Hampton Roads Transit 2008 ROADEO

No, you don’t have to lasso your passengers. The Ninth Annual HRT Roadeo is where drivers race a 35-foot bus around the parking lot of Harbor Park without touching any orange cones or barrels. Maybe “race” is too enthusiastic a word; the buses actually creep around the barrels, like tiptoeing through a minefield.

Thirteen drivers qualified to participate in the Roadeo, including three from Hampton and a trolley driver from Virginia Beach.

It was still dark when the drivers arrived at Harbor Park and piled into an idling bus to keep warm until 8:00 a.m. When it was time to walk the course, the drivers were led by Northside dispatcher John King. They shook their heads and tried to picture an 8½-foot-wide bus squeezing through the cones and around the Serpentine. The second obstacle was the Offset Street, which was no different than driving down Princess Anne Road or Tidewater Drive.

Next was the Straight Street—sounds doable, right? Except instead of cones, there were merely two rows of yellow tennis balls, only three inches wider than the rear dual wheels! The official explained that the right dual wheels must pass between the balls, without touching them.

Following that was the Service Stop—we do that 50 times a day. But this time, a judge has to measure our front tires to ensure they are no more than 6 inches from the curb. Then came Backing 90 Degrees to the right and to the left, following by the Diminishing Clearance. This was the final sprint between two rows of yellow barrels 9 feet apart. Sounds hard enough, but a sedan was parked at the finish line with a judge shooting the bus with a radar gun to ensure we reached 25 miles per hour before stopping within six inches of the final Judgement Stop cone.

Then it was back on the bus to warm up and take the 20-question test of CDL general knowledge. It was a good idea to review the CDL book because some of the questions were tricky. For example, if you double your speed, your stopping distance increases how many times? (2, 4, 6 or 10).

All thirteen drivers were still in the running for the pre-trip inspection. Here, we had seven minutes to find as many discrepancies as we could on an actual 1700 Series bus. Problems included an upside-down license plate, a missing wiper blade, and minor body damage. I lost count after ten hits and ran out of time before finishing.

We all moved on to the main event. The other drivers gave me advice: “Aim your mirrors at the bottom of your back tires” and “Take your time.” Another driver added, “But remember, you only have seven minutes.” One thing they agreed upon was, “Just go out there and have fun.”

As I understand it, there comes a time when the seat is properly positioned, the steering wheel is at just the right height, the mirrors are perfectly aligned, the driver becomes one with the bus, and the two glide across the parking lot like Fred and Ginger.

The hardest obstacle seemed to be the Straight Road. The judge said that nobody had a clean run, but two drivers hit only one ball.

At the end of the day, Bus 1806 and I did not become one. It was more like I turned the steering wheel and, later, when the bus felt like it, the wheels turned. Additionally, when I tried using my mirrors to back up, I felt as disoriented as Alice in Wonderland.

The top four drivers will go on to represent HRT in the state Roadeo in Blacksburg, Virginia, in March, and the state champ will represent Virginia at the national Roadeo in Austin, Texas, in May. First place was Calvin Parker, second Miranda Accoo, third Roland Shury, and fourth Mary Giles.

Bored with driving in circles? Up for a bigger challenge? If you’ve been driving for HRT for at least one year, have no avoidable accidents, and no more than four miss outs, we’ll see you at next year’s Roadeo.