The two Vicinity buses in Quesnel will soon be retrofitted with full driver doors.
Jamie Weiss is the Senior Media Relations and Public Affairs Advisor with BC Transit…
“Full driver doors are a movable barrier, so when customers get on the bus they will see the barrier kind of situated to the right of the driver’s seat right near the fare box, and it’s been designed to increase protection for our drivers.  It’s got a metal base but there is kind of a clear plexiglass window so that important interaction between customers and drivers won’t be impacted because they’ll easily be able to see and hear each other.”
Weiss says the retrofit will take place Tuesday and Wednesday and is not expected to impact customers.
We asked Weiss if drivers in Quesnel have been assaulted ?
“What we’ve found over the last five years is we’ve seen about 35 assaults on transit operators every year and that’s across the province, and even one assault on a transit operator is too many, and an assault can mean many things, it can be a physical assault, it can be a verbal assault but it’s really all about creating that level of safety.”
Weiss adds that it’s not just to protect the drivers…
“It also really does protect the safety of all our customers because, I mean in other places in the province we have seen people attack drivers while the bus in is motion, and that creates an unsafe environment for everybody on board.”
Weiss says Quesnel’s smaller community buses won’t be getting the full driver doors as they are already equipped with a vinyl panel that was installed as a preventative measure for the COVID-19 pandemic.