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Does anyone know why College Point drivers love to take out the old 2XXX express buses? I’ve noticed multiple drivers prefer to take these buses on their trips every day. I’ve had the same guy for two picks in a row and he does both my morning and even express trip and he ALWAYS takes an old bus.

If anything you would think they would try to attract more ridership by expanding service to Wall Street or 3rd Avenue because that's how you can peel away some riders who take the LIRR. I bet there would be more people willing to take a cheaper, more convenient commute to those areas in lieu of taking the railroad and then getting on another subway train and vice versa, especially in the morning.

It looks like the tide is swelling in Northeast Queens. Cuts to service spans like the ones proposed are outrageous. What's the logic in curtailing Union Turnpike buses to as far as 188th Street on Saturdays? Wouldn't it just make more sense to run the QM6 or a modified combined version of the QM5 and QM6 on weekends so that service can continue for people who live in Glen Oaks, Oakland Gardens, and Lake Success? I see that there is now a delay on Bronx implementation which is great news for those residents. My only concern is that all of this noise in Queens is going to just blow up the entire express bus redesign altogether. I like the majority of the proposed routes and think they'll expand service to areas that need it and speed up commutes for people with some tweaking, but the cuts themselves are egregious and the MTA needs to know that it's NOT okay to turn these buses into commuter only peak service. Even the spread of service seems strange in that the majority of service is early in the morning to get people to work before 8am and the majority of service to get people back to Queens really picks up at 5:30pm. Meanwhile I consistently see 3:30 and 4pm buses that have adequate ridership on lines like the QM7 and the QM25, it really boggles my mind why they think it's okay to slash service the way they did.

With the MTA claiming to be broke along with the new campaign to decrease fare-beating, I don't see how it would be a good idea for the MTA to proceed with all-door boarding unless they want to just admit that fare-beating doesn't really matter much when it comes to the overall operations budget. By getting rid of the bus driver watching you dip a card, there will only be more of an incentive not to pay. The problem is only going to get worse if you take away more and more deterrents and let people go on the honor system. OMNY isn't going to bring in more revenue because it doesn't address the problem of fare-beating. People don't fare-beat because it's too inconvenient to pay the fare, they do it because they either can't afford it or don't respect the ethics of society.

Did the winter pick start today?

