T driver stops for cell call, loses job
Borrowed phone but violated ban
The bus driver thought he found a loophole in the MBTA's new ban on operators using cellphones: He did not bring a cellphone to the job, which is now banned, and he did not talk on one while driving.
Instead, the 41-year-old driver put his Route 111 bus in park on Sagamore Street in Chelsea, borrowed a cellphone from a passenger and spent nearly five minutes talking while riders sat waiting for him, according to a video taken by a camera installed on the bus.
The driver, whose name MBTA officials would not release, was fired Thursday.
"He thought he was being cute by not talking while the bus was moving," MBTA General Manager Daniel A. Grabauskas said at a press conference yesterday, where he showed the video of the driver chatting. "This was an unauthorized stop."
It was the second time that the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority has punished an employee under its strict new cellphone policy, which took effect May 18 after a crash on the Green Line that occurred while a trolley operator was writing a text message.
The crash injured 50 people after the train ran a red light and damaged three trolley cars, worth $9.6 million. A Suffolk County grand jury is considering criminal charges against Aiden Quinn, the trolley driver, two officials familiar with the case have told the Globe.
The last employee who violated the new policy, a train attendant on the Orange Line, was slapped this week with a 10-day suspension for wearing a wireless device on his ear.
The new rules, believed to be the toughest in the nation for a major transit agency, bar drivers even from keeping electronic devices with them while operating an MBTA vehicle. First-time offenders will get a 10-day suspension. After a second offense, they are subject to dismissal. Any employee caught talking on a cellphone is subject to being fired immediately.
The bus driver seen talking on a cellphone this week had worked for the MBTA for the past four years. The incident occurred at about 6:40 p.m. Monday.
Stephan MacDougall - president of the Boston Carmen's Union, which represents bus drivers - did not return calls.
Grabauskas said the driver was working an overtime shift, earning nearly $40 an hour.
He said the MBTA received an e-mail from a neighbor who saw the driver walk on and off the bus while talking on the cellphone.
"Last night, while sitting on my front porch in the Prattville section of Chelsea, I witnessed a bus on the 111 route pull over at a designated stop," wrote the neighbor in the e-mail, which the MBTA provided. "The driver opened the doors, left his driver's seat, and stood in the open doorway talking on his cellphone. Several times he disembarked from the bus during his conversation. There were passengers waiting on the bus."
Grabauskas said there is no excuse for a bus driver to borrow a cellphone from a passenger. In an emergency, he said, drivers should use their radios.
The video also showed the driver allowing several passengers to board the bus without paying. Grabauskas said about one-third of all MBTA buses now have video cameras.
At a meeting with MBTA officials yesterday, the driver had no comment, Grabauskas said.
As he showed the video at the news conference, Grabauskas shook his head and called it "ludicrous."
"This is about safety," he said. "We do not allow the use of electronic devices at all. . . . That's why he's no longer working at the T." 