I started this discussion on mastodon, but want to here too. If you could create the perfect bus stop, what would it have? Here are some of my ideas:

⛑ Safety:

  • Shelters: no advertisements blocking views. Enclosed shelters must have 2+ exit points.
  • Solar lights

♿ Accessibility:

  • A space in shelters for wheelchairs.
  • Marked wide paved section for wheelchairs & those with mobility difficulties to board a ramp onto the bus.
  • Braille on bus stop signs & tactile pavement.

🚲Other:

  • Bike racks
  • Vending Machines
  • Public water fountain
  • Tiny library

Do you have more ideas?

Edit: realized the photo i added is ai, but i can’t seem to get rid of it so 🤷‍♀️

    • grrgyle@slrpnk.netEnglish
      1·
      22 hours ago

      It’s so frustrating because all the infrastructure and willing workers are right there. We just don’t do it (because of money) - at least in my city.

      • 🇨🇦🇩🇪🇨🇳张殿李🇨🇳🇩🇪🇨🇦@ttrpg.networkEnglish
        2·
        21 hours ago

        I hated public transit in Ottawa when I lived there. It was so bad that I bought a car, something I’d at first thought I’d never need, just so I didn’t have to take OC Transpo anywhere. (OC Transpo is optimized for taking people from the suburbs downtown for work in the morning, and take them home in the evening. For literally any other use case it is worse than any other form of transportation other than, sometimes, walking.)

        At least I thought I hated it.

        Then I moved to a place that has reliable, frequent, fast public transit. 16 years after that I returned to Ottawa for a trip … and found that beforehand I only mildly disliked OC Transpo. NOW I really hate it!

        And why is it so bad? Because the City of Ottawa has made two fundamental errors:

        1. They think their bus system should break even or possibly turn a profit. This is not what public transit is for.
        2. They then adopted the reversed attitude of what they should even if #1 was a thing: they won’t spend money on the bus if there’s not enough ridership … but the whole reason there’s not enough ridership is because the buses are such crap.

        And what’s especially annoying about all this is that they have all the pieces to have a world-class public transit system in place. The Transitway is roads that only buses can drive on, allowing them to slip past traffic jams. The buses themselves are astonishingly comfortable (kicking complete ass against the buses I ride in that regard). Bus stops are generally located in smart places and are frequent enough that you’re probably within walking distance of a bus stop even in the middle of the suburbs.

        And yet the system is so incompetent that despite those advantages only the truly desperate use it outside of two hours in the morning and two hours in the evening.