Some thoughts about the Express Buses: General thoughts: 1. AM Downtown buses should keep their current routing from the LIE to the FDR. There's very little traffic on these roads in the morning and any time saved from having a more direct route via the BQE and WBB will be quickly erased by the crawling traffic to merge onto the BQE and go over the Kosciuszko bridge. Don't even get me started on that appalling Delancey to Bowery route. 2.Getting rid of the downtown loop is just a way to make overall run times look faster on paper. Thames and Vesey Street get a lot of usage and eliminating these stops means 10-20 minute walks for anyone who works West of Nassau Street. Anyone who works west of Broadway might as well just take service to Midtown and jump on the subway. QMT100 Eliot Ave-Downtown The split makes sense, the majority of ridership on the QM25 comes from Eliot Ave. Absolutely terrible routing though. This is some pathetic attempt to bring service to areas that will never use them and will make run times even longer. This route already had the gold standard of service in the morning, it literally took 30 minutes to get from its last pick up to its first drop off on an average day. Metropolitan Avenue has a drawbridge that could potentially cause a multitude of delays if a bus is ever unlucky enough to get caught when that bridge is about to open. Grand Street is one traffic lane in each direction. Who thought this would be a good idea? QMT101 Glendale-Downtown I don't see them having ridership to support this line. People already opt for the M train in the afternoon because of how much faster it is, and nothing will be different here. People will quickly learn that they can take a much quicker subway train that doesn't have to crawl over the WBB and down Metropolitan Avenue to get to virtually the same areas downtown. Riders can wave to the M Train as it flies past them while the bus is sitting in bumper to bumper traffic on the WBB. QMT102 Briarwood-Downtown I don't mind this. The route makes more sense and is a true Queens Blvd downtown route. Downtown express routes are pretty much the only routes in Queens where you truly can save some commute time, so hopefully this will work out. QMT103 Bay Terrace-Downtown It's weird that Midtown service along 26th and Utopia is axed and replaced by this downtown route. It might be better to just have buses stay on the BQE in the afternoon and go via Astoria Boulevard. There's a reason the super express drivers opt for this route as opposed to staying on the LIE to the Van Wyck. QMT104/QMT134/QMT165 Glen Oaks-Downtown/Midtown I like this routing and these people deserve to endure less pickups and drop offs, but I'm concerned if getting on the LIE will be faster than just taking Union Turnpike and Queens Boulevard. I've been looking at QM7 and QM8 regular runs around the same time the super express bus in the morning runs to see if the LIE is faster and the few times I've looked, it appears that the Union Turnpike/QBlvd runs get to Woodhaven/LIE faster. Traffic on the LIE is really bad between Main Street exit 23 and Queens Center Mall exit 19, it can take 30 minutes just to go this distance in the morning. Anyone getting on these buses should be prepared to lose 2 hours of their day to get to Glen Oaks in the PM rush. QMT105 Fresh Meadows-Downtown Pretty much no changes to this route, I would have gotten rid of the stops on 188th Street and just kept this bus on Union Turnpike. A lot of people get off at Utopia or Chevy Chase to take a local bus further down Union, and they are leaving PM ridership on the table because I know for a fact that people will opt to take the E/F to Union Turnpike and just get on the local bus there because they'll have to get on it later eventually anyway. QMT106 Belmont-Downtown Having this bus take the Clearview and LIE is just begging for a 2+ hour ride each way. This seems like a troll bus in the same vein as the BxM17. Two trips each way? I wouldn't be surprised if this bus doesn't make the final cut. QMT112/QMT115/QMT116/MT117 Hudson Yards Is there a real demand for Hudson Yards at this time? No connecting service to any subways until 7th Avenue is just ridiculous. Put stops back at Park and have it stop between 6th and 7th instead of just at 7th. QMT130/QMT160 Eliot Ave-3rd Ave/6th Ave The interactive remix map makes it seem like buses will be taking the LIE via Van Dam street. If this is the case, buses should exit at 69th Street and turn onto 69th Street and do the stops instead of staying on the LIE only to double back toward 69th Street. Eliminate the LIE/Woodhaven Blvd stop, I don't know where they would even put this stop, there's way too much going on over there with cars fighting to get onto the LIE in both directions. If you look at the actual route maps though, it looks like the bus will be going over the Queensborough bridge and then staying on Queens Boulevard to Woodhaven Boulevard. QMT131/QMT161 Glendale-3rd Ave/6th Ave This is a good idea if the ridership is there. It's a shame to make Ridgewood and Glendale residents have to sit on the LIE to Woodhaven when the bus can just make a right turn at 69th Street and save about 20 -30 minutes in the afternoon. I'm concerned about the loss of the HOV lane for these riders in the morning, but not having to go down Eliot Ave to the LIE will save some of that time. QMT133 Bay Terrace-3rd Ave I don't really know how much time it will save running this bus to the LIE instead of staying on Northern Boulevard. You'd be better off syncing the lights so buses aren't stopping every 10 blocks and actually enforcing the no standing zones for the eastbound PM rush to speed up service on the Northern Blvd corridor. The majority of traffic issues are from standing or double parked cars on Northern Boulevard in Jackson Heights and Corona . Step up enforcement and sync the lights and Northern Boulevard can go back to the glory days of taking 15 minutes to get from the bridge to the Whitestone Expressway. QMT163 Beechurst-6th Ave A strange realignment, Utopia Parkway and 26th Avenue will lose midtown service and now they will merge Powells Cove which has two huge coop complexes with another two coop complexes, Clearview and Mitchell Gardens. Let's not forget that a lot of people use the Willets Point stops between 149th and 154th as well. It seems like overcrowding might be an issue. I think they should have left the Powells Cove people on the QMT133/QMT164 (QM2). And same deal with the LIE vs Northern Blvd, I think the only way this might be faster is if someone waves a magic wand over the LIE and makes traffic better. QMT166 Fresh Meadows-6th It seems ridiculous to make this the off peak bus when it would be a better use of resources to just keep the bus on Union Turnpike to serve more neighborhoods (QMT167Union Turnpile-6th Ave). This is purely a cost cutting maneuver.

With these cuts and new frequencies, it seems very clear that the MTA wants to turn these buses into peak commuter buses only. I don't understand how you can have 1 hour headways between 4 and 5pm for a lot of these buses. And what happens when a run goes missing? Do these people now have to wait for a 5pm bus in the middle of rush hour? The good news is, there won't be too many more missing trips, because these new runs are going to take so long that B/Os won't have the time to deadhead back to the city for a 2nd PM trip. I know for a fact that Middle Village and Glendale will be going crazy over the loss of service and the loss of some of their friends from Glendale and Fresh Pond due to the route split. People need to start screaming and hollering over the new QM25 route over there. Taking the bus off the LIE and FDR to put it on local roads that have lots of traffic on them make no sense. The idea to put stops in Williamsburg make no sense either. That area is filled with young people who live with 4 roommates to split a $3500 rent, they move there specifically for how cool it is and how close it is to the L train, these people aren't working 9 to 5 jobs on Wall Street and they don't have disposable income to be getting on an express bus that will take longer to get to the city from where they are already.

