💾 Archived View for dioskouroi.xyz › thread › 25011722 captured on 2020-11-07 at 00:57:15. Gemini links have been rewritten to link to archived content
-=-=-=-=-=-=-
________________________________________________________________________________
Greyhound: a tour of the worst part of every city in North America. During less lucrative times in my life I used to ride on Greyhound (and Bolt & Megabus) semi-frequently. It is a good deal if you don't mind spending an extra 6 hours waiting around and are willing to risk being decapitated to save ~$50-200 (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Tim_McLean
). One thing that I will say is that intercity bus travel in North America is much nastier than comparable services in Latin America or East Asia. I feel like this is primarily a socio-economic issue stemming from the fact that middle class Americans do not like to ride a bus so Greyhound is much worse than equivalent services in Mexico. I recall once riding a bus from Texas to California, and the greyhound was being too exceptionally sketchy in terms out the amount of drugs and pornography in use before sundown. In El Paso I transferred to a Mexican bus service to go the rest of the way to LA, and I was very grateful for the massive improvement in hygiene, noise and sanity on the Mexican bus line.
I'm in Western Canada and Greyhound is gone now. A couple of replacement bus lines started up prior to the pandemic, but I don't know if they've survived.
I never had a problem with the depots, though they definitely weren't classy places. If you knew the towns along the route, it was usually easy to walk to a better restaurant, store, etc.
I continued to ride the bus long after my economic situation improved, because I actually enjoyed it. I met a lot of interesting characters taking the bus. I've heard a lot of "Greyhound stories," smoked a bit of weed with strangers, and found myself in some unexpectedly cool situations. Always an adventure. Air travel is so sterile in comparison.
When I was younger, I used to take the Greyhound a lot between my home town and the town I was doing an internship. The stations were definitely in the not so great parts of town. If you were there after dark, it just did not feel safe.
Of course, you rode it because it was cheap vs. your other options. Eventually, I got wise to the slightly pricier competitor in the area and started using that. I have to admit that now I would not bat an eye at spending the extra $25 on the ride, but back then it felt like a luxury.
Oh god I still remember that and the 5'th estate episode. Really tragic.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3gAeVysCIl8
Boltbus (Greyhound subsidiary) and MegaBus are certainly better where they are available.
Frequently rode greyhounds from Vancouver up through northern BC when I was young. About 1/5 rides would have some memorable event. A drunk yelling slurs at no one in particular, a mother screaming at her kids to the point the driver is threatening to call child services if she doesn’t calm down. Police pulling the bus over in the middle of nowhere and arresting someone. These kind of things.
Generally it was only the poorest people who would be riding Greyhounds up north, or those unfortunate enough not able to drive themselves.
The last time I rode a Greyhound was in 2003 to go pick up a car I was buying. It was still in the "Dirty Dog" era, and it was memorable for the acute hearing the driver had, able to pick up someone in the 12th row listening to music without headphones, and his subsequent yelling at them to turn it down.
I think they're heading in the right direction these days. I have seen reviews that say the buses are clean, generally on time, and pretty nice with leather seats.
It's okay, don't think it's gotten better since. Until I graduated a few years ago, I'd take the Vancouver to Seattle route about once a year to meet friends or interview and can't say I've ever had anything I would describe as a good experience in my dozen or so trips.
First, there seemed to some major issue with every other ride. One time the vents started leaking, in another the shocks were absolutely horrid, sometimes the bus reeked, sometimes the seats were dirty or you could feel the seat springs. One time the driver just didn't show up and our bus departed 4 hours after the scheduled time.
Second, more minor issues were always abundant. Things like broken or glacial wifi, power not working, stench, dirty terminals, dirty washrooms, annoying passengers, late departures/arrivals or general confusion from poorly documented check-in/pickup/dropoff locations.
I've taken Bolt buses now and again, usually to go from NYC -> Philly, which is kind of a pain by train. Didn't even realize they were a Greyhound brand! I'm not a very finnicky public transit user and while not fancy, the buses I was on were usually pretty clean and spacious. I do wish Americans were more willing to utilize buses, as often times they are a very economic way of getting around (both for the individual, the environment and congestion on the roads).
