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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To ask whats the most annoying thing on public transport

96 replies

Dancingfairy · 26/09/2017 09:12

I'm currently sat on a bus and someone is sitting behind me humming loudly, and hasn't stopped for the whole journey. It's so annoying as the seats are closed it feels like they are just humming in my ear!! Ok not the most annoying but it's up there. What annoying things do you hate about public transport??

OP posts:
bertsdinner · 26/09/2017 11:40

The constant coughing, sniffing, chewing, slurping. Basically, other passengers.

Snotgobbler99 · 26/09/2017 11:58

I always make a beeline to the people who've put their bags on the seat next to them. Entitled fukkers.

I'm seriously asthmatic so loathe people wearing strong perfume, I'd rather suffer BO than perfume/aftershave.

AuntPol · 26/09/2017 12:01

Other people.

blackteasplease · 26/09/2017 12:01

People who sir with a huge amount of their leg in the aisle so that you can't wall past without asking them to move. Esp those who seem disgruntled when you say excuse me, and most of all those who do it when the seat beside them is free for spreading into.

Anyone who spreads part of themselves into your seat or space.

Loud chewing.

Music out loud.

Loud inane conversations about nothing.

People having business meetings on the train either in person or on the phone.

Smelly food.

Shoxfordian · 26/09/2017 12:05

People having really loud conversations

Smelly people. BO is the worst.

People who get to the ticket barrier and start digging around in their bags for a ticket.

People stopping at the bottom of the tube stairs to have a good study of both directions and decide which one they like best.

Bicyclethief · 26/09/2017 12:18

People who ignore other people who obviously need a seat more than them.

Bicyclethief · 26/09/2017 12:20

Smelly people. Why the hell do I think it's rude or hurtful if I get up and move seats if they are sitting next to me?

WhyIsThereHariboInMyWine · 26/09/2017 12:39
  • The same group of elderly people that stop the bus at 9:15 to argue with the driver until they get let on for free. The bus runs every 10 minutes and the driver never gives in because the machine won't accept it. We end up sat there for 15 minutes while they fight it out and a later bus goes past. I just get the earlier bus now to avoid being late.
  • Drivers who do that jerky start stop when you're trying to walk up the stairs (even though they are meant to wait)
  • People that sit next to you when the bus is empty
  • The weird man on my bus that clips his fingernails and dumps them on the floor when he's done
  • People that cut buses up in a traffic jam. It's just pointless
  • Screaming devil children that give me a headache - I try to remember that it's 30 minutes for me but 24 hours a day for the parents though.
  • People at the front of the queue to get off and ask the driver loads of questions and won't move out the way!!!
  • People kicking the back of my seat
  • Loud sweary phone calls
  • I live in between 2 sporty towns so whenever there's an event on the bus is full of drunk seedy men... even in the morning
  • People playing bad music on their phones
  • People asking me questions about the book I'm trying to read
  • Men that insist you take your headphones off so they can flirt with you and don't seem to take not interested as an answer. I'm not married but I often wear a wedding ring in public just to put them off. I'm not particularly attractive either so I dread to think what it must be like for attractive women.
  • The people that resent you having to sit next to them and spread out so you have an arse cheek hovering in the aisle
Catwithglasses · 26/09/2017 12:59

Any music coming out of phones/headphones.

'Smelly people' is a common one, but it's that pervasive, long-term-unwashed, lingering smell, normally combined with dandruff.

Bus drivers that break sharply all the time.

People who insist on getting up way before their stop - so you have to get up and let them out even though you are getting off at same stop.

Catwithglasses · 26/09/2017 13:00

*brake Blush

BeatriceBeaudelaire · 26/09/2017 13:02

Agree with smelly people - especially on the tube in summer where you’re all being cooked alive

Guiltybystander · 26/09/2017 13:11

When you are forced to listen to their inane, mundane conversations on their phone:
can you hear me?...I'm on the bus..Where are you?...yeah...yeah...okay...really? When did that happen? Did you talk to Jake?....yeah....okay...no,no, I was on holiday in Turkey...yeah it was fab....

And similar shit like that.
I am always waiting for something interesting to hear like mama, just killed a man, put a gun against his head, pulled the trigger now he's dead but it never happens.

Spikeyball · 26/09/2017 13:20

Trying to get a wheelchair or sn buggy on it. People being arsey about said wheelchair. People staring.

SomeBerryJam · 26/09/2017 13:50

Bags on seats.Angry fucking angers me!

