SEPTA bus driver posts lighthearted social media videos to help riders

PHILADELPHIA (WPVI) -- If you've worked in customer service, then you know how challenging it can be dealing with different personalities.

Well, a SEPTA bus driver is spotlighting what drivers face day-to-day with a comical way of helping people be better passengers.

From his TikToks to Instagram videos, Eric Lilley, better known as Bus Driver Doo, is making lighthearted, but matter-of-fact skits about the interactions he has with passengers.

He's been working with SEPTA for almost a decade but didn't start posting the innocuous videos until recently.

One of his most popular posts was his story of two passengers who tried to bring a mattress and a couch on board his bus on Broad Street.

"Hey man, you're getting too out control," Lilley said in the July 1 video.

The SEPTA driver said he saw the mattress and the couch at the bus stop, but didn't think anything of it.

Lilley said a man then asked him to open the back door of the bus so he could get the couch and mattress on board.

Lilley told the man it wasn't happening - to which the passenger replied, "That's the problem with you bus drivers, you act like you own the bus. This is public transportation."

"I'm like 'bro, you're not bringing a couch and bed on here...if I let you bring that on here, what are people going to sit on?'" Lilley asked.

He said the man responded, "'They can sit on the couch with us.'"

Lilley told Action News, "I try to give the passengers a perspective from the driver and what we deal with, and to show people the things they do wrong when catching the bus."

Lilley also hopes to remind riders of the dos and don'ts of using public transit--highlighting fare evaders.

Rider safety on and around the bus and bus stops is also a recurring theme in his videos.

"Don't just run across the street without looking, don't just be getting off the bus running in front of it. So hopefully it can save lives because I've seen some crazy things happen," said Lilley.