Is it possible?

[peterjames124]

I was riding the QM1A on an MCI express back from Queens one morning and as we approached the Midtown Tunnel, the B/O was stopped by a Transit Police Officer right before the toll. He asked him to step out from the bus, and told him that a woman in a car had told him that the bus' rear sign read "EMERGENCY CALL POLICE." The B/O strongly disputed the claim because the front sign read "QM1A MIDTOWN 57TH STREET VIA 6TH AVE." I was sitting in the front part of the bus and was able to see the sign flashing Midtown 57th Street even while the B/O was out speaking with the police officers. My question is, is it possible for the signs to display two totally separate signs?

[Q25toJamaica]

It happens often

[7LineFan]

The rear sign can freeze up. It happens quite a bit.

[peterjames124]

.

 

Oops! My mistake. Finals season has helped mould my brain into cheese.

 

Anyhow, my question is a two-parter. Is it possible for the rear sign to work independently of the front? And I know the LED rear signs are quite advanced compared to the old flip-dot ones, but are they capable of displaying all that information? The most I've ever seen them read is a simple group of words such as "Not in Service."

 

Any thoughts?

[7LineFan]

Oops! My mistake. Finals season has helped mould my brain into cheese.

 

Anyhow, my question is a two-parter. Is it possible for the rear sign to work independently of the front? And I know the LED rear signs are quite advanced compared to the old flip-dot ones, but are they capable of displaying all that information? The most I've ever seen them read is a simple group of words such as "Not in Service."

 

Any thoughts?

 

For the first one, I doubt it. The only way you'd see something different on the rear sign is if something's wrong. It's not practical anyways to have a different thing on there.

 

For the second one, I don't think you really need more than the route on the back.

[Zman]

The electronic signs break...and often. I'm thinking that the panic button was pressed, not necessarily by this particular driver, the signs reset, but the rear sign froze.

[Forest Glen]

I've seen many buses with the Emergency signs on. Ironically, most of them have passengers. However, no one actually thinks it's an emergency.

[aemoreira81]

I've seen many buses with the Emergency signs on. Ironically, most of them have passengers. However, no one actually thinks it's an emergency.

 

One time when I was on a Bee-Line bus with a similar reading---the driver got stopped by at least 5 different officers in different jurisdictions (it was a sign defect and the bus was yanked from service at the end of the line).

[Q53 Limited]

sometimes the sign may read what you coded in the bus but it may be diffrenet outside. i was driving the Q33 bus from the 74th st term, and while going in the 33 slot the starter walked up and told me why i got the Q49 sign up? it say Q33 on the code box over head but outside was frozen to the line of the driver who had the bus before me. but yet Lagaurdia wont take the bus out of service nor they want paper route number on the windows.

[peterjames124]

It was actually quite funny to see. This operator is perhaps the most annoying operator ever. Anybody who knows him knows never to sit anywhere near the front because he will talk like mad with whomever is closest to the front. He is always, always complaining about how much worse the line is under the MTA and how he used to rule the roost when it was part of Queens Surface Corp. Seeing him become flustered just made me laugh. I didn't say this before, but his answer to the police officers was, "How do you know the woman didn't think I was cute and just wanted me to step out of the bus so she could see my butt?" The police officers made an awkward face and then he said, "Or maybe she ran away from Creedmore." Upon noticing that he had not found an audience amongst the two police officers, he got back in the bus and began talking again to his front seat passenger.