hiidenkonttibeta

Today was “International Car Free Day”. Oulu is one of the participating cities and there’s been ads in buses and around the city. Our friendly bus company Koskilinjat seemed the handle this opportunity for attracting more passengers in their usual smooth manner. Oops, I seem to have the sarcasm mode on – just a moment, switching to plain whine mode for a little while.

They sucked.

According to the time table it takes 15 minutes to get from the city center to the University using bus route 19. Today it was over double that, which means about 40 minutes from the center to Technopolis. The bus #19 is usually full in the morning and there’s people standing on the aisle, like today:

Compared to Japan this is probably half empty, but we Finns find it crowded enough. Today it was so full that on every stop from the center to the University the driver had to tell the people waiting on the bus stop that there’s no room for them.

What a wonderful pro- public transport experience for all the people who actually made the mistake of not using their cars today! You’re waiting on a bus stop, in the rain (it was raining), the bus is 10 minutes late already and when it finally arrives the driver just says “sorry, we’re full, there’ll be another bus in 20 minutes” and drives away. Will you:
a) sell your car and use bus from now on
or
b) never again voluntarily use bus?