Welcome to the Buzzer blog!
Welcome to the Buzzer blog!
Hello everyone, and welcome to the Buzzer blog!
I’m Jhenifer Pabillano, and I edit the print Buzzer for TransLink. I’ll be the chief writer behind this new blog, which will be the online companion to the Buzzer newsletter.
There are a few reasons we’ve decided to take the Buzzer into the digital realm. First, having a blog lets us update you directly on the latest TransLink news, commentary, and behind-the-scenes stories. We can also start publishing things that wouldn’t usually make it into the print version, or can’t be showcased in the newsletter format (hello, photo galleries, podcasts, and video clips!).
Second, a blog lets us open up a two-way conversation with you, our customers. Comments are built into every blog post, giving you the chance to provide your feedback or spark up a constructive discussion about what’s happening at TransLink. We’ve also got an e-mail address in case you’d prefer to communicate with us that way. (Please read our participation guidelines before you jump in, though!)
I’ll be updating the Buzzer with new content at least once every weekday—you can check back at buzzer.translink.ca, or subscribe via RSS to see the updates. I’ll also respond to comments regularly during normal business hours (around 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday to Friday).
(Edit: Also, since each post takes a fair amount of work, I’m now simply pledging to update the blog as often as I can. Hope that’s not too much trouble.)
Once again: welcome! We can’t wait to start talking with you about TransLink and its work!
Congratulations on the blog!
I’ve really enjoyed the printed Buzzer, and will be slightly saddened to see it go down to once per month, but a blog is so much better!
I really have no idea what to expect from the blog (and I imagine its hard to decide what to put on the blog), so I’ll make some story suggestions for rainy days:
-A segment about the new Nova buses that have come into circulation in the summer: what their fuel consumption /100kms is compared to the buses they’re replacing, why they were made in Germany, what that non-aerodynamic lump in the middle of the roof is for, etc.
-A list, and brief description, of hiking trails that can be easily accessed by transit
-How the new GPS voice system works—and if accuracy-improvements are in the works
-What Farecards are made of
(those are all I can think of off the top of my head)
Anyway, keep up the great work, and good luck on the blog (I’ll keep my eye on it regularly). Had I not already proposed to my fiancée, I totally would have done it through this blog.
Thanks so much Scott! I’ll put this all on the grand List of Stories that I can research for the future. Glad to know you’re enjoying the print Buzzer and the blog too–and I would have totally helped you propose to your fiancee on the Buzzer blog if I had only known :) Lovely to meet you and thanks for keeping up with us here!
The Nova buses are built in Quebec, but probably were designed somewhere in Europe as you mentioned. There was a blurb about the Nova buses in the Feb 1, 2008 edition of the Buzzer.
The “lump” on top of most buses is the HVAC. The low floor trolleys and hybrids also have other electrical gear on top. The high-floor diesels have all of this under the floor so it’s hidden.
Thanks Dennis. The Feb 1 Buzzer can be also seen in PDF here: http://www.translink.bc.ca/files/buzzer/2008/Buzzer_Feb1.pdf
To Jhenifer,
How are you? I enjoy the Buzzer Blog as well as the print format also.
Could you please tell me what is TSP Technology?
Thanks
@sure_eats:
Thanks for commenting! I’m not sure you’re referring to by TSP technology though – where did you find the term originally?
i like this blog version of the buzzer….
I have one question though… Where can I find the info that was posted in the oct. verson (i.e. the interviews and the bus driver quiz.) I can’t seem to find it!
@ cooldude45:
Well, thanks for your comment too! So far, I’ve got one audio file up — the interview with the SeaBus voice: http://buzzer.translink.ca/index.php/2008/10/buzzer-podcast-voice-of-the-seabus/
The SkyTrain voice interview will go up sometime next week and the interview with John Abou-Samra will go up soon after that. Sorry for the delays, but it’s just me doing the blog and the print Buzzer right now. I’ve just got to find a good stretch of time to get editing on the audio.
It’s hard to believe that there are so many blog posts already. I keep thinking that you only have about a dozen. This blog seems to be a success. I’m also encouraged to see more people dialoging. I didn’t expect much to happen, when there were a few consecutive blog posts with no comments.
I’m impressed. Keep up the good work.
scottclayton said:
“-A list, and brief description, of hiking trails that can be easily accessed by transit”
That reminded me something Ian Fisher said about transit. He’s a planner at Translink. He said something along the lines of how a trail in North Vancouver could be entirely traversed only by transit. In other words, you couldn’t go there, and park a car, and expect to travel the entire trail in a day. You would need to take transit to 1 end, and then take transit at the other end, if you want to travel the entire trail in a day. This is what my searching has turned up.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baden-Powell_Trail
http://www.google.com/search?client=opera&rls=en&q=Baden-Powell+Trail&sourceid=opera&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8
This gives me the idea that maybe a volunteer opportunity is for transit fans to create a bunch of brochures that give lots of information for different places that are great visits.
Fanatics would gather the information, and photos. Fanatics could help to organize the information into various high quality formats, such as PDFs and static web pages. The documents could be licensed in a way that would allow Translink to publish them into high quality paper versions & then sell them.
There are nice routes out there that are worth riding. I enjoy riding from Scottsdale Exchange to Ladner Exchange, because the bus is usually not crowded, and the scenery of the farms is nice, in my opinion. This could be something in a brochure.
Does anybody else have any favourite routes?
Eugene, using volunteer contributions to determine good visit spots or trails is certainly a possibility. I’ll pass that along to some of our staff who might be interested in such an idea, and for my part, that’s definitely a great topic idea for a future Buzzer. It would be great to do an issue where people let us know of good trails/places to visit on transit! Probably closer to spring/summer though, since it would be an awful tease to publish this info in the winter and then see everybody traipse out there in the rain :)
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