Lost, Looking For the J Bus

I tried to use public transportation to get to a meeting about public transportation.

It was near impossible.

The Nov. 18 meeting was a transit roundtable hosted by the Connecticut Association for Community Transportation. The panel, moderated by CACT executive director Mary Tomolonius, included Michael Sanders, a transit administrator for the Connecticut Department of Transportation, Joe Carbone, president and CEO The Workplace, Tony Rescigno, president of the Greater New Haven Chamber of Commerce, and more transportation heavyweights. The panel discussed accessibility, upgrades, budget, and the future of Connecticut transportation.

According to Google Maps, I live approximately 4.2 miles, a 15-minute drive, from the Greater New Haven Transit District’s garage in Hamden at 1014 Sherman Ave., where the meeting took place. Yet, for me to get back and forth from the meeting it took a $16 cab ride, a 2.2 mile walk, two relatively short bus rides and a piece of my sanity.

I don’t drive. While I have a permit I have yet to take steps that will allow me that privilege because, frankly, driving scares the hell out of me. But I must admit the journey through the frigid fall air of 34 degrees last Tuesday might make me reconsider.

While I’m a frequent CT Transit customer and know the Hamden routes fairly well from my regular commutes, I decided to take a cab to the meeting because I had little time Tuesday morning to commute via public transportation. I often resort to calling a cab when I lack the extra time required to commute via bus, or when the schedule doesn’t match up with my own.

At first glance, the address seemed familiar. I recalled it being relatively close, so I presumed the cab ride would be $10 at most. I couldn’t have been more wrong. Like myself, the cab driver recognized the address and presumed he knew what direction to go. What we soon learned, there is a difference between the familiar Sherman Parkway, near Dixwell Avenue on the South end of Hamden, and the great unknown, Sherman Avenue, which is closer to the Sleeping Giant side of Hamden. So, this time with GPS in hand, we made a U‑turn and headed in the right direction, arriving 30 minutes late.

Upon my arrival, the big wigs of Connecticut transportation debated the budget and had Sanders, ​“the money man,” on the defensive. While Sanders crunched numbers and crushed my hope for a more convenient bus system, I wondered how I was going to use that same bus system to return home from the middle of nowhere.

At the meeting’s end, while all the panelists drove away in their cars, I began my search on foot to find the nearest bus stop, which I eventually found, a half mile away.

I reached the bus stop at 11 a.m. and attempted to read the weathered paper bus schedule in its yellowed display case. I had no idea where I was and with my phone service temporarily off for the moment, GPS was not an option.

So I did what anyone in my situation would do. I guessed. I could at least make out that it was J‑Bus schedule. Luckily, it was still morning because those times were the only times visible on the schedule. But, the fact still remained, I had no idea where I was, at least in correlation to the bus route. Therefore, using the process of elimination, I knew I wasn’t in Cheshire nor was I at the Hamden Plaza, so I figured I was somewhere in between, which left the Hamden Hills.

While I have never heard of the Hamden Hills previous to reading the schedule, it sounded plausible. The schedule said the bus would reach the Hamden Hills at 11:03 a.m. — only three more minutes.

Three more minutes passed and so did the J2 bus — on the other side of the road. I ran like a crazy woman weaving through cars, waving my hands in the air trying to catch the bus driver’s attention across the street. No luck. I continued to chase the bus as it turned the corner and drove out of sight, as if I was going to catch up to it and give that bus driver a piece of my mind.

At that moment, I lost any hope of getting out of the cold anytime soon. I pulled out my hideous, but exceptionally functional gloves, put my earbuds in my ears and blasted A$AP Rocky’s song F**ckin’ Problems because that is exactly what I had at the moment: problems, minus the expletive. With no car, no phone, and no bus in sight, I continued to walk with no real destination.

But, after about a half hour of walking the sidewalk-less streets of Hamden, there was a light at the end of the tunnel. I saw the IHOP sign, signaling that the Hamden Plaza was near. While I still had two bus rides before I was actually reached my front door, I’ve never been more happy to see a familiar place, where the D‑bus comes every 10 minutes.

The CT Bus Diaries project is a collaboration between the New Haven Independent, the Valley Independent Sentinel and students from the multimedia journalism class at Southern Connecticut State University. The students are blogging about experiences on CT Transit’s bus lines in order to give a glimpse into the commutes of the people using the bus system.

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