Bus driver celebrates five decades behind the wheel

For most people, a daily bus ride is just part of the routine. A way to get from point A to point B without stopping for fuel. Shane Butcher, however, views his daily bus ride as his lifelong adventure.

Celebrating 50 years in the industry, Butcher can still recall the day his passion for public transport began.

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“My earliest memories are of standing on the seat of a Bendigo tram as a toddler, gripping the windowsill while shopping with mum,” Butcher told ABC.

“That moment ignited my love for public transport and I knew I wanted to be part of it.”

At just 14 years and 10 months old, Butcher began his career in May 1975, working as a tram conductor in Bendigo. By 1980, on his 20th birthday, Butcher took the next step, joining Melbourne’s tramways at Hawthorn Training Centre and becoming a driver in 1981.

“I was hooked from the beginning, always looking for the next way to get myself more involved,” he says.

“I wanted to follow that tram and public transport dream. Melbourne was the Mecca, so to Melbourne I went.”

Over the next 18 years, he drove trams across Kew, Glen Huntly and East Preston depots, witnessing the evolution from conductor-assisted travel to driver-only operations.

In 1999, a new chapter began when he moved to Perth and traded tram tracks for buses. He joined the Transperth bus network as a driver, and with Swan Transit, became a fixture at the Canning Vale depot.

“I used to love catching buses and watching the drivers and having a chat with them. It seemed like a natural progression considering there were no trams in Perth,” he says.

“I obviously loved it and have been here ever since.”

For more than five decades, Butcher has seen public transport transform, from manual ticketing to digital systems, heritage vehicles to modern fleets and the introduction of accessibility innovations that make travel easier for all passengers.

“Technology has changed so much, but the heart of public transport remains the same and that is getting people where they need to go safely and reliably,” he says.

Witnessing the changes in the industry for over five decades, Butcher says it is his passion for the job that has led him to last this long.

“Unless they’ve got passion, a lot of these people, I think they’re just in the job on the way to something else,” he says.

“I’ve worked with actors, lawyers and doctors, people who were just driving on the way to something else. There were very few of us who were really passionate about what we were doing.”

Looking to the future, Butcher says he can’t imagine himself doing anything else.

“If I have lasted this long and still love it, it must be the right job for me,” he says.

“I’d do another 50 years in a heartbeat.”