Life Outside PLT1

It’s official, we are all incapable of walking alongside heavy traffic without police supervision

My bus broke down.

No, it wasn’t my fault. Just after Otahuhu the driver pulled over and stopped (some weird alarm thing went off, very annoying sound). We then proceeded to wait while 5 buses (including several expresses) passed us. Several of the other buses stopped and offered to take us the rest of the way into town. Apparently Stagecoach (or OSH, or the LTSA) have a policy that disallows bus passengers walking 10 metres in a straight line and boarding another bus parked directly in front of the broken bus when said changeover must occur on a motorway. We had to wait 20 minutes for the cops (actually just one cop) and a replacement bus. Overall it was an interesting experience (being tied down due to bureaucratic pragmatism), although I’m not sure exactly what the police escort added to the occaision, when we did get to switch buses he just stood in one place and stared at the Tow truck, not even warning us about the dangers of placing ourselves in front of motorway traffic, which I had assumed was his job under such circumstances. Why else would they have made us spend 20 minutes watching express buses pass us while waiting for the police?