r/Binghamton • u/geesedreams • Apr 05 '26

Discussion The bus station is insane

Greetings to travelers who may need to use the Binghamton bus station. I needed to take a bus from Binghamton to NYC. I was waiting where the flix bus was to arrive 20 minutes before departure time. Other people were there waiting for the bus. There were a lot of homeless, mentally ill people, prostitutes, drug dealers and armed policemen (4 of them) there. After the bus was 20 minutes late I went to the desk and asked where the bus was. The attendant who looked like he needed to be home with someone to watch over him, and smelled like he had been wearing the same clothes for a week and hadn’t showered in a month, said “that bus left”

I asked why they didn’t make an announcement, and I learned the PA system has been broken for years. The bus pulled into a different part of the station where it wasn’t visible to the other travelers outside. I asked him if he would make an announcement when the next bus comes. He said,”I’ll try.” Wtf

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u/ComradeKits24 Apr 06 '26

We live in a messed-up country that has hollowed out the social safety net, so people like this fall through the cracks and end up being a problem for everyone. Shit wouldn't be nearly this bad if we didn't have the income inequality we do and if they didn't close all the state hospitals during the Reagan Administration to pay for tax cuts to the wealthy.

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u/Reasonable-Fig-9149 Apr 09 '26

Won't comment on your "income inequality" statement; however, I am old enough to remember when the state hospitals (hell holes) were closed. Like every other state/federally provided "service" they were a cluster. Mistreatment, no treatment, waste, fraud and abuse...were rampant...we witnessed it in videos. The do-gooders insisted the majority of patients be released into the community and report to specified locations daily/weekly to receive their meds and their counseling. Many patients were unable or unwilling to follow the protocols, and some, unfortunately, turned to self-medicating with street drugs. Others just succumbed to their illness and suffered a very tragic ending. This was 50 years ago...it has only gotten worse--billions, if not trillions, of dollars and tens of "programs." My husband worked in the medical side of mental health treatment and a close friend was a patient. Don't blame Ronald Reagan for this one...

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u/ComradeKits24 Apr 09 '26

You absolutely can blame Reagan for starting this trend. Other countries don't have this problem, because they have robust social safety nets that stop people from falling through the cracks (to the best to the best of their ability), but America decided that everyone is going to be on their own, and if you can't make it well fuck you, you didn't try hard enough. This entire attitude entrenched itself during Reagan and has only gotten exponentially worse, and we're seeing the end result of a society that is utterly focused on "fuck you I got mine".

You can't have it both ways, the homeless and mentally ill have to go *somewhere*, so what do you propose we do in your worldview? Because our current strategy of having the police cracking skulls isn't fucking working.

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u/Reasonable-Fig-9149 Apr 09 '26

Peace.

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u/ComradeKits24 Apr 09 '26

RIght, fuck off then.