Summer of Bus Hell

 

NY Daily News

The Queens bus map will change this summer, MTA brass announced on Monday.

As previously reported by the Daily News, the massive overhaul of the largest borough’s bus network will give Queens 124 routes — 94 local and 30 express — with an emphasis on connecting bus riders to the rest of the city’s transit systems.

In a statement Monday, MTA Chairman Janno Lieber said that “800,000 Queens residents depend on our buses every day, and we owe it to them to find new ways to speed service.”

The bus map will change in phases, transit officials said, with the bulk of the new routes coming online in June.

On Sunday, June 29, 16 new routes will launch, 67 routes will change, and five routes will be discontinued. Then on Sunday, Aug. 31, one new route will launch, 37 routes will change, and one route will be discontinued.

To help Queens riders parse the changes in service, the MTA has launched an interactive version of the new bus map.

“As implementation dates near, we’ll ramp up the outreach efforts to make sure everyone’s aware about the upcoming changes,” New York City Transit president Demetrius Crichlow said in a statement. “In the meantime, we strongly encourage bus riders to take advantage of the online tools which provide the best customized approach to learn more about how your trip can change.”

More rejection blowback to the bus routes of yes

QNS 

 With the MTA’s Queens Bus Network Redesign project in its final stages, Community Board 11 in Northeast Queens voted down a motion endorsing the proposal as it currently stands.

At their meeting on Monday, Apr. 1, board members and local residents said their main problem is with the changes to the Q13 and Q31 bus routes in Bayside. In particular, Bell Boulevard, a popular commercial corridor for shopping and dining which is part of the bus routes, would see a significant reduction in bus service if the plan goes into effect as is. 

Despite the concerns, the board’s transportation committee decided to approve the plan given the vast improvements that the MTA made based on community input from initial drafts. 

But at the end of the meeting, where issues with the bus redesign plan were one of the main topics of discussion, the motion to recommend the plan failed to pass in a vote of 19-14. 

The MTA’s initiative to rehaul the city’s largest bus system first launched in 2019 with the goal of providing faster and more convenient service to see an increase in ridership. The process was paused due to the pandemic until it was restarted in 2021. After rounds of drafts based on community input, the final plan was published in Dec. 2023. 

Throughout the review process, community boards have analyzed the proposed route adjustments within their districts, attended detailed presentations by MTA representatives, and voiced their concerns.

“We’ve been working on this… for years,” said CB11 Transportation Committee Chair Victor Dadras. “I will say that we had lots of issues. The MTA to their credit, did extensive work based upon the comments they received, not just from us, but from the community.”

However, the board members were unable to overlook their two primary concerns and thus could not align their vote with the transportation committee’s recommendation. Their concerns were reinforced by members of the Bayside Village Business Improvement District, local civic groups and transportation advocates.

They collectively cited their disapproval with the reduction in service along Bell Boulevard, which could hurt both local businesses and the consumers. They also cite the proposed increase in distance between stops as a major drawback of the plan overall. 

The existing Q31 runs between Bay Terrace and Jamaica along Utopia Parkway. And under the new plan, 84 stops will be removed along Bell Boulevard, 47th Avenue, 48th Avenue. While the route will be extended by slightly more than a mile, the average distance between stops is increasing from 762 feet to 1,224 feet. 

Increased spacing between stops under that new plan has been a chief concern among critics of the plan who say it would be a burden for those with mobility issues such as elderly and disabled riders. But the MTA says that it will allow them to speed up service by cutting out stops they say are underutilized. 

The Q13, which goes from Fort Totten to Flushing, will still run along Bell Boulevard but 6 stops in each direction will be removed. Along the entire route, the average distance between stops will almost double from 688 feet to 1,146 feet under the new proposal. 

“We’ll have no way to get to the shopping and restaurants on Bell,” said board member Jena Lanzetta, who is also President of the Northwest Bayside Civic Association. “We need to go back to the drawing board and I will not be voting for this.”

Missing the 11

 

Queens Chronicle

After the MTA proposed a Queens bus redesign that would largely neglect those in the Centreville area of Ozone Park, three area elected officials are speaking out.

According to a press release from the office of state Sen. Joe Addabbo Jr. (D-Woodhaven), he, alongside Councilwoman Joann Ariola (R-Ozone Park) and Assemblywoman Stacey Pheffer Amato (D-Howard Beach) sent a letter to the MTA, expressing their “deep concern” over the proposed discontinuation of the Q11 bus service through Centreville due to the impact it would have on residents.

Currently, the Q11 and Q21 both provide service from Queens Boulevard in Elmhurst down the entire length of Woodhaven Boulevard and into Crossbay Boulevard. The Q21, however, serves Lindenwood and New Howard Beach, while the Q11 stops in Centreville and serves Hamilton Beach and Old Howard Beach.

