It's an art art AND a science. You gotta use the tools at your disposal to compose the shot you are imagining. A 70-200mm seems a little big for street photography, but your example of a bus driver at an intersection is intriguing, especially zoomed in from a distance with lots of heads in the immediate foreground.
Not the most inconspicuous lens to use on the street either. Keep that in mind.
Granted this is more for landscape photography, but what you are describing is kinda like a hyperfocal length chart.
Try the DoF tab in the PhotoPills app. You can set your specific camera model and lay in your distance from subject, aperture, and focal length. This is really designed to get EVERYTHING in the field of view acceptably sharp and isn't really used for bokeh. However, this may help to fill in some of the technical numbers stuff you are trying to iron out.
I have a Manfrotto Compact Action tripod with a pistol grip that works well with smaller lenses.
The Manfrotto BeFree is excellent, but with a large head.
I have a Joby Advanced Compact that I was NOT impressed with at all.... Stay away.