BrooklynBus

What everyone should be concerned about and should ask the MTA is why the Remix comments not visible? Why don’t they want us to see what others are thinking? Are they afraid people have ideas that are better than theirs? And they have the nerve to say that transparency is one of their goals.

What kind of question is that?

That should be 2,560, not 1,560.

I attended on Zoom the MTA’s presentation of the Brooklyn bus redesign before the NYC Transit Riders Council today. Everyone complimented the MTA for doing a great job only saying the redesign needs a few tweaks. One person criticized the B4 for no longer serving Beach Haven, but that was it. The MTA outright lied by showing a picture of their proposed B16, stating that they have straightened the route which will make it go faster. Never mind that 6O Street has more traffic than 56/57 Streets and the community twice rejected that plan, once in 1978 and again in 2004 because of that and twice asked that the route pass Maimonides on Ft Hamilton Pky. They also praised the “benefits” of “bus stop balancing”, never using the words “removal” or “elimination.” I raised my hand to speak as soon as they started talking about bus stops. Andrew Albert refused to call on me and then lowered my hand and stated we will end this portion of the meeting since there are no more questions. I did enter some comments via the chat. Cate from the MTA wrote “With all due respect Mr. Rosen, we have been listening to the public by revising the Queens drafts.” I asked if that meant they will not remove 1,300 stops in Queens because of the 1,560 people who signed the petition against bus stop removal. No further response from her.

Exactly, which is why I proposed it. Use Clarkson westbound and Winthrop eastbound between Remsen and Utica and should be extended to E 98 St along Clarkson to provide additional transfers.

A bus route to JFK could use the shoulder of the Belt Parkway which mostly exists east of Knapp Street. The road could easily be improved to fill the small gaps where it doesn’t exist. Elsewhere it could use the service road, except going west, west of Ocean Pky.

Just found out something very interesting. They used a consultant to develop the routes. So what does their Operations Planning Department do? Even more interesting is the consultant they chose who employs the same person who did all their bus planning in the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s. The person I was constantly at odds with when pushing through my Southwest Brooklyn Plan of which only about 25% was accepted. in fact, I was hired to replace him in 1981 after he screwed up the first Brooklyn redesign attempt by spending 90 percent of the money and accomplishing only 25 percent of the tasks. The first think I had to do was get more federal funds to continue. I only had six employees to develop an entire Brooklyn plan which was much better than what the 300 MTA employees and a consultant came up with this time around. Why it went nowhere is another story. My first three months were spent having my staff clean up a mess he caused. He fired the hundreds of survey temps on Friday, only to rehire them the following Monday as new employees. That way he saved the MTA having to pay them sick and vacation benefits. They found out and retaliated by sabatoging the survey data. He was eventually fired by the MTA many years later for some impropriety. Now he is back still planning Brooklyn Bus routes. The more things change, the more they remain the same. So much for taking a fresh look.

I misread the map.

Something else I proposed in my plan. https://onedrive.live.com/?authkey=!AMuE4L4GieYCDX0&cid=27B4793AC6019868&id=27B4793AC6019868!192&parId=27B4793AC6019868!105&o=OneUp

