When I travel to Cádiz, I tend to use the coach. It is more environmentally friendly and a hell of a lot cheaper than going by car or motorbike - motorway tolls alone are 2/3 of the price of the bus ticket.
I tend to spend most of the journey in a semi-trance, listening to my iPod and reading, but last weekend I was sitting diagonally opposite the driver - and marvelled at his skill as he negotiated the junctions and roundabouts of Seville before getting to the motorway.
As a car driver, I am used to steering quite a large car along the same or similar routes, but please pause to think about this: in any car you are always behind the front wheels and as such you are directing the car to where you are going. The coach driver, perched in front of the wheels, is steering towards where s/he has just been. More than once my driving instincts told me we were going to hit a lamp post or mount the pavement - even perhaps drive straight over a roundabout. But no! the 40+-foot(?) coach was gently guided around all obstacles with no mishap. Today power steering helps any driver a lot, but even so I was fascinated as I watched the driver caress the steering wheel as he seemed to enter a Zen-like oneness with the mammoth machine he was so skilfully manoeuvring. It reminded me of a car advert in which Bruce Lee advises us all to be water and flow through life, weaving past obstacles and being one with our surroundings.
Obviously, such skilful coach driving is the result of exhaustive training and practice but it has left me in a state of profound admiration for the professional drivers who do it every day of their working lives.
But there is more. The driver has to observe a 100-km/h (60-mph) speed limit, not just because of speed cameras but also because of the tachograph which is recording his/her every move as well as fuel consumption, braking etc. Try that in your car. See if you are able to observe the speed limit at all times, accelerate and brake smoothly and still arrive on time without getting impatient or frustrated at the other, obviously inept, road users. I couldn't. In fact, I think my children learnt to swear in English by listening to me as I was driving.
So, hats off to our imperturbable coach drivers. They earn every penny of their wages.
Finally, in the interests of balance, here's a video by Bob Newhart on training urban bus drivers.
Perhaps Spanish coach drivers are carefully selected and trained. Having travelled by coach in the UK I am not sure you would accord local drivers the same accolade. On one journey, the driver maintained a continual - one-sided - and aggressive dialogue with other road users. For example, as a car sneaked up on the inside, he moved to cut him off and then growled "Nice try!"
ReplyDeleteNeedless to say, I felt less than completely safe in the care of said driver.
On the other hand, on another journey I took by coach, the driver was female, and aged probably in her 50s or possibly 60s. There was no muttering, no competitive driving; she showed restraint at all times and acted with courtesy towards other road users, holding back to let them go first, etc. I felt completely safe in this driver's care.
Managing a coach (so I imagine, never having tried it for myself) must be a non-trivial driving task. Moreover, the driver has huge responsibility for his passengers and other road users. When coaches are involved in accidents, the toll or injuries and deaths can be shockingly high.
Adequate training programmes and subsequent monitoring are of the utmost importance and I suspect their quality varies from country to country and perhaps from coach company to coach company.