More safety for drivers
MTA DRIVERS CAN NOW cruise with peace of mind — every bus has been equipped with a partition.
The final batch of the city’s 4,700 buses got plastic panels this year — fulfilling a hard-fought benefit won by workers in their contract with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.
Officials with Transport Workers Union Local 100 believe it’s a reason why misdemeanor and felony assaults, including spitting, on bus drivers dropped 35% to 56 attacks last year, compared with 86 in 2012.
Bus drivers at the Grand Ave. bus depot in Queens said the partitions prevent the most severe, life-threatening assaults.
“They saw the potential of how safety partitions work,” said Clarence Patterson, union chairman at the Grand Avenue Bus Depot. “We knew it wasn’t all going to be perfect, but it’s a great start.” Orlando Pitre, a bus driver for 10 years, appreciates the partitions. About five years ago, while he was driving the B13 down Linden Blvd., a young woman spit in his face, he said.
“Had I had the partition back then, I wouldn't have gotten assaulted,” Pitre, 51, said. “With the partition, she wouldn’t have reached me.” He took three months off as he got treatment for any possible hepatitis infection. He also dealt with the mental anguish of the attack — one he felt NYPD and MTA officials dismissed as nothing serious, making him feel belittled.
“The mental and the emotional — it’s devastating,” Pitre said. “It messes up your mind, like, why did this happen to me? I didn’t do anything to her.”
Though bus drivers say the partitions block attacks of opportunity, a truly angry rider can still ruin a shift — Pitre’s brother, a longtime bus driver, was hit with spit two weeks ago.
The partitions don’t completely surround the driver, giving violent passengers an opening to swing an arm over the plastic panel or douse a driver with hot coffee.
A quick-moving passenger can also slip a hand behind the door and open the partition.
“That was another thing we were arguing for: safety locks, where it can be locked from the inside,” said Moises Del Rio, union vice chairman at the Grand Ave. depot. “A person who knows the system could just go over and reach in and open the door.”
Bus driver Anthony Griffith, 53, who was also spat on, said his solution to wipe out assaults on the job was easy — mandatory minimum sentences for assaults on transit workers.
“A mandatory minimum would be a real deterrent,” he said.
But J.P. Patafio, a senior TWU official, said that partitions reduce much of the hazard. He likens the effort against on-the-job assaults to Vision Zero for bus drivers — a reference to Mayor de Blasio’s goal of eliminating all traffic deaths.
“You have a lot of just threatening behavior — banging on the glass, they’ll curse them out,” Patafio said. “You’re not going to have the punching; it’s harder to grab, choke.”
There’s another safety feature that’s appearing in more buses as well — cameras. Surveillance equipment is now on half the MTA’s fleet, and new buses will be equipped with them, said MTA spokeswoman Beth DeFalco.