If you’ve ever been frustrated because a bus driver forgot to let you know when the bus reached your stop, now is the time to help us help BC Transit to resolve the problem.

An enforceable BC Human Rights agreement has been signed requiring BC Transit to ensure that drivers call out all stops clearly. Transit’s senior management needs to know how well the agreement is working.

We are asking each of you to document each and every one of your bus rides during the week of October 27 to November 2. We want to know:

1. Which bus number or route you took.

2. Approximate Time, and date you boarded the bus.

3. Direction of travel for example: North-East-West-South/ in-bound out-bound,

4. Your destination bus stop.

5. Above all, we want to know whether the bus operator calls most bus stops, only your requested stop, or no bus stops during the trip.

6. Please send an email with this information to:

info@cfb.ca.

Here is an example report:

Sept. 23, 2014 at 12:50pm took #14 Uvic from Richmond at Lansdowne heading South, driver did not call out any bus stops to my destination at Douglas at Johnson.

If you can, please consider taking a few extra bus trips this week on routes you don’t normally use or at times you don’t normally travel in addition to your regular transit routine. The more widespread the documentation, the better. We feel that a one week concentrated effort will provide BC Transit and us with the most complete sense of how the calling out of bus stops policy is working. At a later date we will ask you to document another week of bus travel to assess ongoing compliance.

We will compile the information we receive and forward it to BC Transit to let them know the rate of compliance and any particular issues that arise.

Although blind people have led the way on this issue, sighted people will also benefit greatly from a transit system that provides bus stop announcements. Victoria is a tourist mecca; visitors will find their experience in our province’s capitol much more pleasant if they receive clear, audible information when they use transit. Also, many thousands of seniors with much reduced vision will benefit immensely from a more accessible public transit. So please ask any sighted transit riders you know to help by documenting compliance with the calling out of bus stops policy.

Although greater Victoria has been the focus of this agreement, data from other BC Transit locations, such as Nanaimo, Penticton, and Kelowna, will also be very helpful.

This request does not apply to TransLink, since BC Transit is a separate system and TransLink has already implemented automated bus stop announcements.

Thank you.