Bus pass

In the UK the Bus Pass is a pre-paid - or to pensioners, free – ticket allowing one to travel on any bus in a given area. In the US, however, the phrase is a verb as in “I was bus-passed three times today”, meaning “a bus failed to stop for me”. 

It came into common use during civil rights protests of the 1950s, such as the Montgomery Bus Boycott, when the right of black passengers to sit anywhere on a bus became a national issue. Bus-passing was a common complaint among black residents of southern towns in the ‘50s and ‘60s. 

The expression has more or less died out now, thankfully, but is sometimes used to describe the situation where a driver fails to see a passenger at a stop, for example:  “A number 6 came along but I wanted the 2 or the 19, and both of them drew up to the stop but didn’t see me, as the 6 was obscuring me. I was bus-passed like a motherf***er.” (Denis Hopper)