The Intersection of Work and Wellbeing: A Bus Driver's View

A tell-all interview with San Francisco transit operator Mc Allen about the ups and downs of the job. "I love my work, but I do find it very challenging and it can be very stressful."

Mc Allen

This is an excerpt from a recorded interview with transit operator Mc Allen (bio). For the full story, listen to the audio version. Mc elaborates on wages and benefits; health, safety, and ergonomics; his love of the work; poetry; and organizational support for employee wellbeing.

Listen on most podcast platforms, including Apple and Spotify.

Excerpt

(Includes minor edits for brevity and clarity)

Bob Merberg: Mc Allen, tell us what you do.

Mc Allen: I’m a transit operator for San Francisco’s municipal transit agency. We call it Muni and I drive the bus. I take the bus from one end to the other and pick everybody up, get them where they want to go.

I notice the phrase “transit operator.” Is it objectionable to refer to the job as bus driver?

No, it’s not objectionable. Transit operator is the official title in San Francisco. We don’t just use buses. We also have light rail trains, streetcars, and cable cars. It’s the same job title for everybody who operates the different equipment. The job title is equipment agnostic.

What’s your work schedule?

I currently work Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and I do slightly different work each day of the week. I go for about nine hours a day from the time I arrive at my division bus yard, where I take a bus into service until the time I get relieved out on the route.

We have work assignments that can be as short as eight hours straight and as long as 12 hours with 10 hours working time and two hours off in between what’s called a split shift.

Many of the work assignments at Muni are split shift assignments. You’ll do a piece of work, have a period of time off — where you’re not being paid — and then take a second half of work as a split…

Split shifts come up a lot in research on stressors of transit operation. That two hours without getting paid? I’d be grousing.

It does bother a lot of operators… Transit service is peaky. There’s a morning service peak and an afternoon peak and you want to have the maximum number of vehicles in service at those times. That trough in the middle is part of the reason splits exist…

But it means having this gap in the middle. You can’t use that gap productively for yourself, especially if you’re commuting. You’re never going to be able to go home, for example, or have an appointment. It therefore is grating for a lot of people. I prefer straight-throughs…

Work assignments at Muni are extremely complicated. A lot of factors go into it. We have very little control over our schedules and time.

One of the major drawbacks of the profession is that our schedules are set for us… with not a lot of control and there’s very little flexibility. And for your time off as well, there’s a once annual opportunity to bid for time off… for vacations.

Operators who are newer to the job won’t be able to get the time off they desire in terms of vacation…

The type of stress that really gets to people usually has to do with lack of control, excessive demands, and weak social support. Control over schedule is a big thing.

I agree. And it is a very stressful job. As I’ve had more time at the job, it’s become more evident to me that it is more stressful… than I at first encountered.

It’s a safety-sensitive occupation — safety is the overriding concern, and we are in control of a couple dozen tons of bus and possibly carrying a couple dozen tons of passengers. You are therefore always in a heightened state of awareness — requiring you to be alert and concentrating for many hours at a stretch, while having to skillfully use a very specialized and large piece of equipment in an unpredictable environment where, at any moment, you might have to initiate an emergency stop. With no warning you’ll have, if you’re lucky, a second to make the decision.

Initiating that stop could result in a dozen or more people on your bus being injured. That’s a very stressful workload that we carry constantly. And at the same time, we have to be aware of everything that’s happening outside the bus and everything that’s happening inside the bus.

And then we’re making plans to stop at the bus stops, let people off, identify which stops have people waiting at them. All of that requires an enormous amount of attention and focus. It’s fatiguing.

It’s also a physically demanding job. Literally the work of turning the wheel and using the brake pedal are fatiguing. You’re also sitting for very long stretches at a time which can be uncomfortable. People have back injuries; people have hip problems…

Another concept in job stress is threat avoidance vigilance, which you described. There’s also threat of violence from passengers.

I’ve experienced that threat as well. And I know many other operators who have been assaulted.

You mentioned social support. We’re not generally having social interaction with colleagues. Those opportunities are far and few between. That restricts us from having an outlet for some of those stressors where you’re sharing those things with other people.

If you feel very alone, it makes it more difficult.

