B35 via Church

Yeah, the #125 runs like crap, but length isn't the reason why I wouldn't bother running the #123 to JSQ... @BreeddekalbL's "random thought" there appears to be rather implicative of having the #123 take the place of the #119 running inside JSQ, which I can't concur with.... I'd kill two birds with 1 stone here, because I never cared for the #126 running past Hoboken to serve that pocket of Jersey City at/around Hamilton Park.... I can side with the general idea of running the #123 to Exchange Place, but during peak hours (peak direction), I'd divvy up trips between 1] short turning at Congress st. HBLR, 2] terminating at Hamilton Park (less total trips serving it than the current #126), and 3] terminating at Exchange Place - however, peak trips to/from Exchange place would be all 'X" trips (inbound trips would run straight to PABT after Congress st, outbound trips would have Congress st. be the first stop after leaving PABT).... All other times, no service to Hamilton Park, but I would still have a significant enough an amount of trips short turning at Congress st. HBLR.... You mean like the current #126 from Hoboken & the current #119 & #125 from JSQ?

For what? The #119 would go back inside JSQ.....

Hard disagree.... Subjecting the #119 to the helix & that stretch of 30th/31st st in Union City would loom that much more detrimental to the thing, compared to the way the route currently slogs south of Congress....

It's not better publicized because it's not for the general public... It's only for Mercer county residents.

I'm more of a proponent of microtransit being used within denser areas, as opposed to within semi-rural areas... In either case, as I not too long ago said in the SCT redesign thread, microtransit shouldn't be used to supplant public fixed routes (especially those that are under-performing, or otherwise below par).... Specifically to the 2 routes mentioned, well, as we both know, Bee Line themselves destroyed the #12... As for the #32, I honestly think fixing that route is an easy fix... Get rid of the portion west of Park Hill & have it circulate to/from MNRR Yonkers - something like this..... The #8 is all is needed for the portion of SW Yonkers, west of South Broadway....

I have no doubt about it..... Otherwise, SCT would've unapologetically cut the 10B/10C outright.... Public transit providers are (mis)using microtransit as a passive means to slowly cut bus service... The concept will be used as the scapegoat as to why to the "East Hampton Zone" & the "Southampton Zone" will end up failing.... It puts the (performance of the) 10B & the 10C off the hook. Not saying you're implicating this, but I still want to make the point.... To sum it up, microtransit is not the answer to a poorly utilized fixed route service... This is the trend (or craze, as BM5 puts it) that these public transit providers are resorting to & to me, at the very least, it's further aiding in giving microtransit a bad rep'...

The problem AFAIC isn't the general concept of microtransit (which is how the pro-microtransit folks construe the criticism) as much as it is microtransit being used by public transit providers to supplant fixed route services.... Let's just call it for what it is - it's done as a passive, gradual way of cutting bus service.... For discussion's sake I guess, I'll just leave this flowchart here from Jarrett Walker's blog for anyone to ponder where the 10B & 10C falls into this...

Feel sorry for the poor guy/girl..... I would've helped out with getting him/her back to PABT if I was on that bus.... Too many pax in those situations either get worried/panicky or start cursing out the b/o & it tends to piss me off....

In order to keep the scheme of only having n1's running [to Jamaica in the AM] & [from Jamaica in the PM], this is how they try to handle catering to n1 demand from Jamaica during the AM hours.... That's what has to be resorted to; As they can't have inbound AM n1 trips leave as n1's back to Hewlett, because almost all of them are interlined with AM n26 trips to Great Neck. As I see it, the issue with those old n15's to RFM via OCR was that the demand was grossly imbalanced/one-sided... Virtually nil during the AM hours, but enough to warrant service during the PM hours... If there's people at the Country Glen shopping center & those other shopping plaza's up along Glen Cove rd. in Carle Place making their way to the WB n22/24 to xfer for those Mineola n15's (instead of for the n40/41), I wouldn't know it... But what I do know is that there no noticeable amt. of people walking from those shopping centers to RFM, or people making their way to that stop across from the Carle Place diner to take the EB n22/24 or SB n27 the one stop to RFM....

