Public Transportation & the Collective

I often witness public transportation -- buses, planes overhead, BART, trains -- and think about how underanalyzed it is. Public places are a favorite source of entertainment for the people-watcher at heart, and I have found that public transport sets the stage for an interesting assortment of situations and combinations, leaving much to the imagination.

It's very rare that you find yourself on a bus or plane where everyone is silent. More often than not, you overhear things you wish you hadn't, or maybe wish you heard more of. How many cell phone arguments, sketchy conversations, or outright ridiculous scenarios have you come across while on the bus? For me personally, the answer is more than I can count.

Growing up, I never took public transport save airplanes. Buses in Irvine were out of the question -- a social suicide of sorts -- limiting my experience to airplanes. I became fascinated with the microcosm of society that existed, all the life stories that unfolded from take-off to landing.

I couldn't edge away from that tugging feeling that while on-board, we were all apart of a mysterious trick-of-the-eye; that perhaps the passengers were somehow apart of a collective. After all, when seen from below, everyone is apart of the machine -- every passenger sits in its belly, their identity hidden by great hulks of metal. We are all arriving at the same destination, anticipating what lay before us as the wheels slide across the runway. Our individuality, is, of course, retained by who we are and what will become of us once we step off the plane.

Comparatively, a bus is composed of an ebb and flow in passengers. People get on at a different stop, get off at another, and the sense of unity felt in an airplane is almost absent. One of the similarities, of course, is that we give up a little of our freedom when stepping onto a vehicle of public transport. Our paths are at the mercy of others: bus drivers, captains, train conductors. A mutual, unspoken trust is formed whenever the ride begins -- the passengers abide by certain rules and the drivers will fulfill our need to arrive safely.

Whenever I take the bus (or fly on a plane for that matter) I always like to wonder about the people around me -- where they are coming from, where they are going. It's nice to know that for a brief period of time, whether it be suspended in midair or on a city street -- you can share something tangible with strangers.