Having said that, there is a great esprit de corps… Our buses are going past each other, and that provides a great opportunity to just wave and say hello…

You will sometimes see bus operators stop, passing each other side to side in the middle of the street to open their windows and have a quick 10-second chat. That’s a special thing. Some people might be annoyed by it, but I think it’s great…

You hit key things: autonomy, workload, social support, and threat vigilance. Mc, I watched a video you did, and my sense is that you love your job.

I absolutely do. I love it.

What do you love about it?

I have always had deep love and admiration for the transit system in San Francisco… I think the furthest you can be in San Francisco from a Muni stop is a quarter mile, which is a remarkable system.

It’s also excellently constructed in terms of your ability to get from point to point… We also have high ridership relative to the overall number of people who are mobile in the city.

And I love San Francisco deeply. It’s a huge part of who I am — a San Franciscan. Being a transit operator puts you… in the rhythm of the city. That is extremely rewarding for me.

It’s also enormously rewarding to know that I’m facilitating people to get where they want to go in a way that is ideal. There’s walking, there’s cycling, and there’s public transit — those are the ideal ways to move through the city.

I also meet a lot of wonderful people.

Mc, are you someone who’s going to love your job, no matter what you’re doing?

No. I didn’t finish my college degree, but I studied architecture, and as a college student, I had opportunity to intern at an architecture firm. That internship turned into a draftsman job and I was miserable. It was a terrible experience...

I ended up then working in politics through fundraising and candidate campaigns, and that was in many ways worse and extremely dispiriting. And then I worked in retail as a bookseller in bookstores, which I enjoyed a lot more, but I certainly didn’t want to do for a career…

Being a transit operator is definitely the first work-for-pay career that I have felt at home in and that I’ve wanted to continue. My goal is to make it to the full retirement age with my vesting pension and healthcare benefit, which is 20 years in service…

Muni is fortunate to have you.

I hope so. I mean, they do pay me.

For transit operators, Muni pays very well. I think we’re among the top pay in the nation.

You’re also in one of the most expensive cities.

That’s absolutely right. And many operators are barely covering their bills. Having said that, we have excellent benefits — we have excellent healthcare benefits, and we have a really excellent pension.

One of the other models of stress is efforts-rewards. Do they balance? For you, it sounds like they do.

Yeah. I'd also like to say that there is a lot of opportunity to work more as a transit operator.

I work five days a week. I have the opportunity to work overtime on my days off. It’s called RDO — regular day off work. There are operators we call seven day rollers, which means they work seven days a week to get extra money because the sixth and seventh days are paid at an overtime rate.

People also will choose to work overnight, where there’s a differential, an increase in pay. We call those vampire hours… So some operators are earning a lot more than others, which is something people wouldn't necessarily expect.

My goal is to never work a day of RDO, to never work overtime in that way. I want to work five days and I want to be off, too.

San Francisco MTA, SFMTA, is a parent organization of Muni. Their website includes information from their employee survey. Employees were asked whether they agree with the statement, “Our workplace culture supports my health and wellbeing.” 34% of transit workers in SFMTA responded that they “Somewhat Agree” or “Strongly Agree.” 34%. What do you think of that?

I can only speak for myself — I love my work, but I do find it very challenging and it can be very stressful. And I don’t necessarily feel that SFMTA or the Muni management necessarily treat operators as if our job is as stressful as it is.

That can lead to resentment and to a sense of not being appropriately valued or trusted…

When I go into the division office to get my documents that I need to take with me into the bus, the dispatcher is separated from me by a pane of plexiglass with a little notch in the bottom to hand documents, which feels as if they are being secured from me. That does not engender the sense of a collegiate shared experience, but a very hierarchical imbalanced power situation.

I would say that permeates many parts of the culture of how management and the supervisors interact with the line workers out on the route, as well. So I understand why such a large proportion of operators don’t feel highly supported. I also feel it could be a lot worse.

A lot of people, when they hear “supports my health and wellbeing,” think about fitness programs, healthy snacks, and mindfulness apps… What are your thoughts about health promotion programs like fitness and healthy eating?

…We do have things like gyms available at some of our facilities. Some are nice and some aren’t. There are online programs where they encourage good diet and things like that. I’ve never used those.

