) the bus-riding life. Some examples are the L.A. Bus Bench, Boise Bus Blog, and the Seattle Bus Chick. These blogs may not be around 5 years from now, but at least they are a snapshot into a bus riding community.

Historically there have also been community based efforts that have gotten some popular culture attention. Those community based efforts have been in support of expanding bus service at a low cost to riders and have gotten the most fame in the form of "bus rider unions". The most notorious of these is the Los Angeles Bus Riders Union, although there are others in Austin (TX), Tuscon (AZ), Oakland (CA) and Madison (WI),to name a few other places.

So, be on the look out for positive role models riding the bus! If you hear of any, let us know. Even if they were notorious in a past life, but are now retired :)!