Sir, – I am old enough to remember the days when there was a bus conductor on every bus in Dublin, who would call out “Fares please” as he walked along the aisles, upstairs and down.
A paper ticket would be issued to each passenger following payment (cash only of course).
Back then, the driver had company over the long hours of a working day and those on board passed the time looking out the window and daydreaming, chatting (even to total strangers!) or maybe reading a book or a newspaper.
While my memories of that time are good, clearly I must be deluded, and, in fact, we were all living a terrible existence.
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No mobile phones, let alone smartphones, and, needless to say, no contactless payments.
From letters published on the subject of contactless travel, it is hard to imagine how we all coped at all. Such deprivation!
Now, it seems, contactless travel is essential and being expected to wait any length of time for its introduction is a cause for loud complaining and general outrage.
It seems that in today’s world, nothing is ever good enough, or fast enough or convenient enough.
We must keep rushing headlong towards the next gadget or technology that we believe will make our lives easier and, therefore, it is assumed, better.
The expression contactless travel is well chosen. Let’s keep going and, with a bit of luck, before long we can get on a bus where there is no driver, no friendly chatting among strangers, and no looking out the window at the world going by. – Yours, etc,
KATHERINE QUIRKE,
Dún Laoghaire,
Co Dublin.