Most of the real risks to our health are our bodies. Supporting our shoulders and preventing rotator cuff injuries, leg and muscle injuries, back injuries.

The difficult routes that are more grinding on the body — some are more easy, some are less easy, some are turning a lot, some aren’t — could have more time built into the schedule to accommodate those needs.

That is not how SFMTA organizes its service. Its service is organized around the transit needs of the users and not the employees. That’s probably not the wrong way to organize their service.

The operator is going to have to make the concession to the service needs.

What do you think of the driver’s seat ergonomics?

I would rate it as fine. It depends on the equipment. We mostly use high quality New Flyer [a bus manufacturer] equipment. Only the New Flyers meet my needs as a taller person.

On a bus we were demoing, every time I put my foot off of the accelerator onto the brake, my knee hit the steering column. I put my foot on the brake — a thousand times, maybe, in a shift? — and I hit my knee against the steering column every time. I literally had a bruise on my knee.

For the most part, Muni has pretty good equipment.

Tell us about your poetry, please.

I’m a poet and I’ve done a series of poems about Muni and Muni routes.

I started before I became a Muni operator, and I’ve been writing poems from the perspective of a Muni operator since I became one. Anything can be an opportunity to be poetry.

I have on occasion written a poem about a route that I’m operating and then handed that poem out to my passengers, which I did recently on a route that I just stopped serving — the 35 route. For a week, I gave everyone who rode that route a copy of a poem I wrote about it.

That one is The Bee of Moffitt Street. It’s about hitting a bee with the bus.

I look forward to reading it. Mc, what would be the number one thing your employer could do to support your wellbeing?

Muni needs to compensate its operators such that we are at least level with inflation. In our next contract negotiation operators should not take a pay cut. The other opportunity would be a more generous vacation policy and a better opportunity for operators to take longer vacations.

If you have an idea for an improvement (say, in a route, or a policy) are you comfortable voicing it to someone with authority? Is it likely to be implemented if it’s a good idea?

We can technically bring to our management suggestions and ideas to improve service or make something better. But there’s never going to be direct feedback… Most service changes that Muni implements are political considerations. They are considered with the elected politicians. The constituents that lobby those politicians are far more influential than anything that the workforce has to say about how things are done — very basic things like having bus stops that are long enough for us to smoothly and reliably make a good quality bus stop, which is a high skill thing.

The length of the bus stop dictates how difficult that is, and many of our bus stops are too short. It would be entirely within the realm of possibility for Muni to take away the parking spot at the end of that bus stop to lengthen it, to make it better for us to serve our passengers. This is something that Muni is not going to do with the suggestion of operators.

…My dream for San Francisco is that every bus stop is a real concrete bus stop that comes to the lane of traffic, rather than having to pull the bus into the stop. Make real bus-stop furniture, a real shelter, a real lamp, a real sign, a bench, a trash can.

We have the resources, but we don’t have the political will to do it.

Copenhagen overhauled bus routes and various ways the work gets done. It had a measurable impact on transit operators. Stockholm, as well. And some people have said, “Why don’t we do that?”

We cater to the automobile instead of the bus.

Is there anything else you want to share?

One of the most important things you can do in the city is ride transit. Using the system makes it better.

I want everybody riding the bus as their first option. Or walking or bicycling. We are in a world of changing climate where weather events are becoming more extreme. The oceans are literally rising. One of the important things we can do in our lives is change how we get around.

And thank your operator. Sometimes we feel invisible. You can just say thank you. It does feel good to feel appreciated.

Thank you for your candor and for your wisdom.

Thank you as well. I really admire Heigh Ho. The people who do work of every kind need to have that experience shared. Thank you for including me in it.

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About Mc Allen

Mc Allen believes that high quality public transportation is a powerful and essential part of the city. In 2021 he became a transit operator for the “Municipal Railway” (Muni) in San Francisco, where he lives with his wife and kids.

Mc can be found at @that_mc on X (formerly Twitter); @that_mc@sfba.social on Mastodon; and mc-allen.com, a website he says he doesn’t really maintain.

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Don’t miss the previous posts in this series:

A Bus Driver's Story of Connection, Kindness, and Trust… featuring Mc Allen’s moving encounter with a distressed passenger.

Steering Thru Stress… spotlighting the vast research on transit operator job stress.