...but yet the #163's that short turn at GSP Mall have no suffix; go figure.... It would be one thing if GSP mall was a part of the regular #163 route to Ridgewood Terminal, but it isn't..... JSQ, OTOH, was always a part of the #119 before the construction at JSQ, so to append a temporary suffix for that, **shrugs**....

....and as for the lowly utilized express bus routes?

Ever since they came out with the revision of the initial draft, I've stated (on here) that I thought the #11 should've ran to Smith Haven over the #5.... Specifically, I would do 2 things with the #11 at this point regarding that: Smithtown is overserved with the current #5 (30 min. headways)... Not only that, but it's a waste of time having it sit in traffic in Smithtown to have every trip (on weekdays) pick up/drop off almost nobody... The waste-of-timeness (so to speak) includes the backtrack from the NYS Office Bldg. to have it serve more of Smithtown (as in, via the North Complex & via Old Willets Path)... With that said, not only would I reduce service to hourly in Smithtown, I would have a branch of the #11 to Smith Haven running via rt. 111 after serving the NYS Office Bldg.... I see what's going on with the #58 to Brentwood & now I'm more than convinced that the #58 should be cut back to Smith Haven.... Not because that it doesn't do well, but because too sizeable a portion of pax. getting off at Brentwood are xferring to #7's or #11's... That, and quite frankly, I think it's ultimately more beneficial to have the #58 & the #62 be the (respective) Smith Haven - Riverhead routes & the #11 offering a 1-seat ride b/w Smith Haven & points south of Brentwood (towards Bay Shore), than the current setup with having the #58 be a Brentwood - Riverhead route & the #11 being one-half of a deliberate/all-day interlining scenario with a route I don't think should even exist in its totality in the first place (of course, I'm talking about the #17 here).... So I say all that to say, I'd have the other hourly branch of an #11 to Smith Haven bypassing Smithtown via the Smithtown Bypass I honestly don't care if each branch gets a separate route number or not, but the point is, I'd say it'd be well worth it for a Bay Shore - Smith Haven route hitting (the pulse point that is) Brentwood, and industrial & governmental (lol) Hauppauge in the process.... ---------------------- As far as the #5 is concerned, my outlook thus far on it, unfortunately, is rather low..... Even given the whole 3 routes doing Brentwood - Smith Haven & 3 routes doing Brentwood - Hauppauge bit, I would look into dismantling it before having it run up to Hauppauge from Babylon, to then run back down to LIRR Central Islip (never mind that I don't think anything should be terminating there to begin with)... Speaking of which, if it's anything that should perhaps take over parts of the #17 north of the main line, it's one of the #52 branches.... Have one of them continue westward along Motor Pkwy down Hawthorne or something....

I'm CTFU if they got the outbound #108 signed up as "NWK" in 3 big ass letters. But yeah, I brought up the "Eliz" BS in an earlier post in this thread, referencing having seen it on a #26... Just dumb all the way around... For whatever the reason, they're regressing in the designation signage category.

Lake Success (Nassau County). We were in a meeting (11 of us present, only 2 people felt it).... Interesting that the only 2 people that felt it were (standing) on the little podium we have.... The rest of us were sitting down.... I was one of the people sitting down.... I'd say there's about a 10-12 foot distance b/w the podium & those of us that were seated.

That's exactly the point of doing that.... and quiet is as kept, buses randomly (unofficially/wrongfully) have been doing that for ages. Especially during the PM rush hour on Fridays, I used to stay seeing M20's on the middle lane or left most lane (with waiting pax. getting screwed in the process).....

You think.... What, is more than that? That is exactly why I never bothered wasting time filing any sort of complaint or issue their way.... Canned ass responses piss me off to no end: I'd honestly rather be ignored than to be fed some automated response....

Figured it'd be something as silly as this....

Not with as many people being influenced by the fear mongering & the current state of the subway system, we don't....