But both those proposals involve an investment in a borough that is growing and the MTA is only interested in cutting service. They say they want straighter and simpler routes, but not if they need to provide additional service to accomplish that. They talk about the need to improve inter borough connections, but will not add a second route to JFK. It’s a bit ironic that the B4 they are now proposing is the exact same route I proposed in 1978 when making my Southwest Brooklyn proposals, except I would have left the Neptune Emmons portion as a separate route. The MTA rejected the idea because they wanted the B4 to serve Coney Island Hospital and I wasn’t sure it needed three routes. Now, the MTA reversed its position so they could cut service in Bath Beach. They proposed moving the B16 to 60 Street in 1978. Rejected by CB 12 who asked for straightening of the B16 and a new route on 13 Ave. Proposed again in 2004. Rejected again, and community countered with same proposal. It will now happen a third time and the MTA will relent and leave that portion of the route as is. 60 St has more traffic than 56-57 Streets, and the route will be further delayed. Community has asked for B71 restoration and extension into Manhattan. Rejected by MTA, and chose instead to widen the service gap by moving the B65 to Atlantic Ave. Rockaway twice rejected removal of Q35 from Newport Ave. MTA wouldn’t send B44 SBS to Kingsborough as was proposed, but sends it to CI Hospital that no one asked for, but they brag how it’s an improvement. But they don’t mention they are removing Coney Island Hospital from the B4. That is dishonest. They wouldn’t connect Sheepshead Bay to Rockaway as proposed, but will provide direct service from Broadway Junction to Sunnyside that no one asked for and no one will use. 2500 signed petition to not have their bus stops removed. MTA is ignoring them. So explain to me how the MTA is listening to the it’s riders, and not just doing what it wants.

https://www.change.org/p/mta-oppose-the-mta-s-plan-to-eliminate-bus-stops/u/31130926

The B49 should go straight up Ocean. Thought they wanted to simplify the routes so they make the B49 more indirect for this transferring to the B35 toward Sunset Park. They brag how they are adding Coney Island service to the B44SBS, but conveniently omit they are removing it from the B4. Now they nursing home workers on Emmons Ave from Crown Heights will no longer have direct SBS service and now may have to pay additional fares to use it if they already require a transfer. Sending the B44 SBS to Kingsborough makes more sense than sending it to Coney Island Hospital when riders already have the B36. If they want to straighten routes why did they leave the B16 basically as is? It’s because it would have required extra service and all they want to do is cut. They only filled two service gaps on Empire and Clarkson, but left many others. Totally not comprehensive. They totally ignored southwest Brooklyn.

First explain to me why move the express bus from Avenue K to Avenue J when Avenue J is chronically congested and Avenue K moves much better which is why J was not chosen when the route was created? You are 100 percent correct regarding Manhattan Beach. By cutting it off from Sheepshead Bay commercial area, there will be no way to access Net Cost, Stop and Shop, PetCo, Marshall’s the dozens of restaurants, banks, and local mom and pop stores there. A ten minute direct bus trip will now require two buses and longer walks increasing the trip to 30 minutes. Well-bodied people can walk it in 20 minutes. Totally ridiculous. But I understand their point about wanting to speed up the B49. When I created the diversion to the station in 1978, it only added about 5 minutes to the route. Today, with the added traffic, it’s more like 15 minutes, so something has to be done which was why I would have diverted most of the Kingsborough students to the B44 SBS by extending that to the college giving them a much faster trip. Also, at school dismissal time, I would send some buses non-stop to Avenue Z on the pre-1978 route straight up Ocean Avenue. Other than Kingsborough students who don’t need the Sheepshead Bay Station, there are few through passengers who are inconvenienced with the diversion to the station because many are getting on or off in Sheepshead Bay. You speed up routes to help people, not to inconvenience them. Also, the B68 makes fewer bus connections than the B49 causing some to have to pay additional fares like those transferring in Crown Heights. And diverting it to NY Avenue, further increases travel time for those transferring from the B49 to the B35 going toward Sunset Park. They talk about straighter more direct routes, but they rejected my proposal for the B49 to go straight on Ocean Avenue and are causing more indirect travel.

But there is no indication they are revisiting the bus stop situation.

One issue is Astoria losing direct bus service to Manhattan which will also result in extra fares which the MTA has said nothing about. Another is the loss of 1600 bus stops despite 2500 signing a petition against this. So how can they claim to be addressing rider concerns?

They are not ready for a final draft yet. There are too many problems with the current draft.

There are parts of the BQE that are 5 mph from 6 AM to 10 PM. That has to be worse than Manhattan CBD. Also, with Congestion Pricing and removal of a traffic lane for another bike lane on McGuinness Blvd which is an alternate for part of the BQE, traffic will get even worse with more spillover on to local streets. There are also plans to close more streets in Downtown Brooklyn so traffic will come to a complete standstill.

