Bus company messaging evinces shirking of civic pride and responsibility

I’ve recently begun seeing Facebook advertisements for another new mobile app-based on-demand transportation service, this one called Skedaddle. This Boston-based startup is bringing the Uber/Lyft ridesharing concept to intercity bus and van travel. It promises to match a user up with at least nine others going to the same destination on the same day, and give users a quick, comfortable ride in “a professionally driven luxury vehicle” with “comfortable seating and plenty of storage” and “no crummy bus stations.”

Adam Nestler, co-founder and CEO of Skedaddle, explained to Mashable, “"There's this big trend for millennials to live without cars, but getting outside the city or getting to a weekend destination can be super difficult and expensive, and really inefficient.” In general, being a car-free Millennial myself, I support the development and expansion of technologies that enable more people to live and take advantage of all the opportunities out there without needing to drive everywhere. But there’s something that rubs me the wrong way about the implicit attitude in the way that Skedaddle, along with some of the “curbside” intercity bus operators like Megabus, market themselves and conduct their business.

By pitching themselves as alternatives to having to deal with “crummy bus stations” and other attendant displeasures of using public conveyances, they promote the idea that people can simply avoid public accommodations and not have to do their part to improve the public realm. This attitude is reflected in the fact that Megabus and the like tend to locate their curbside stops close or adjacent to major bus or train stations and hubs that someone else pays to maintain. By not maintaining their own stations, or even any kind of shelter at their stops, these intercity bus operators save costs, and can pass these savings on to passengers via lower fares. By locating near other transportation facilities, they pass some of these costs on to other entities — including Amtrak, Greyhound and local transit and port authorities.

I don’t blame travelers for seeking the lowest fare or looking for a more pleasant travel experience. Nor do I particularly blame entrepreneurs in the motor carrier field for seeking to fill a market niche. But we, as taxpaying and voting citizens, must realize that the playing field on which passenger trains and traditional intercity buses compete with other motor carriers of passengers is far from level. Taxes paid by bus operators don’t cover nearly their full share of maintaining the road network they use, while passenger train operators either pay to maintain their own tracks or pay access fees to the track owners, which consume a greater percentage of their revenues than any meager “access fees” for the road network claim of bus companies’ revenues. But to also send a message that reeks of classism — “you can ride in comfort on your own schedule while ‘those people’ wait around for scheduled buses and trains in dingy facilities” — seems to add insult to injury.

Now, I (as a car-free resident of Washington, DC) will consider using a service like Skedaddle to get to a place that is truly difficult to access without a car, such as the southern Delaware beaches and certain mountain destinations in Virginia and West Virginia. There is ample opportunity for bus and vanpool services to fill in these sorts of gaps in the public transportation network, and is a great way for these services and traditional rail and bus networks to complement each other. But these services should not be seen as substitutes for, or excuses to avoid thinking about and pushing for, a robust, high-quality network of public conveyances — particularly transit and regional and intercity passenger trains — and for the need for we, the public, to accept our shared responsibility to pay for their upkeep. 

If you’re tired of “crummy” accommodations for common carrier travel, then work to make them better by, among other things, getting their owners the funding they need for better maintenance, renovations, or replacement as necessary. When it comes to making seamless, safe, high-quality and dignified travel on our shared mobility network possible for all, we’re all in this together. We should invest in and expand our passenger train and connecting bus and shared-ride network and in world-class, well-maintained stations, terminals and transit hubs — as do so many of our peer nations. If we had a saner transportation and infrastructure policy, there would be no need for a “better” alternative — other than driving and flying, which should only be done when necessary to make trips that would be impractical by other means.