Forget about it.... You & those that have your mindset are few & far between..... For as large an agency it is, the MTA, in this aspect, still represents a microcosm of the quality of customer service in this country, as a whole.... Some will tell you that quality customer service is completely dead... I won't go that far, but being perfectly honest, as the poor get poorer, the "quality" of the customer that's expecting exceptional customer service definitely does not help matters..... I have said in the past on here (and still believe it to this day) that there is an adversarial relationship between the MTA & the riding public...

Not that it takes away from the point, but #4 has to be referencing #5... Quite frankly, the educational level of the 2 poor souls they threw to the wolves is rather irrelevant to me (all things considered)... This debacle represents a new low the MTA has hit... Anyone would have to be a fool at this point to believe the MTA is still in it to provide optimal public transit for the NYC region... But of course, the kool-aid drinkers will still slurp-slurp & go AHhhHHhhh at this f***in' bullshit....

My theory for the longest has been that ultimately the MTA will end up whittling down the bus system to a certain amount of long-winded ass routes ("superroutes" as I called 'em)... If/When that will happen, remains to be seen..... With that said, if I value a certain something, you will never catch me up here or anywhere's else advocating that it be free - and public transit happens to fall into that category for me.... There's many variations of this, but the way Serena (Williams) put it, always stuck with me for some reason.... She said "Everything comes at a cost... Just what are you willing to pay for it"... If you have people that think the buses should be free, more power to them, but I aint one of them. As far as a class divide between subway & bus riders, I started hearing (an increase of) people blurt out such a thought around early to mid 2022 or so... Quite frankly, I don't see it.... The middle class has been & still is on a perpetual decline & I don't see that changing (at least, not in my lifetime anyway).... If you're not filthy rich or wealthy, you're either broke, or not as broke..... People making 6 figures in this city for example, and barely making it - living paycheck to paycheck.... In any case, I'm of the belief that a so-called subway/bus class divide in this city is being pushed by transients and/or gentrifiers (basically, non native NY-ers) to have it become a reality! I even remember reading a post on reddit that said something to the effect of, the subway is the new express bus.... Laughable..... But yeah, the real growing divide going on right now are of people (continuing to) taking mass transit, versus those that have completely given up on it..... If the bus system were to be made officially free, that divide is the one that would increase.

Possible, but I don't think this was budget cut related at all..... I'm guessing the decision was completely Six Flags related. Now if the #316 & #510 also ends up getting axed for the summer season, then we know what time it is.....

Trenton offers more connections, but Princeton - Asbury is infinitely more attractive.... As for the #836, the thing should just run straight to Centra State Hosp. from Freehold Center... Being that they don't have #139's serving Freehold Center and Freehold "mall" anymore, I would have a very select few (of the Freehold "mall") trips throughout the day serving Freehold Raceway Mall.... Either could serve as a P&R, but I do think a #139 from points north of Raceway mall would attract more actual mall goers than either the #836 or the #67....

What this isn't telling you is that construction is taking place at JSQ.... Lane D is completely knocked out & they actually got buses running through Lane A (which normally has those Port Authority police vehicles parked there)... You can take a guess as to what affected route served Lane D As an aside, all the bus schedules that were posted for all the routes serving the terminal have been removed... They've been replaced with this shit... ----------------------------------- To add, they have A-frames (the folding signs) with the appropriate bus route & terminal/destination listed on them (bold, black letters with a white background) by each immediate area in Lane A, B, and C so people know what stops where.

Random thought: Not sure if they changed the sign for the #52 as well, but while I was at NJT Elizabeth RR on Saturday, I saw a #26 that was signed up as "UNIVERSITY" (big letters)... As the bus was turning onto Julian pl<>Railroad av., the other frame of the sign looked like it transitioned to: - "Eliz" (first line) - "via Kean" (second line) For certain though, it did not spell out Elizabeth.... I mean YGBFKM with "Eliz" ; there was more than enough space on that top-most line in that frame of the destination sign to spell out Elizabeth.... They also apparently got rid of the KU suffix next to the 26 (which is neither here nor there to me)....