You obviously don’t drive so you don’t know lanes were eliminated under the promenade by our former mayor as a way of extending its life rather than having it reconstructed because it’s falling apart from the weight of all the trucks that use it daily. Scott Stringer actually wanted two lanes in each direction to be a permanent solution so that the congestion never goes away. This has added at least 15 minutes to everyone’s trip daily for those who use it or no longer use it by having to take an alternate longer route. The new Kosciusko Bridge with the fourth lane actually saves about five to seven minutes, but the net is still a longer trip.

The GPS never should have sent me into Manhattan. It did so because going into Manhattan was quicker than staying in Brooklyn. So my point is really the congestion on the BQE is worse than in Manhattan where they will be charging because traffic is supposedly so bad there.

https://www.qchron.com/opinion/letters_to_the_editor/new-tolls-won-t-work/article_be49ca1c-13c7-5d39-83bf-e58335840a76.html

I hope you make these points at the MTA hearings.

A few weeks ago, I had to pick up my car from Long Island City and drive back to Brooklyn in mid afternoon. I don’t believe this BS regarding traffic being the worst in the Manhattan CBD. The BQE has been moving at 5 mph between 7 AM and 10 PM in parts since the closing of a lane beneath the promenade. Guess how my GPS told me the quickest way to get home was? it routed me into Manhattan via the 59 St Bridge, the FDR, and Brooklyn Bridge, then the BQE, Gowanus, and Belt to get home. I was really skeptical about going into Manhattan when I didn’t have to. The GPS was correct. It took only 3 minutes to go over the 59 St bridge, another three minutes to get on the FDR, and a steady 30 mph on the FDR. The Brooklyn Bridge took about seven minutes because a lane was closed for roadwork. The trip was 15 minutes quicker than if I just took the BQE without going into Manhattan.

You are 100 percent correct. If the answer were more investment in the system, how does someone explain why the new bus command center in East NY still isn’t operational? Yes there were some delays with Covid, but if the MTA were competent, they would have been addressed by now. What about other MTA inefficiencies, like the media revealed track workers had to wait four hours for supplies to arrive every day. Why didn’t they follow up, so riders would know if this problem was ever resolved or still exists? what about all the bond issues to build the Second Avenue Subway with the monies diverted? How can the MTA ever be trusted? And what percentage of congestion pricing funds will even go to MTA Capital Projects with the highest construction costs in the world? How much will go to slow traffic even more with construction of new medians and islands, extended intersections, and unnecessary new bus and bike lanes? In Sheepshead Bay, they started building a new bike lane. They started by ripping out a perfectly good short median to replace it with a new median of the same size. Total waste of money. The average speed on local streets is 10 mph. We don’t need that reduced to 5 mph. The purpose of congestion pricing shouldn’t be to increase congestion more which is what will happen once congestion pricing goes into effect with projected reduction in congestion within the zone a measly 5 to 7 percent. Congestion outside the zone will increase by way more. If this were about reducing congestion, there would be no fees during the night. Someone whose shift ends at 1AM shouldn’t be expected to wait up to 75 minutes for a bus after getting off the subway and has no choice but to drive. They shouldn’t have to pay an extra fee. When the desired funding is not raised, the zone will be extended to 72 or 86 Street to include all the hospitals, and raise it every two years? Then what? Add a toll to any congested highway like the BQE, XBronx, Van Wyck and LIE? Don’t forget the prices of all goods will rise when delivery prices increase when trucks are charged extra. This is just a bad idea all around.

https://www.qchron.com/editions/queenswide/myths-about-congestion-pricing-a-mid-class-tax/article_496657c2-841a-5e04-aebd-1b9d245724fa.html

https://www.qchron.com/editions/queenswide/myths-about-congestion-pricing-a-mid-class-tax/article_496657c2-841a-5e04-aebd-1b9d245724fa.html