The drive to succeed…

Female bus drivers are rare. So rare, in fact, that the few, here in Jamaica, still trigger extreme reactions from some passengers that take the buses they drive and generally from members of the public.

Such is the case with Beulah Evans, Stacy-Ann Francis-Williams and Karen Wildman, as they brace themselves for the daily challenges of being a female bus driver in a male-dominated profession.

They know that not only are they responsible for the gigantic buses they operate and the lives of the thousands of passengers that take them, but also the pedestrians and motorists that share the busy thoroughfares. Moreso, because they are female.

Stacy-Ann Francis-Williams is one of only two female drivers now operating an articulated bus in the Jamaican Urban Transit Corporation (JUTC).

At age 26, she is planning on moving to even “higher heights” as she wants to drive one of the two triple buses in the country.

“Some people will say I am a woman and I can’t do it, but I want to go all-out and that’s the highest, so I am going for it,” she declared.

And “going all-out” happens to be nothing new for Francis-Williams as last year during her pregnancy, she operated the single buses for the first six months of that pregnancy.

During this period, she also went into training to drive the articulated double buses, and at the end of the training she resumed her job transporting passengers. This time, however, she was eight months pregnant and driving an articulated bus.

“Everybody discouraged me and saw what I was doing as a problem, but I didn’t see it as a problem of such as I was still driving. My husband even had to remind them that nothing was wrong if I was doing what I was doing because I would not stay pregnant forever,” a smiling Francis-Williams told All Woman. “If you love something just go for it, don’t listen to criticism. I heard a lot when I started and look at me now.”

Yet, inspite of being married, and having two children, she is enjoying every moment of what keeps her on the road – driving – though this was not her first love.

“I used to be a mechanic having done it in school. But, having a child and all…being a mechanic was just not cutting it. I wanted to do something steady and I love driving so I took it on”, she said.

She has been with the JUTC since its commencement in 1998 and she is still enjoying every moment of it.

“Sometimes, the people you meet on the job are so much fun. I remember once a garbage truck rush down to my window as the driver could not believe it was a woman at the wheel. He then said’ OEDriver you nuh want a garbage man in a you life, mi wi keep you house clean for you’ and I found it so funny.”

Francis-Williams is not the only female making JUTC proud as Beulah Evans and Karen Wildman are also blazing trails on all the routes they operate.

Evans is a mother of three, a singer and a Jehovah Witness by faith and she is loving every minute of what she does as a profession.

“I love it because it makes me feel good about myself. Every night I go home with something. If passengers don’t have something to give me they don’t feel good.

Sometimes the little children scream when they see me coming and some people actually sit and wait on me. It is so wonderful,” a beaming Evans told All Woman.

She began working as a driver with the JUTC last year, practically 20 years after nursing an unfulfilled passion to drive a bus.

“In 1980 when I came into Kingston to work I fell in love with the JOS buses they had then. I remember there was this woman driving one and I told myself I must drive one of those big buses one day,” she explained. “Then my chance came in 1998 when I lost my job. I asked somebody and they directed me to HEART/NTA and there it began.

“The training was a really beautiful experience. But, I remember going into it with mixed feelings as I was wondering, Can I do it? Am I going to fail? as there were so many people failing and especially since I was a woman.”

However, Evans endured the training even when she felt like giving up thinking she would never learn to reverse and, thus today she can look back and say, “After doing the training I was like, this was really it? Now the buses feel like cars and I find it a pleasure to go through difficult spots where drivers park very badly.”

In addition to applauding the JUTC and the Advanced Driver Training Centre (ADTC) for the wonderful training, she has high praises for her religious mentors.

“My religion helps me to communicate very well with my passengers. Because we at the Jehovah School Organisation have to go to many houses and talk to people, so you find that we master communication well,” said Evans.

Unlike Williams and Evans, Karen Wildman is quite small in stature and has only been driving for the Corporation for 14 months. At 22, she is perhaps one of the youngest drivers on the road, yet she has mastered the art of bus driving.

A graduate of the Alpha High School and Excelsior Community College, she excelled in five business subjects, and worked for a year in a business environment, but gave it up to drive.

“I really wanted to do something other than being in the office, I just did not feel I was cut out for that kind of work so I went and did the test and passed,” Wildman told All Woman.

“Sometimes when I am on the road I see some of my school friends and they say they knew I would do something like this,” Karen said laughing.

But, though she is now on the road turning the heads of many admirers and critics she still reminisces on the days of training. “I remember when I was in training an inspector asked me if my father owned a truck or something because I found the training quite challenge free, is like I was cut out to drive big vehicles.”

Outside of driving, Wildman leads a very quiet life listening to music, her hobby. She hopes some day to go into record producing, a field in which she showed previous interest, when she started studying audio engineering after leaving high school.

However, until that day she feels she will continue driving as she feels great on the road. “I feel no fear when I am on the road, because I am driving the bigger vehicle and if anything, is a next motorist must fear me. All I do is drive with confidence and care.”

The challenges these drivers and their colleagues face are indeed many, but what irks them most is that the male drivers whom they often out manoeuvre, do not see them as equal in the system.

“I remember once when I was running the Port Royal route this man came on the bus and say that he did not want any woman to drive him worst it is a pickney.

But, the passengers cursed him and at the end of the drive when he realised I knew what I was doing he apologized,” Williams shared.

“Things they wouldn’t do to any other driver they do to us because we are women. They often bad drive us, curse us and say we not supposed to be on the road because we don’t know how to drive and all those things.”

Evans, too, had similar problems. “Sometime you have to be firm out there as women because the men try to push us around. They are very abusive, both the male passengers and male drivers.”

Endorsing the same points, Wildman indicated that “the passengers are so awful at times. I remember once this man came on the bus and got off back because he said he did not want a woman to carry him anywhere, worse I was a baby.”

But, inspite of the odds, the JUTC female drivers continue to shine and their numbers are rapidly increasing. There are currently 50 in the system.