Bus Rodeo

Nadine Lee: You're listening to mobility in motion, a podcast produced from Dallas Area Rapid Transit. I'm your host, Nadine Lee, president and CEO of DART.  

In this final episode of Season 1 of Mobility in Motion we start on a chilly morning in Austin, TX.

Several buses are weaving through cones on a huge parking lot. spectators watch from the stands. Welcome to the international Bus Roadeo where 75 bus operators and 52 maintenance teams compete to be the best of the best.

Then...onto the course drives Bus Number 15. Jesus Rodriguez.

Announcer:  The next operator is Jesus Rodriguez, another friend of ours from right here in the Lone Star State.

Announcer: Jesus Rodriguez is a DART driver out of Dallas, the Dallas Area Rapid Transit or DART. Jesus has been driving for nearly 30 years, 28 years, and he is a State Rodeo Champion here in the State of Texas.

That's a great job. He's on a great run. Jesus Rodriguez

Background Voices: People are excited about that one.

Nadine Lee: Jesus starts winding through the course in a New Flyer Electric Bus.

Announcer: This is the first year we've had all electric buses, every bus we're driving today, all electric. I don't know that I've ever seen a better looking bus.

Nadine Lee: our producer, Neille Ilel, met up with Jesus the day before as he practiced for the event.

Neille Ilel: Can you describe the course of the Bus Rodeo?

Jesus Rodriguez: Sure.

Neille Ilel: Like from the start to the finish?

Jesus Rodriguez: Sure. Um., We have 11 obstacles. We have right and left reverses. We have the opposite street. We have right turn, we have left turn, and then the barrels, and the serpentine.   

Nadine Lee: The Serpentine. Like it sounds, this is a course where the drivers must weave through cones like a serpent. If you hit any of the cones, it costs you points.

Jesus Rodriguez: Those cones, all of those cones, if you hit one of those, it costs you 10 points. But if you hit a pivot cone, it's 25 points.

Neille Ilel: Oh wow.

Jesus Rodriguez: Okay. So, all of the cones is 10 points, except the pivot cone.

Nadine Lee: The Serpentine is considered one of the most difficult maneuvers in the competition.

Another challenging obstacle is called "Diminishing Clearance," aka The Barrels. This maneuver tests the bus operator's ability to judge the position and speed of their vehicle. Jesus will have to drive between two lines of barrels that are forty feet long. Not too terrible sounding. Now, put yourself in a bus that is also forty feet long. It's sort of like threading a needle, except the thread is a 31,000-pound passenger vehicle!

Jesus Rodriguez:  So, the first two enter barrels is like a one-foot half wide, wider of the bus. And then wider. Yeah. And then every barrel is close, close, close. So the last one.

Neille Ilel: So they get narrower and narrower.

Jesus Rodriguez: So they get narrow and narrow, and narrow. And the last one, it's going to be only six inches wider.

Nadine Lee: And you have to maneuver this course going at least 20 miles an hour, or you forfeit the whole thing. Sitting at the end of the barrels, between the two sides of the row of barrels is a single cone, just 18 inches high. This is called the "Judgment Stop." Jesus will have to drive straight towards the cone at 20 miles an hour and then come to a complete stop.

The front of the bus must not be more than six inches from the cone. If he stops further away than six inches, then he'll get points deducted. And if he hits the cone? Jesus says that will automatically drop him out of the top ten in the competition. Now imagine doing this smoothly with a bus full of people. This is the operating prowess that our operators exhibit every day.

Neille Ilel: How did you do in practice today for that one?

Jesus Rodriguez:  I feel good. I think I did a good, um, sometimes we do much better in practice. But you know what?  In every, in every thing that you do in, in every competition, you have to be focused. If you be focused and you prepare well, hey, people think, you drive the bus every, every day. So competition should be easy. Aye no!   

Nadine Lee: The International Bus Roadeo is an annual event put on by the American Public Transportation Association. It’s designed to recognize the skills and professionalism of bus operators and maintenance crews across the U.S. and Canada. Participants have reached the Big Show by winning local and state competitions.

Nadine Lee: While the bus operators compete, on the other side of the course a team of bus mechanics from DART are getting ready for their competition.

Maintenance Official: This is the way to start huh? We got DART. We got VIA. Texas gets the first crack!

Welcome, welcome. All right. You guys excited? Oh yeah.

Nadine Lee: Making up the team are Edgar Aponte, Louise Acevedo, and George Garcia.

Background Voices: So you guys are Dallas Area Rapid DART. Perfect.

Nadine Lee: Fifty-two maintenance teams will be competing to demonstrate their mechanical abilities. Each team is made up of three mechanics. The teams will be tested at six workstations, also known as modules. These modules contain different components of a disassembled bus. The mechanics have to go through and find the problems with each of them. Ruben Salas is the Assistant Vice President of Maintenance at DART. He's also on the APTA committee that helps set up the competition. He explains the modules.

Ruben Salas: We take the components of the bus, like the air conditioning, the door system, the engine and transmission, the computer system, and the brake system. And it's all, outside of a vehicle, and the vendors will place several defects on the system. It's an actual working system, uh, module. And the mechanics are timed to go in there and find it, show their mechanical skills to find those defects and list them out.

Neille Ilel: And are these the types of defects that mechanics will deal with on a daily basis, like at DART?

Ruben Salas: Yes. They believe the vendors believe in creating real defects that you would deal with on a daily basis. They don't go and come up with some new inventive defect that probably would never happen in normal applications. And they do this because they want to show these guys and the new guys that have never competed that these are things you're gonna come across. So, it's a learning experience.

