Artiks

2105, my all-time favorite ride at RTS. A Park-and-Ride from Fairport Baptist Home, through Fairport, then “ER” (East Rochester), with a civil and friendly clientele. 309 is a M-A-N artik (articulated), slow, but they rode way better than our lumber-wagons. (Long-ago photo by BobbaLew. I’ve started many blogs with this photograph.)

—Six or seven years after I started driving RTS bus, we got our first “bendables,” our 300-series M-A-N artiks.
We bus-drivers had to train to drive these things, but after that I jumped right in.
For winter I picked a run whose first “half,” 2105, used an artik.
Out to Fairport Baptist Home, probably dead-head (no passengers), then in over our 2100 line.
Since an artik could carry more passengers, 2105 did the equivalent of two separate bus-trips — one from ER, and the second from Fairport.
Our ER passengers were angry because they no longer were the earlier time.
The two separate buses started about the same time, so 2105 covered ER later, since it had to cover Fairport first.
The idea was only one driver to cover two bus-trips. Them ER passengers could just go to Hell, as long as Transit management continued to get their bloated paychecks.
I think a 300 could carry 60; but I averaged about 35.
Our mechanics hated the 300s, since they had metric fittings requiring new wrenches, etc.
Bus-drivers were also leery of the 300s. Not only were they bog-slow, they liked to get stuck on icy pavement.
Our lumber-wagons would go through 18 inches of snow, but not a 300.
The trailer also steered. You had to be careful on corners, lest the trailer sideswipe a car next to you. If it did you didn’t know about it until your contact pulled you over blocks later.
I liked driving the 300s. Excellent clientele, usually rural folk. And Park-and-Rides often had expressway: PEDAL-TO-THE-METAL, and head for the passing lane!
65 mph was top-speed for a 300, but they would do it.
There were things you kept in mind driving a 300:
—When the traffic light for the street you were crossing changed to yellow was when you hit the accelerator. Your traffic light might go back to red before you cleared the intersection. They were that slow.
—For 2105 I asked the morning trainout man, Greenlea, to give me a 300 with chains. Only three 300s had ‘em; chains that dropped under the drive-wheels.
I had a hill in an apartment complex that was never treated when it snowed. I almost didn’t make that hill once.
—You also had to be aware of pavement that could get the center-hinge pogoing. You had to cross just so, and slowly!
—The 300s were extremely heavy.
I remember once aiming my 300 straight into a 10-foot snowbank. Snow everywhere, but we plowed right through. Never even got the front wheels off the pavement.
Them 300s were my favorite ride.
But I will never forget the first time I drove one — that was 2105.
Inbound in Fairport is a 90-degree corner with its apex right to the corner.
And of course a streetlight pole was right at that apex, waiting for you to clobber it.
Getting a 40 foot lumber-wagon around that corner took gigundo swing. Clear into the opposing lane, then back up traffic around the corner.
“33-foot wheelbase,” I told some dude once. “It’s not a snake!”
300s were 60 feet long, yet “here comes that corner!
How’m I gonna get this sucker around that corner?” I swung almost onto the opposing shoulder!
Easy as pie! A 300 was “bendable.”
We just “snaked” around that corner.

• For 16&1/2 years (1977-1993) I drove transit-bus for Regional Transit Service (RTS) in Rochester, NY, a public employer, the transit-bus operator in Rochester and environs.
• “Park-and-Rides” were trips from suburban or rural end-points, usually through Park-and-Ride parking-lots, where passengers would park their cars, for a bus-ride to work in Rochester.
• The M-A-N artiks were German, but assembled in NC.
• “Lumber-wagons” were our regular 40 foot city buses. They rode like lumber-wagons.
• A “half” is one-half of a daily work assignment; usually comprised of two “halves.” Some runs had three “halves.” (Go figure!)