After only two days of improved service, Metrobus is in hot water with its passengers once again.
A week after the service has promised to fix broken buses and even lease extra ones to supplement their ailing fleet, commuters are up in arms again.
According to Susan van Schalkwyk who uses the service on a daily basis to commute to Sandton, everything went well on Monday with 23 extra buses being introduced after mechanics spent the weekend salvaging them. Unfortunately on Tuesday her bus broke down again. She says it overheated and the ignition was damaged, leaving the passengers stranded. They had to walk a considerable distance to catch another bus but there was not enough room on the bus for all the extra passengers. According to Van Schalkwyk the afternoons are the worst because of insufficient and over-crowded buses. She says Metrobus is to blame for not informing the ever-growing number of people who use the service’s Westgate-to-Sandton route for not informing them that they do not have the capacity to carry these extra passengers. She also says passengers are so disgruntled that some verbally abuse Metrobus drivers and that inappropriate insulting messages were send to Metrobus spokesperson Esther Dreyer. This Van Schalkwyk does not agree with.
Ronel Zurcher, another daily commuter tells a similar story. She says the biggest problems are buses breaking down or being cancelled, and agrees that afternoons are the worst.
Another female passenger says after her bus had broken down she and other female passengers had to suffer the humiliation of being ferried to Westgate in the back of a bakkie with a canopy.
Most of the female passengers also complain that because of buses are not on schedule they often arrive at their destinations after dark, which holds potential danger.
Another complaint was the absence of inspectors despite promises to that effect, and those who show up are rude towards passengers.
The record is awaiting comment from Metrobus.
