Burrstone

I was in the parking lot for Northport Harbour this afternoon and was surprised to see one of the new NICE ford SUV's in the community parking lot that boarders the water... Anyone want to speculate what that was doing way up on Suffolk's northshore, way off NICE's path...???

I'm glad you think so but in reality there was no need for chains. As already stated chains tear up the road, were ALL roads NICE buses traveled on covered in a compact layer of snow? Were buses traveling on any clear roads? Chains are not recommended on roads were you can see the road surface because they will tear the shit out of the roads... In addition to tearing up roads chains would lower fuel economy and the biggest kicker, you are not supposed to go over 30mph with chains. This would all just slow down the system, and did I mention tear up the roads for no benefit... Brett, what would have been gained by adding chains to NICE buses? Nothing, they weren't needed in this storm...

There was no need for the chains,,, The doing it does not create a need...

Vehicles don't need chains in the amount of snow we had in this store, in fact service would be suspended way before in a store that dumped enough snow to need chains. If you put chains on all the buses in the NICE fleet for this storm (and every storm similar to it) all you would do is tear up the roads! My original point was merely that a bus weighs much more than your car and has much more traction than your car...

Buses weigh a LOT more than your car...

I suggest you get a proper pair of snow boots and perhaps some heavy duty socks....

Sabotaged by the , that's what my money's on...

I could understand if there was a massive snowfall where they needed to close the LIE (and other roads) to remove massive snowfall... but that'sit... To close the LIE, thruway and I-84 to commercial traffic at 5 pm and regular cars hours later.... Why? First of all "Commercial traffic" is more experience in this, but shut down first LMAO, FAIL!

You do realize why drivers like better right? it's not bc they care about the system, passengers, or service. It's because of the pension, they could get away with more with the , a driver could make $100,000 or live a very comfortable life with overtime, etc.. Hound has said before he would benefit from the skeleton system the wanted to run. How would that affect you and the average rider? Of course someone like him wants wants the back and I said before I totally understand why a driver in his position would want the back. But to say things would be better with the back because drivers are pro is just silly - of course the drivers want the back, it's better for THEM that doesn't mean the passengers would be better off.

I love the random posts about a story at Whole Foods or Wendy's in the Nassau Inter County forum on a transit related website/forum. lol

Were you fanning or running errands? Why didn't you take the S1 15 minutes before the one you took? You really thought you could make a connection that tight traveling on 110 during the PM rush?

That's exactly what I was thinking!

Sure, mechanics have CDL's and can drive the buses, but they'd still be getting paid (and not fixing buses)... Who knows, anythings possible and apparently none of us know. lol

It was being a nice neighbor indeed, maybe stepping up so everyone in Nassau doesn't view Veolia as the villain. I also wonder if Nassau and Veolia have a deal (or if its in their contract) to provide buses for shelter where there would be a lot of evacuees standing out in poor weather? BTW the UPS story was on News12, no mention of NICE.... Fuel ain't free, if the bus is running a driver probably has to be on the bus for liability purposes... In the grand scheme of things, not that much money but someone has to pay for it...

I like how the bus actually say "EVACUATION CENTER" so unneeded but so cool.

So you ran 30 minutes late?

I could walk into company tomorrow and take a poll, I'm sure a majority of employees at any would say they felt they deserved longer or more breaks... That doesn't mean the company is treating them unfairly, I think a lot of people forget their employer is paying them to work, not to take breaks. Are NICE drivers not covered by NYS labor laws regarding breaks? I know certain industries are not covered, I have no idea if this is one of them. Whatever it is I'm sure it's on the up and up, the union wouldn't allow the company to violate labor law... It's funny, Yuki posted what a driver told him, yet he forgets he posted pics of 2 driver paddle reports (List NICE interlines You Know) that both showed a 30 minute meal break...