For the PM 6th Avenue run I would rather them go down 5th or 7th to get back to the Midtown Tunnel. I don't think 57th is much better than 59th Street and having buses go down Thompson and Van Dam to get to the LIE just seems unnecessary. Traffic from the Midtown Tunnel to the BQE almost always moves quickly, where as the upper level of the bridge gets backed up to make the left turn onto Thompson Ave and Van Dam can backed up too that now every bus in the city will be making left turns onto it to get to the LIE. AS far as putting buses back on the LIE to the Van Wyck, all I'll say is there's a reason why the Super express drivers take the BQE and Astoria Blvd back to Whitestone as opposed to staying on the LIE all the way. I'm thrilled to get downtown service to Whitestone, but who thought it was a good idea to have all of these buses merge onto the BQE in the morning from the LIE? Did anyone get in a car and try and take these routes in the morning? The BQE exit backs up onto the LIE, it's the reason why traffic on the LIE never clears up until after you get past Maurice Park. In contrast the LIE HOV lane to the FDR is virtually smooth sailing in the morning. By the time the buses would actually merge onto the BQE - before even going over the Koschuisko bridge - downtown buses could be coming out of the tunnel and making their way to the FDR for a quick 5 minute ride down the FDR instead of going over the Williamsburg bridge and then sitting in traffic trying to make left turns onto Bowery.

I think a lot of people are gonna be unhappy with these changes.

Major cuts to express buses, no PM express runs until at least 4pm, getting rid of the Downtown Loop, pointless plethora of service to Hudson Yards, getting rid of virtually all subway connections for 6th avenue and Hudson Yards buses. Why would you get rid of the Park Avenue stop? Plenty of people use that stop to get on the 4,5,6 lines to get to other parts of the city. Regardless of what the MTA thinks, people don't just work on 3rd Avenue or 6th Avenue between 34th Street and 57th Street or Hudson Yards... I applaud some of creativity with getting more express access to parts of Queens that need it, like in Southeast Queens, but a lot of these routes are going to be 2 hour runs, there's just no way to get people to the city faster with all the traffic. A lot of these routes don't make sense either. They're going to take the QM25, split it into 2 routes, and have the Eliot Ave QMT100 run downtown via Metropolitan Avenue? The QM25 as is takes 30 minutes from it's last stop to get to Peck Slip and Pearl, there's no way Metropolitan Avenue will be faster. It also looks like they're going to send Downtown buses via the BQE in the morning, has anyone gotten in a car and tried out these routes? The LIE to the BQE is a nightmare in the morning and will only add more time to these already long runs. It looks like they're putting most midtown buses on Queens Boulevard in the PM to get back to Queens, however there are some buses like the Whitestone/Bay Terrace buses that they are taking off of Northern and putting back on the LIE via Van Dam street. Why not just get rid of the midtown loop and run the 6th Ave bus down 5th or 7th so it can take 34th Street to the tunnel instead of adding an extra step to get back onto the LIE. Thompson and Van Dam can get very backed up while the LIE from the tunnel to the BQE is relatively smooth sailing (though B/Os will have to cut people off to get on to the lower level of the LIE). The MTA has already shown they have no qualms of chopping off service to speed up runtimes like they are proposing with the downtown buses, why not chop off some stops from the midtown buses so that it won't have to go cross town on 34th to get to 6th an then back across town to get to the bridge, going crosstown is what takes the longest.

Where do you see this?

This would be great, especially if they are planning to get rid of the Q38 as is. It would provide much needed coverage for a large portion of the area around Juniper Valley Park, even on the North side, to get to either the 7 train or the M train.

I don’t get why the MTA doesn’t advertise for the express buses. They have no problem advertising bridge repairs for the LIRR, subway stations getting art murals, Game of Thrones printed Metrocards... What is it to post even on Instagram or even in subway cars like “want quick and reliable service on the weekends? Take the express bus, be in the heart of midtown in as little as 30 minutes” or something like that.

There was a Bronx Bus Redesign web open house last Thursday the 12th where Bronx riders expressed concern over commutes that would require more than 1 transfer to which Byford replied they would look into those routes and accommodate riders accordingly because technology could be loaded onto MetroCard to account for the extra transfer or bus drivers would issue paper transfers. He basically went as far as to promise no one would have to pay two fares to get to work with this new redesign.

Clearly there's some fat that could be trimmed from the off peak runs, like the early morning QM32s that run empty back to Bayside or the QM4s off peak. I have no problem with them getting rid of these runs if they can use it to expand express service where it's needed or to add service elsewhere, like a Whitestone-Downtown bus. At least give us data that we can actually see and make sense of. You're absolutely right that averages don't portray an accurate picture, especially when they're contrasted with local weekday ridership which is like comparing apples to oranges. They're presenting data showing local bus weekday ridership has 60 boarders on average per hour and express buses have 17 boarders on average per hour, this already implies that Express buses are underused and it really helps push the narrative that only rich people take these "luxury" buses that are heavily subsidized by tax payer dollars when in reality, most people take express buses out of necessity because otherwise they'd be taking a 20-30 minute local bus ride to the end of the subway in Flushing or Jamaica to get to the city.