According to redesign information on the MTA’s website, the Centreville Street/149th Avenue stop could be removed “due to new routing.” The MTA has drawn up a “final” bus route redesign plan it says it will present to the public for feedback.

While the Q11 in its redesign would still serve residents of Howard Beach and Hamilton Beach, the loss of the Centreville stops on its existing route may still impact those residents.

The area affected by the proposed discontinuation of the Q11 service, according to the elected officials, is home to approximately 3,500 residents. Their letter emphasizes the essential role the Q11 route plays for those who rely on its services.

The redesign would result in longer walking distances for residents who would have to access a bus stop on Cross Bay Boulevard instead of one closer to home. The politicians emphasized that the change would be burdensome and potentially dangerous for those who have come to rely on the safety and convenience of having a bus stop nearby.

The elected officials in their letter also cited “numerous testimonies and complaints from residents who utilize the Q11 for short trips to Old Howard Beach,” including those who often visit Our Lady of Grace Church, nearby Veterans of Foreign Wars meetings or quick stops at the butcher shop for groceries, all of which are accessible via the Q11.

 

MTA B13 reroute makes a transit desert on purpose

 

 QNS

A Glendale resident voiced her concern about the MTA’s proposed Brooklyn Bus Redesign that would impact the B13 route that runs through Queens during last week’s Community Board 5 (CB 5) meeting at Christ the King High School in Middle Village.

During the meeting, a letter from Glendale resident Deloris Bachmann was read in which she stated that the proposed changes along the B13 line would make it harder for her and other senior citizens who use that line to go anywhere. 

“This is a hardship for the many senior citizens and handicapped people who live in my neighborhood, not to mention an inconvenience in bad weather,” Bachmann said in the letter. “Without reliable bus service, how will be able to shop, visit doctors, go to Wyckoff Heights [Medical Center], visit friends, go to church or the library?”

The MTA revealed their Brooklyn Bus Network Redesign back in December that proposed the B13 reroute to the Ridgewood Reservoir and Cypress Avenue, which would eliminate stops along Cooper Avenue, Fresh Road Pond Road and Gates Avenue. 

“Queens is already a transit desert — why create another?” Bachmann said in her letter. “This plan may look good on paper, but the MTA has not considered the welfare of those who live along that line.”

CB 5 has reached out to the MTA in the past regarding the MTA Brooklyn Bus Network Redesign and getting reliable bus service to the Ridgewood Reservoir. In their letter to the MTA, CB 5 stated that the residents will be negatively affected by the proposed changes.

“The currently proposed B13 Bus route change is very likely to negatively affect bus riders in parts of Ridgewood and Glendale, Queens, who would, if the plan is adopted, lose helpful transit links to areas north and south of where they live,” the letter read.

CB 5 District Manager Gary Giordano told QNS that MTA needs to find a solution that would benefit both parties.

“They gotta find a way,” Giordano said.

Assembly Member Jenifer Rajkumar addresses racial hate assault on city bus

 

NY Daily News 

A white woman riding a Queens MTA bus was bashed in the head during a confrontation with three Black passengers who told her they “hate white people,” police sources Thursday.

The incident is being investigated by the NYPD’s Hate Crime Task Force.

The 57-year-old victim was riding a Q53 bus in Woodhaven when she got into an argument with three Black women or girls about 6:50 p.m. Saturday.

As the exchange heated up, one of the women hit the victim over the head with a blunt object, leaving her bleeding from the head, police said.

“I hate white people...the way they talk,” the victim recalled her attackers saying, police sources said.

The assailants rushed off the bus at Woodhaven Blvd. and Jamaica Ave.. They ran off and have not been caught.

23 Slowdoo

 

New York Times

 

Just beyond the reach of New York City’s frenetic, round-the-clock subway, people in a slice of western Queens wait — and wait — to board one of the borough’s slowest buses.

Many of the 2.3 million New Yorkers who live and work in Queens aren’t served directly by the vast network of trains that keeps the nation’s biggest metropolis moving. The borough, the city’s second most populous, has less subway service relative to its size and population than the other four.

So hundreds of thousands of people here plan their lives around the only mass transit choice they have: the buses that lumber along traffic-choked streets.

One of those buses, the Q23, is among the slowest in the city. For the past four years, it has consistently traveled more slowly than the citywide average of about 8 miles per hour — about the speed some people can run — bogged down by an awkward path and riders who swarm two stops that connect to the subway.

It was slower than nearly all of the 76 other buses in Queens in April, and it ranked dead last in the borough in January, when it traveled at 6.5 miles per hour.

 

The Q23’s route curls around the Tudor-style houses and lush yards of Forest Hills, then cuts through the bustling heart of multicultural Corona before turning west toward the edge of Queens to head to its last stop, near La Guardia Airport.

