ViaWaterViaChurch

I took the 6:50am QM32 on Tuesday and the 6:30am QM32 on Thursday and they went via the GCP.

I wasn't aware they opposed it so much. I was aware that they significantly slashed the run times to every hour but it's only just hitting me that they literally split the service, I was thinking of them as two independent lines. I think the split was a good idea because people in Glendale and Ridgewood could turn up 69th Street and go straight to the LIE instead of having to double back from Middle Village. It would have been good in the afternoon when buses could get off at Maurice and head back toward Eliot via 69th Street. I do acknowledge that it's not ideal to lose out on the HOV lane though and that might negate any real time savings in the morning of having to go down Eliot Avenue. I can't remember if I mentioned this before but I also think it's a common sense move to have downtown buses stop at 1st Ave and 34th for the Hospital crowd. I was thinking for years that people who work at NYU would benefit from this. I just hope I won't be stuck sitting at 1st Avenue on the way home because the time point isn't properly accounted for.

My reaction to the express routes: I'm glad they kept most of the pickups the same. I think they should have split the QM24/25/34 to two portions like they did in the last plan but as a frequent rider of that bus I think the majority of the ridership comes from Eliot Avenue. In general I like what they did with the Rego Park buses instead of having them meander all around the LIE before finally getting on. I understand the logic behind the pickups on Queens Blvd for the QM7 but feel bad for those riders as it's already almost 2 hours to to 188th from downtown. Most people in Fresh Meadows are probably better off taking the QM8 for more direct service. I'm very curious to see if taking the LIE to 188th Street will be faster than going down Queens Boulevard and Union Turnpike, this is a question I've pondered for years. I think the QM2/20/32 should be put on the BQE and GCP/Astoria Blvd. Why do the majority of Super Express Bus runs go this way but your agency's plan puts them back on the LIE? This makes no sense. Also, they will seriously have to do something about Van Dam Street if EVERY midtown bus will be going down there and turning onto the LIE now. This will cause serious backups along Van Dam and other capacity issues if this is not addressed.

I thought I read somewhere that the Queens Bus Redesign plan will be out in Q1 2022, did I just imagine that? If so, that should be by the end of this month.

I saw a QM15 the other morning and it made me curious. Does anyone know why Howard Beach doesn't have 3rd ave and/or downtown service? It seems like those buses are just as frequent and packed as some of the Union Turnpike buses. Does anyone have any intel or history about a demand for service?

I've been seeing a lot of grumblings about this in the facebook group and now even on reddit this morning too. In all likelihood this mess on Northern Blvd won't get any better any time soon and hopefully the MTA and DOT will realize that. Having the bus go onto Astoria Boulevard doesn't seem much better since it looks like it's been getting slammed with traffic too. The time savings will probably be almost nil depending on how they plan to get the buses onto Astoria Blvd from the city anyway.

Now that the re-designs are back on, I hope they will squash the change in routing for Queens downtown buses to take the Williamsburg Bridge and just keep them on the FDR. The MTA had a 6-9 month test run on this idea when a sink hole opened up by the FDR and 34th Street exit and commute times were much worse as a result of it.

Those Staten Island riders sure put up with a lot.

Northern Boulevard is absolutely awful during the rush hour once you get past the BQE. There are constantly cars and trucks double parked in the right lane and you're lucky if you make it 3 blocks before the bus gets stuck at another red light.

You and I both have very similar commutes from Whitestone/Bayside to lower Manhattan. I've tried every which-way to try and speed up my commute because the QM2/20 is usually about 1hr 30min door to door for me coming home. In the morning I've found the QM2/20 is faster than the local bus to the 7 train by 15-30 minutes, coming home they're both about the same. I was considering permanently switching to the LIRR, but like you I would have to transfer and take a train downtown so it would wind up costing me another $100 a month on top of what I already paid for my unlimited express bus pass. From what I understand, there is (was?) demand for Bayside to Lower Manhattan express bus service and there were planning on adding the line when they did the Queens bus redesign, but now that everything is paused due to the pandemic I fear the MTA will just scrap the idea of that route. I know a lot of people drive to Union Turnpike and grab the QM7 or QM8 to get downtown and avoid the subway but I just find that it takes too long. Leaving a little before 5pm it takes me almost 2 hours to get home door to door. I actually find it faster overall to drive to/from Middle Village and grab the QM25 and deal with the LIE/Whitestone Expressway traffic then drive down the Clearview and take the QM7/8 which has to go down Queens Boulevard and all the way down Union Turnpike.

Yeah I was thinking the same thing with the QM2/20 that they should start them earlier in the morning. The 5:45am QM2 gets almost a full load even now. It doesn't get you into the city until about 6:30 which is awesome considering it leaves the last stop in Queens at 6:10, but realistically you can't take that bus if you have to be in for work before 7am.

Yeah I understood it back in the beginning of the pandemic when they stopped charging to get on the local buses, but c'mon now. They've been charging fares since last August.

I wonder when the MTA is planning on getting rid of the "FARE REQUIRED" scroll on the express buses. I think we get the point by now. It's so annoying to have to stare at a bus for 10 seconds just to figure out if it's the one you want, especially because unless you have 20/20 vision, you only get a few seconds to flag down the drivers.

I saw some Supervisors out on Wednesday the 23rd at Union Turnpike and Main Street and also at the downtown loop for the QM buses in the morning and afternoon. It might have been to make sure buses weren't running hot but I wouldn't doubt it was to get headcounts for service cuts. Queens downtown buses in particular are doing pretty bad right now with ridership. Sometimes I'm the only person on the QM7 I take in the morning and it seems like half the time the driver doesn't pick up any on Union because I see on bustime he goes down Union and then doesn't make the trip into Manhattan. It also doesn't help that The QM8 comes literally 3-5 minutes before the QM7 is scheduled. Interestingly enough, I took the 2:15pm QM7 back to Queens yesterday and that bus had the highest passenger count I've seen since I've been back 5 days a week in July. I've taken QM7s, QM8s, QM25s at various times between 3 and 5:30pm and if these buses have 10 people on them it's a lot. I guess people are trying to get the hell out of the city as soon as possible during the day.

Thanks. You used to be able to view the run sheets on CPs website through some googling but it looks like they’re gone or I just am not getting as lucky with my searches anymore.