It was before then that I wrote a pretty damning post toward the driver for his treatment of the passenger. Now that I have found out that the driver had suffered the deaths of his mother and wife earlier this year, I felt I needed to reconsider my tone a little more in this piece.

Although I stand by my thought that his behaviour was inappropriate, and also understand the driver’s pain in the situation he faced this year, I still feel he should be punished and should not have been driving the bus in his emotional situation, especially late at night. This isn’t just for customer service, it’s for the safety of the passenger, the driver and even the people and cars outside the bus. It doesn’t take a PhD to figure out that anger can cause irrational decisions, but even associations like the APA are starting to agree. The instinctive, natural way to express anger is to respond aggressively. Anger is a natural, adaptive response to threats; it inspires powerful, often aggressive, feelings and behaviours, which allow us to fight and to defend ourselves when we are attacked” is the word the APA gives to describe it. The driver was clearly angry from the emotional situations he faced involving death (as any person would be), and aggressive and emotional drivers possible tendencies to drive dangerously are very likely to act dangerously or be distracted, especially when grieving as this driver was. It also can cause us to commit regrettable social acts too, as happened in this case.

This is why I strongly feel that while you can question OC Transpo’s decision to fire him, you can’t question that maybe they should have checked up on his emotional situation before then. If both an OC Transpo supervisor and him had met up to determine his emotional fitness to drive and serve passengers, the entire situation could have been avoided.

Although the driver had just come off paid leave, sometimes the grieving process can be long and arduous one, and more time is needed to adjust before a person can return to their previous responsibilities. Although the bus driver union’s initial reaction of denying the driver was the one yelling in the oft-shown YouTube video here in Ottawa, I do find it appropriate that they will attempt to find him a non-driving job with OC Transpo and challenge his firing. Even if the proposed new job for him proved to be only temporary, it would have allowed him to earn a paycheque and not have to face driving a bus in the emotional state he is in right now as a result of his two losses. It would have been safer and better for all the passengers and himself (especially Matthew Taronno!), as well as many other people.

In short, I am willing to let a little bit of my anger towards the driver go. The sooner that myself/Ottawa/OC Transpo can let this go, the better.