“Each section has its own little demon,” John Breeden, who has driven city buses for 11 years and counts the Q23 among his routes, said as he sat behind the wheel on a spring afternoon. “You need patience.”

More New Yorkers ride buses in this borough than in any other. On a given weekday before the pandemic, 680,000 people took a bus in Queens, making up about 32 percent of the city’s overall weekday ridership of 2.2 million.

Many blue-collar workers rely on the Q23 to reach their jobs, and its frequent delays can derail their commutes and make them late to work. Some riders set out hours early to compensate. When buses are slow, people put off basic needs such as medical care, according to a May 2020 study published in the American Journal of Public Health. They spend longer in harsh weather, and their quality of life suffers because of lost time.

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which operates the city’s public buses, wants to speed them up in Queens, in part by getting rid of stops and adapting to modern traffic patterns, making routes straighter and more direct.

“Most of the subway system was built when Queens still had farmlands,” said Janno Lieber, the M.T.A.’s chairman and chief executive.

“Now we have to make the bus system do a lot of the work in Queens that the subway system does for so many other parts of the city that got more heavy rail, because of when they were developed,” he said.

The authority released a draft plan to redesign the borough’s bus network in March, and it is soliciting community input through June.

Critics of the plan say it would not solve problems like drivers who don’t follow the rules, dining sheds that make narrow streets even tighter, and construction jobs like the one that blocked Ms. Mora’s route.

“Realistically, there’s not much you can do,” Mr. Breeden said. “It’s very populated over there. And then you add in the churches, then you add in the deliveries, and the people’s entrepreneurship out there — it’s always going to be crowded.”

The tragic bus

NY Daily News

Nine homeless riders on the No. 2 train, evicted from their usual all-night tour of the underground early Wednesday, toted their belongings upstairs to a city bus soon cluttered with their garbage bags and a handcart.

“I’m not going to a shelter,” shouted Tyronne Batte, 35, who struggles with drug addiction and spends many nights riding the rails. “I went five years ago. I got robbed. People tried to rape me three times. It’s like prison with fewer guards.”

Night one of the 1 a.m.-to-5 a.m. sanitizing sweep and shuttering of the sprawling subway system over coronavirus concerns sent more than 2,000 confused homeless people onto the streets and aboard city buses, with Mayor de Blasio declaring the policy imposed by Gov. Cuomo would remain in place for “a matter of months” at minimum.

“My general hope is that we’re going to see more and more normalcy through the next few months,” the mayor said. Asked specifically when things might change for the late-night trains, he replied, 
“When the crisis is over.”

NYPD Chief of Department Terence Monahan said most riders knew what was coming, and “no one was really taken by surprise” that the nation’s largest subway system would not run on its round-the-clock schedule.

Batte loudly disagreed before leaving the Flatbush Ave.-Brooklyn College station for the B44 bus shortly at 12:55 a.m.: "They didn’t make any announcement on the train.” He declined help from a group of six homeless outreach workers before boarding.

Another policy failure decision by Governor Cuomo and Mayor de Blasio.

MTA plans to cut Astoria's Vernon Blvd bus route

Astoria Patch

The MTA's proposal to eliminate the Q103 bus route along Vernon Boulevard has riled Astoria residents, who say the line is needed now more than ever.


Under the transportation authority's preliminary proposal to entirely redraw the Queens bus map, released Dec. 31, the Q103's north-south route along the Astoria waterfront would be cut.
As a replacement, the MTA's plan would shift those riders to a new version of the Q69 bus, which would still run along 21st Street — about 0.4 miles east of Vernon Boulevard — but continue further into Long Island City.

MTA officials working on the redesign said their proposal is only a draft and that the Q103 elimination isn't a done deal, but the mere suggestion had locals up in arms at two recent meetings on the plan.


At an MTA presentation on the redesign plan Friday in Astoria, nearly all of the 30-some attendees came to address the Q103 proposal: When one planner leading the presentation asked who had a question that wasn't about the Q103, the audience roared with laughter.

 Actually, someone should have asked if this was a way to open up the road for the BQX.

Like this woman did;

Q70 bus illegal idling, hydrant parking caught in the act in Woodside

 I've been making 311 complaints since January regarding illegally idling Q70 buses on 61st St in Woodside (multiple buses just put on their hazards and block the street). Yesterday at 5 pm I found one *parked in front of a hydrant* on 39th Ave (driver apparently napping in the back seat). The neighbors say it happens all the time.

 Around the corner on 61st were two more idling buses, outside the "drop off only" zone that *always* has two parked vehicles, and the actual bus stop on Roosevelt. Needless to say, buses more or less permanently occupying the southbound lane on 61st makes for a massive honking traffic disaster.