Move your fucking bag!! Don't think for one second because you stick your bag on the empty seat next to you, it makes me not want to sit there, because I deliberately seek you selfish fuckers out! Tut and sigh and give all the dirty looks you want, but the seats weren't meant for your shitty Karimoor backpack and Lidl bag and you fucking well know it!!!

BlurryFace · 26/09/2017 14:03

Chatty eccentrics who latch onto people and tell them their life story while they/I squirm with awkwardness.

Bus drivers who need directions from passengers and in one case, got some tourists to get off the bus with me so I could help them figure out how to get to where they were going. Hmm

Pervs.

Lairy drunks. Last time I caught a late bus two blokes were getting right in each other's faces - doing the whole "me alpha, you beta" holding the back of the other guy's neck/stroking the other's face thing. One of them was all but sat in my lap while they were doing this. The thing they seemed to be arguing over was who should carry their barely conscious friend home, what lovely chaps.

PickAChew · 26/09/2017 14:05

Have to confess that I secretly like earwigging the loud phone conversations, and they're always loud, that are complete car crash. Sometimes literally. I mean, if you're going to broadcast your dysfunctional family shenanigans to 20 other people, I might as well make the most of it.

GruffaIo · 26/09/2017 14:11

Sniffing, sneezing, coughing, etc. all within my air space.

Dirty smelly people.

Leaky old buses where you end up breathing in the exhaust.

The fact that I have to get public transport to work and it takes 2.5 hrs each way compared to a 45 minute drive!

Bloodybridget · 26/09/2017 14:12

People leaving their uneaten food and its packaging on seats.
Everyone crowding onto the lower deck of the bus and blocking the stairs so you have to fight your way through to get a seat upstairs.
People standing right by the doors - I wish the drivers would tell them to get out of the way.

HerBigChance · 26/09/2017 14:15

Every person ringing the bloody bell on the bus for the same stop, even though it's clearly indicated that the bus is stopping.

It needs to be rung ONCE. Once only, by ONE person - it doesn't matter who - to indicate to the driver that they want to get off. The bus will then stop for one person or 12. no need for constant ding ding ding.

Parents who let their kids constantly ring the bell and don't do anything about it.

AgentCooper · 26/09/2017 14:21

God Bisquick, public transport and pregnancy. You DO get people who stare at you when you have to stand, as if you shouldn't be there! It's bizarre!

I've just finished up for mat leave and sweet Jesus I am glad I don't have to get that fucking train+subway combo anymore. My pet hate was people who sat in the aisle seat at rush hour on the train, leaving inner seat empty, and when I asked if I could sit down they shifted their legs about an inch so I could climb over them with my humongous belly, so desperate were they to cling to that aisle seat. And people who cut in front of me when boarding the train after I'd dragged myself all the way up to the end of the platform in the hope of getting a seat.

notacooldad · 26/09/2017 14:25

Last train from the city to my town leaving 10 mins before gigs from the area its attached to finish!
Why can't the co ordinate time. Gig finishing times + a bit of time for shuffling out!

hangry · 26/09/2017 14:31

i really hate man spreading and usually ask them to budge up a bit but the other day really took the biscuit.

this youngish bloke sits next to me and i'm hit with a wave of smell. i don't have much of a sense of smell so this must have been bad. he'd clearly both pissed and shat himself at some point in the recent past. plus there were subtle hints of BO and general mustiness as well.

anyway he sits next to me, spreads and then literally sprawls out on the seat. i couldn't say anything cos i really didn't want to be opening my mouth any more than was strictly necessary. i felt like i was eating his smell. it was almost visible as a fuggy fog.

he had this self satisfied over confident air, kept looking over as if i should somehow be pleased by him choosing to sprawl stinkally next to me.

he only stayed on a couple of stops, thank god and it was just as he was stepping off the bus that i noticed his phone had slid out of his pocket and was still on the seat. ha. satisfying. if he'd sat up properly he'd still have his phone.

it was only a few stops i could smell him on me for ages. shudder

Yura · 26/09/2017 14:44
  1. clipping toe nails
  2. clipping finger nails
  3. eating smelly food
  4. performance parenting
hellswelshy · 26/09/2017 15:01

Yes yes yes to sniffing, long boring conversations on mobile phones (sometimes on my commute these happen really early in the morning - WHO are they ringing so early???) , smells and loud music.
But to the folk who get irked by dawdles on the tube, it's probably me or someone similar who visits big cities and doesn't know exactly where we are going. So to those posters yabu Grin

Catwithglasses · 26/09/2017 15:02

Have to confess that I secretly like earwigging the loud phone conversations, and they're always loud, that are complete car crash.

Same. Although I hate hearing other people's music, other people's lives are a different matter...