There is a very similar style bus service in Europe called FlixBus that I have fond (nostalgic) memories of as an _incredibly_ cheap way to get around Europe. Was it fun trying to sleep on a cramped 12 hour bus ride? No. But you can't beat getting from Bratislava to Zagreb for only 20 euro!
Yeah in my experience riding Greyhound in the Great Lakes late 2000s-mid 2010s it's not as bad as people made it out to be, if you got a newer bus. Service was frequent and cheap and I never faced a cancellation that wasn't due to snow. Though it may be because the New York - Chicago routes are heavily used.
I would rank it around the same as budget airlines like Spirit. Maybe better because there were rarely infants traveling IME.
Still no public transport beats a train for me, even Amtrak. You can't beat the space and comfort.
Interesting story. Failed as a car salesman, the Swedish entrepreneur created an option for inter-city travel where none existed.
Wickman decided to start transporting workers between Hibbing and Alice, a mining town two miles away. Cramming 15 passengers into his eight-seat “touring car,” the 27-year-old charged 15 cents a ride. On his first trip, in 1914, Wickman collected a grand total of $2.25.
This is the car he used for the first few rides [0].
[0]:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hupmobile
Freight is also a good part of their business much like the airlines. No mention of that in the article.
_Freight is also a good part of their business_
When I worked in television, satellite time was very expensive, and microwave links were scarce. We very often would send videotapes between stations and bureaus via Greyhound freight.
Ah, yes. I once left my mother-in-law's suitcase behind in the Harrisburg suburbs, discovering this only once I got back to Maryland. My brother-in-law kindly dropped it at Greyhound, and we had it the next day.
It's not as good of a deal as it used to be. It used to be a great replacement for LTL freight for all the "this doesn't deserve a pallet but I can't reasonably ask the postal service to handle this" type items.
Forty-odd years ago, I rode Greyhound a fair bit. It was before deregulation brought airline fares down. The buses were reasonably clean, not that smelly unless you sat way back by the restroom. I wouldn't care to do it today--the 20-year-old back can tolerate what the 60-year-old back can't, or anyway would rather not.
But it wasn't that bad. I would stand at the end of the line for a bus. The worst outcome was sitting next to the person nobody else wished to sit next to. The best and more common outcome was that the bus would have filled up before I boarded, and Greyhound would bring out another bus--I could ride in a nearly-empty bus.
_But it wasn't that bad_
I rode Greyhound a few times in the year before the pandemic. Cincinnati to Indianapolis. Los Angeles to Las Vegas. Chicago to Madison. My experience was the same as yours: It's not as bad as everyone makes it out to be.
I think people just have a worst case scenario in their minds that keeps them away. I understand that. I feel the same way about airplane travel over the last decade or so.
For the most part, yes, Greyhound is a solid service. I have been across more than 20 states on Greyhound buses and it is generally a great service that provides excellent value. That said, I also have about 2 drinks worth of seriously messed up stories associated with some of these travels. As a man under 40 with a reasonable build and plenty of patience, everything will probably be fine, but I would not necessarily recommend this mode of transportation to everyone.
The messed up stories are there, no question.
It’s run of the mill vilification of anything associated with poverty
No, it's not. Greyhound regularly simply cancels trips in order to fill more seats on the next trip over the same route. The result is that people who don't have any other choice end up traveling e.g. for 20 hours instead of 8 as the published schedule would suggest. They wouldn't get away with this if their customers were people whose complaints have the attention of officialdom. I don't really believe the "it would cost more if they didn't jerk you around or if they ever cleaned the terminal" excuse either.
My travels have tended toward trips that are too long for Greyhound to be an option. NC-TX or NC-MN are more expensive than even non-discount airfare and take more than a day vs less than half a day...
I used to love riding the Greyhound, ... that is until that beheading in 2008. That was ..... that was ... messed up.
I used to ride that bus to Edmonton too. Hit a little too close to home for me. Never rode the Greyhound again after that. Now every drunk or drug addled person was suspect for me and Greyhounds had no shortage of them.
And ... yes I know the guy was a schizo ... but still.
I used them a lot in the past. Man did they stink!