Definitely looks like some interesting changes in Queens from the screenshots. I'm all in favor of getting some local buses that will get me to Flushing faster because the Q15/Q16 are just too long. I'm hoping the strategy for express buses are not to chop away major parts of existing routes and then claim that end to end run times are improved. Any idea what's up with that QMT133 expressway routing? The way the map is drawn it looks like they're putting that bus back on the Van Wyck. I'm assuming the QMT133 is the QM32 and they're taking service away from LeHavre and Cryder Point which should be interesting. If they're cutting back service for Mitchell Gardens I wonder if they'll make the QM20 less cumbersome to get around there. Any time I've ridden the QM20 for peak service, I haven't noticed much ridership to justify all of the stops that they get, but admittedly I also get on the 7am bus out of Bay Terrace and am on the 3:30 or 4pm bus back to Bayside so I don't really experience peak loads.

Even the numbers that they're using to justify the inevitable Queens off peak express cuts seem off. How are Queens express buses averaging only 17 boardings per service hour on the week day across a total of 20 something lines? It definitely seems like they're manipulating data or showing data in contexts to get whatever narrative they want across.

Doesn't look like the plan will be released tonight. On the facebook group for express buses, a guy was tweeting from the meeting tonight. His name is JimRockway and if you look on his twitter he was releasing a couple of juicy tidbits. He says the plan will be released December 30th, bus routes were scrapped completely and redone from scratch, and express service off peak will be getting chopped. I would suggest taking a look on his twitter to see for yourself, he uploaded some pictures from the meeting.

Last night at the Bronx Bus Redesign Web stream Mark Holmes was talking about the cuts in express bus service. He mentioned that one of the reasons they scaled back off peak service was because buses were getting an average of 10 riders over a 14-16 hour span. Is he talking about talking about 10 riders say, on the BxM1, for the entire 14-16 hours, or 10 riders per trip over 14-16 hours? I'm not specifically talking about the BxM1, but rather, is this an average of 10 riders total on each bus line for the entire 14-16 hour day, or on average 10 riders per trip for the 14-16 hour time period?

Yes, when you swipe to get on a bus you will get 1 transfer loaded onto your card automatically. When you get to the subway you will swipe at the turnstile and it will count as a transfer and cost nothing. On the way back when you swipe into the subway to get on the F, you'll have a transfer when you swipe onto the Q76 bus. Just know that transfers are only good for 2 hours but if you're strictly going from Q76 to F train and vice versa, you'll have plenty of time before it expires.

It's a shame they scrapped the BxM17 altogether. They could have at least given Co-op City residents AM service and went from there. The route wouldn't have been too bad in the morning if they ran the buses over the Whitestone and Grand Central the way the QM2/20 go, probably an hour to an hour 15 door to door on most days. More and more business are moving back to FiDi. I saw an article this past year that there's more businesses down there now than before 9/11.

You really think there's a chance they'd expand QM3 service? Any idea if those 6 runs a day get good usage? I think the QM5 would benefit from turning right on 188th, keeping the 73rd Ave and 186th Ln, 64 Ave, and Horace Harding Stops and then going nonstop to the city via the LIE/Service Road to give the people in Glen Oaks some relief from having to pick up on Union Turnpike and go back up to the LIE via Queens Boulevard. Then the QM6 would just keep the regular routing and pick up on Union and go via Queens Blvd. You would only lose service at the 188th/75th Ave stop, and honestly, I could see that stop being cut because it's a short walk to 73rd or Union Turnpike which are the next closest stops. The problem with these Southeast Queens runs are that they are just so far from the city and there's so much traffic over there too. The Van Wyck always is bumper to bumper, and then these buses have to crawl up Queens Boulevard. It could easily take upwards of 2 hours to get back to SE Queens on a normal night.

I wonder what the redesign will bring for the QM1. If they're looking to cut service, they'll probably chop these runs to 2 or 3 hours peak and expand QM5s to run via Fresh Meadows.

I'm sure there's gonna be plenty of cuts to express buses outside of the AM and PM peak periods. I wish the MTA would consider running downtown express buses up Pike Slip to the Williamsburg bridge to the BQE for the PM runs back to Queens. I've been looking at traffic over the past few weeks and the BQE northbound is surprisingly not bad. It would save some time and avoid drivers having to take the upper road on the LIE which is always slower than the lower roadway.

I'm curious to see ultimately how much faster the new BxM2 and BxM18 routes will be since they're supposedly more direct. I'm not sure how great ridership was up around Mt Sinai but it sucks those people have to hoof it over to Lex now for service from Riverdale.