“I love taking everyone up to Clydebank shopping centre then getting everyone back on the bus home to Drumchapel or Duntocher.
The best bit is at Clydebank at night time, taking everyone home, especially Friday night and everyone’s ready to get home and relax with bottle of wine or a beer! But I cannae do it till a Saturday night and they’re all ‘cheers’ and I’m like no I cannae do it till tomorrow night but its all good! It’s definitely my favourite bit, getting everyone up the road.
If I hadn’t worked on buses then it would have been trains, I love public transport! I like how it all works, I’ve travelled all around the UK on public transport! So it was either buses or trains and I chose buses. I was 20 and I thought, I’m too young for this. I’ve got two mates and they are at Larbert depot First Scotland East, they joined a year before and they loved it so I thought if they can do it, I can do it! I thought you needed to be a lot older!
I’ve got a friend from school that also loved the buses. He went on to do a mechanics apprenticeship and I went to college and McDonald’s. A year after I started the buses he was asking how I’d got in so young! Anyway, I got him in and he’s now driving buses, he loves it! It’s a school reunion! We pass up at Clydebank and wave, it’s great! I’ve been getting loads of my mates into driving bus too! There are quite a few of us all early 20’s driving buses, my 2 best friends at Larbert, a couple of friends at Dumbarton depot, 3 or 4 friends at Caledonian depot and everyone at Scotstoun. Quite the majority of young folk!
I sometimes stop the bus and think, wow! The responsibility of getting people around, the buses are so important in some of the outlying smaller areas like Duntocher! It’s their only way of being connected to people & places and we need to provide a happy friendly service that helps with that!
Bus is also important for young people too, getting them to school and college. I get them down to Clydebank college and the train station. I leave no one out, everyone is the same, stopping and getting the wheelchair ramp, welcoming wheelchair users and treating them the same on the bus as everyone else. I’ve a wee pal in Duntocher, she waves to me every time I pass. On a Saturday when she’s out for her messages I stop and pull over!
I’ve always been positive, I wanted to try and make a change to the stereotype of grumpy drivers, make a change to the company and the people and I think I’m doing that! I want to keep building and making things better!
Today, a gentleman got in the bus and asked what time I was on until, 6pm I said! He said I’m on till 4 and I bet I’ll get you home tonight. Then ten past 4 there he was getting back on laughing knowingly, saying that’s him finished for the weekend! And I’ve still got 2 hours go!! These moments get you through the day.”