Ruben Salas: So you're back home, at your home, uh, base and you're working on buses daily. You're like, hey, I learned that at the rodeo.

You know, I know that that's, that, that is a real defect can happen. And on the engine, which is the one that all the mechanics like to do is finding the one defect that will allow that engine to start and who does it the fastest.

Nadine Lee: During the event, the official gives the team an overview of the engine module and what to expect.

Maintenance Official: Uh, a couple things that aren't in play. Fluid leaks. If you see any fluid leaks, we're not, uh, using that as a defect. Uh, uh, you won't have to go into the radiator search tank. That's out of play as well. And everything else is up for you guys to find

Nadine Lee: The team stands on a yellow line at the floor at the ready. The officials run a timer, and the mechanics have between seven and ten minutes to identify as many defects as they can.

Reuben says it's the timer that really ratchets up the pressure in these challenges.

Ruben Salas: The main thing that hurts the team is they can be good when they practice, but when that timer, it's the timer, that gets, that gets every team. It changes your whole outlook that all of a sudden you get nervous. And you feel the pressure of that timer and some guys can handle it, some guys can't. They'll lose; they'll throw their whole routine outta whack.

Neille Ilel: Would you call this the Olympics for transit mechanics and operators?

Ruben Salas: Definitely. And I think it's a good morale booster for the mechanics too. You know, you go to work every day and you work on buses every day, but this is that next step, that gives them something to be proud of and show their skills and what they do for a living is not just a job. It's something to show your technical and your skills and your pride and what you do working with your hands.

Nadine Lee: The timer starts, and the mechanics quickly move to the engine. They have just a few minutes to figure out what is wrong, make an adjustment, and start it up. They check the power and the computer. Before they start up the engine, they have to yell "clear." The engine is sitting out in the open, and they don't want anyone to get hurt.

Background Voices: Clear. Clear. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing Power... Off...You off? No. Leave it off.... Got it.

Nadine Lee: The team hovers around the engine checking connections, trying to find the source of the problem. Then they try again.

Background Voices: We clear? ...Clear. Jump over here.

Nadine Lee: And just like that, the engine starts up. They'll continue to check out the engine, listing any other defects they find. When their time is up, they'll move to the next module.

Back at the bus competition Jesus is finishing up the course. Cheering him on in the stands are some of his co-workers at DART, including leaders of Bus Operations, Amina Wolf and Vickie Biggers. Jesus is about to complete the “Serpentine” course.

Vicki / Amina: He's coming in now. Um, he's getting ready; he's getting ready to bring it to an end. He's gotta go through the barriers and then get as close as possible to that cone right there. See

Neille Ilel: He hasn't hit any cones, right?

Vicki / Amina: Yeah. He has not hit a cone.

Neille Ilel: Okay. Wow. And now he's picking up speed.

Vicki / Amina: He’s picking up speed to come through the barriers.

Announcer: And watch how close he gets to this cone at the end. That's impressive.

Neille Ilel: Nice!

Announcer: With a Hulk on top of it! Jesus Rodriguez out of DART in Dallas! Finishing up his run on the course. Wonderful job, as always, to see Dallas in the house. In Austin, about three hours north of here is Dallas, Texas. Beautiful!

Nadine Lee: Jesus steps out of his bus and Vicki, Amina and other DART coworkers are there to congratulate him.

Vicki / Amina: Alright, Rodriguez!

Jesus Rodriguez: Yeah. I think I didn't touch anything. No, I didn't

Vicki / Amina: No. You didn't touch nothing. You didn’t touch anything.

Jesus Rodriguez:  I didn’t touch nothing. That's what I told her.

Vicki / Amina: I said he has not hit a single cone. I recorded it, and the time is good. The time is good.

Jesus Rodriguez: Nothing, it feels very good.  Yeah. We'll see. Right. It's huge. We excited. Yeah. Let's see what happens.

Vicki / Amina: We’re gonna go check out the Maintenance guys and see how they’re doing. ...

Nadine Lee: Jesus and the other participants won't get their results for another three days when they are announced at the Roadeo banquet.

In the end, Jesus took fifth place. That's out of 75 competitors, an amazing accomplishment. And the DART maintenance team placed 18th out of 54. Another impressive showing. With combined scores between the bus operators and mechanics, the DART team placed 8th overall for the Grand Champion.

DART’s Vice President of Maintenance, Ruben Salas, coaches the mechanics, and he's already looking ahead to next year's bus rodeo nationals in Salt Lake City.

Ruben Salas: They’ve seen and they knew their mistakes. And it's lessons learned. So we will go from there and continue improving. But like I told the team, I've been in Roadeo a lot, and a team doesn't get to champion until they've done it several times.

And if you're really committed, you will get there. But you just gotta stay committed to the process, continue learning, continue practicing, and, and become a unit of one where all three of you're in sync with each other, then you'll be a champion. You'll get that first place soon.

Nadine Lee: Congratulations to our DART Mechanics Edgar Aponte, Louise Acevedo and George Garcia and to Bus Operator Jesus Rodriguez. We at DART are so proud of you.

You're listening to Mobility in Motion. I'm your host, Nadine Lee.

Thank you for joining us for our first season of Mobility in Motion. We’re taking a break while we put together more stories about transit in North Texas and beyond for season two.

In the meantime, w​e’d love to hear from you. If you'd like to share your feedback with us, please email us at [email protected].

This episode was produced by The Glue, Jim Gates and Neille Ilel, edited by Michael May with music by BC Campbell. If you liked this episode, make sure to subscribe and tell a friend. Episodes come out every other week and are available on your favorite podcast platform.