I continually see cars from Babylon to Amityville (last town before Nassau) that have "official" license plates without any sort of County or Town seal... So... Lets stop guessing... lol I posted this as a reference to what I was talking about before (maybe I should of said that), not "what is it, what is it? Please guess..." because when I don't know what something, I really want to hear what others "guess" it is. lol

Nah, It's got "official" license plates (EBT wouldn't be able to register their vehicles as official) this vehicle is either owned by Suffolk County or SCT. If that's true Suffolk County needs to stop wasting money on perks for the operators and put the money into the operations, this isn't the 1970's a lot of companies would be more than happy to run the system with what is stated in the contract no free vehicles, gas, upkeep on their yard. lol If any od what you say is true Newsday needs to do an article on the situation and show the taxpayers (and riders) their money being wasted!

I love how everything is always portrayed as "evil Veolia" turning something evil or messing something up. I've been following this deal with the Boston school buses for almost a year now, it is interesting the last operator was notorious for being (very) late, they were even fined $800,000 last year by the Boston Public Schools.

I'm not going to cry a river for the Boston School Bus Drivers just as with the NYC bus drivers I think it is WRONG to strike and leave children stranded to get what you want. IMHO there should be a law against this... Whether it's buses or sewer systems the municipality decides to privatize the system and companies like Veolia bid on the job, Veolia doesn't just decide to privatize something. Of course union members don't want wherever they are working to be privatized because they know whatever private company will be running it will tighten the belt and crack the whip! This is not Veolia Transportation, this is Veolia Water (or environmental I can't remember off hand without googling it)....

BTW this is the car that seems to have some sort of a supervisor or dispatcher in it logging bus times similarly to what NICE does (and LIB did)...

If you get to Walt Whitman Mall you'll sometimes see what I assume is a supervisor or dispatcher with SCT sitting in the parking lot behind the bus lanes in the same type of car (grey chevy sedan with official plates) looking like the guy is logging in times the buses get to the mall. I've seen the same car at Amityville RR once with the guy outside talking to someone, he was wearing a white shirt and SCT jacket so i know SCT must use these cars as this guy wasn't a driver as EBT drivers have blue shirts that have a EBT logo on one arm and an SBT logo on the other arm. Unless EBT supervisors/dispatchers wear white and the SCT allows them to use these cars. BTW there is no county seal on the vehicle just an "official" plate. I assume the car is owned by the County and given to the operators just like the buses... Speaking of which I always assumed Educational Bus transportation INC and EBT INC were the same company (just abbreviated for the transit buses) until about a year ago when I realized they are two separate companies. So technically they have two companies housed in the same yard on Sunrise highway even all I'm pretty sure it's ran as one company, proof is that they "share" drivers, a driver can have work that involves transit and school bus work in the same day (as discussed on this forum in the past). This is odd, it makes complete business sense because both "companies" are protected should EBT should lose the SCT contract or Educational lose a big contract, etc the company who lost the contract could just file bankruptcy and close without affecting other parts of their business. But I know someone who runs the office for a parent company that owns multiple company (they all share an office) and I was told the DOT is very anal in situations where companies "share" drivers and office space... They expect separate records, separate random drug/alchol tests, etc. So let's say a driver drives both a school and transit bus, Educational and EBT must both keep separate records on the driver, both EBT and educational would have to maintain a system to randomly test this driver (technically this driver could come up for a random for EBT and come up for a random the next day for Educational).

Just an FYI, EBT uses a Chevy sedan with "official" plates (assuming the vehicle is owned by Suffolk County or SCT) for driver relief.

Suozzi? Define screw over? Before Suozzi became an "MTA guy" Suozzi battled long and hard saying Nassau was paying (MTA FOR Long Island Bus) too much, getting little in return, and that the MTA's overhead was crazy (aka MTA eas keeping more and the actual "system" was getting little). LMAO why should anyone fill out a complaint with the LIBRU over NICE!?! What can the LIBRU union do besides forward it to NICE? Facebook, for any business, is a marketing tool. I'm not sure what you think Facebook is or why any company would leave up anything negative....