South Devon College Bus Shelter

The picture is of a bus shelter after I clipped it with a bus. I didn't mean to clip it but I did. What I was trying to do was get as close to the curb without going too far forward. There are three bus stops close together to serve South Devon College. The first stop goes to Paignton and Torquay and there was a bus there waiting time when I got there and I needed the second stop, for Brixham. A little way in front of this stop was a parked car and I wanted to get in but leave space for passing cars to be able to pull in in front of me so as to avoid cars coming in the opposite direction. The problem with Long Road is that it isn't wide enough. When there are buses on the stops there isn't room for cars to pass in both directions. So My motive was for the best but my execution was for the worst. The other problem was there was a student with a cam corder filming me as I drove the bus down Long Rd and round the rounderbout and back up to the bus stop. Not sure why.(1)

On the accident report form I had to leave out the bit about 15 students standing behind the shelter who pushed it out into the road as I approached and I had to leave out the bit about the most unusual earthquake the shook Paignton on Friday lunch, even the bit about the UFO that suddenly appeared in front of me just as I moved in towards the curb. The black cat that always seems to run across the road at the right moment was a definite No No. Even the bit about the road being too narrow sounds a bit lame as buses have pulled in at that stop about 14 000 times since we started running the 12A service last year. About a quarter of them will have had to do what I did, that go past an other bus and pull in, and I was the first not to make it in safely. Still no one was hurt except for a small dent in the bus, a slightly damaged shelter(2) and my seriously damaged pride.

Footnote
(1) If you were that student , why were you filming a bus in Long Rd? Is it part of a project or did you hope I would hit the bus shelter?
(2) Slightly more than 'slightly damaged' if truth were known. A driver who came along later reported that it had been completely trashed but that was a slight exaggeration as well. It's still standing isn't it.