B44 +SelectBusService+

[Trainmaster5]

You are correct that the demographics have changed since the "Barnes Dance" was introduced and many streets in Brooklyn became one way. Remember the NYCTA could only react to those changes. They didn't propose them, that was done by the city's traffic division. Bridge Plaza WAS an important destination for many people in the borough in those days. The B40 Ralph, B44 Nostrand, B46 Utica, B47 Kingston, and B60 Rockaway all went to Bridge Plaza for the connection to the B39 to Delancey St. I think it's somewhat mistaken to say the MTA is unwilling to adjust bus routes. Look at the reduction in routes serving WBP today. The problem with the NY, Nostrand, Rogers, Bedford Avenue ridership base is still the same as it was back then. The SBS debate only makes it obvious. Either the n/b local B44 riders get screwed by losing some service or the n/b B49 ridership between Flatbush Ave and Fulton St get the shaft. Since some people trust the MTA to make these changes I can almost bet with 100% certainty that the B49 will get truncated between Bed-Stuy and Flatbush Ave within three years. I think B35 via Church and Brooklyn Bus will agree with me on this one. It's only the timeframe that I'm unsure of. That's my opinion. Carry on.

 

The truncation refers to the removal of ALL Bed-Stuy B49 service.

[BrooklynBus]

You are correct that the demographics have changed since the "Barnes Dance" was introduced and many streets in Brooklyn became one way. Remember the NYCTA could only react to those changes. They didn't propose them, that was done by the city's traffic division. Bridge Plaza WAS an important destination for many people in the borough in those days. The B40 Ralph, B44 Nostrand, B46 Utica, B47 Kingston, and B60 Rockaway all went to Bridge Plaza for the connection to the B39 to Delancey St. I think it's somewhat mistaken to say the MTA is unwilling to adjust bus routes. Look at the reduction in routes serving WBP today. The problem with the NY, Nostrand, Rogers, Bedford Avenue ridership base is still the same as it was back then. The SBS debate only makes it obvious. Either the n/b local B44 riders get screwed by losing some service or the n/b B49 ridership between Flatbush Ave and Fulton St get the shaft. Since some people trust the MTA to make these changes I can almost bet with 100% certainty that the B49 will get truncated between Bed-Stuy within three years. I think B35 via Church and Brooklyn Bus will agree with me on this one. It's only the timeframe that I'm unsure of. That's my opinion. Carry on.

 

Of course, I agree with you. Yes, the MTA is willing to change bus routes, just as long as the result is a net reduction in service, not an increase. That's why they had no problem with reducing the number of routes serving Williamsburg Bridge Plaza. The problem is they don't reinvest the savings. The B44 SBS is just poorly thought out. The reason for that, is that the MTA is just concerned with getting it off the ground and make the least number of changes, at least iniitially. But in the long term, they do need to think of the ramifications of losing New York Avenue service. Other routes need to be considered for the B44 SBS to become a decent plan like moving the B49 to Ocean Avenue off of Rogers and a new NY Avenue service (that I think B35 via Church proposed) with the B44 local to mimic the B44 SBS.

 

An alternative would be perhaps to create a new route that would be in effect a branch of the B46 from Kings Plaza to Avenue K to Albany Avenue to Empire Blvd (East New York Avenue) to Utica to Eastern Parkway or perhaps continue further north on the B46 route to provide some type of north-south service between Utica and Nostrand. to replace to lowering of service levels on NY Ave. You would decide what to do by performing an O/D survey to find out exactly where the B44 and B46 passengers live. Are the people living near Albany walking to the B44 and B46, or are they using crosstown buses and transfering, and if so, how many are paying multiple fares by having to take three buses. Or worse, are many of them using car services and not even bothering with buses because the walk is so far to a north-south route. You can't obtain that type of information with traffic checks or with a model using 13 year-old census data.

 

The problem is that we will never know because the MTA doesn't care to find out and has no desire to increase patronage by making the routes more useful. They only want to cut service and divert more people to the subways.

[BrooklynIRT]

The B32 via New York/Brooklyn/Albany Aves was my ('89 Liberty MCI's) idea, Allan.

 

To truncate something is to have it shortened....

 

 

 

Those two sentences basically sums up my position on the B44 SBS...

 

I don't see many people benefitting from having SBS's (screw it, LTD service) from the junction running up Rogers, as opposed to keeping them on NY av.... That's not to say I don't understand the physical routing of the SBS buses..... looking at the full B44 route, I get that they're straightening service on the 44 b/w WBP & the junction...

 

For the most part, I agree with that last assessment; somehow they're gonna bastardize the B49, whether it'd be with its routing and/or with its service levels.... I can't see bi-directional service happening on Bedford, nor can I see a scenario where SBS 44's & local 49's (remaining running) along Rogers, permanently - Especially at current B49 headways.... B49 service sucks as it is now.....

 

The parallel I will draw b/w the current NB local B44 & NB B49 services b/w flatbush av & fulton st, is that there are simply more riders utilizing the "intermediate" stops along it's respective routes....

 

 

A question for you: Do significant numbers of people that get off the northbound B41 between Glenwood and Empire, especially at Church, Clarkson, and Empire, walk towards the east after getting off the bus?

[B35 via Church]

A question for you:

 

Do significant numbers of people that get off the northbound B41 between Glenwood and Empire, especially at Church, Clarkson, and Empire, walk towards the east after getting off the bus?

 

On the 41? At those 3 stops, No..... I wouldn't say significant.....

But I will say, the more north you go past church on the 41, the more ppl. you'll notice walking due east (of those that disembark at the intermediate stops).....

 

At those 3 stops you list, though.....

- those that come off NB 41's @ church tend to xfer to 35's... the number of ppl. you'll see walking east is rather low....

 

- those that come off NB 41's @ clarkson tend to cross the street & catch the 12... but you will notice more ppl. walking east than you would, those coming off 41's @ church...

 

- those that come off NB 41's @ empire tend to either cross over for the subway, or make their way east (either for the 43, or walkin it out to *wherever they're heading"... the number of ppl walking east after gettin off the 41 @ empire, I'd say, is slightly more than that of those that get off walking due east at clarkson......

 

 

In neither of the 3 cases are the numbers of people walking east, significant though.....

[Trainmaster5]

Two questions for all. If(when) the B49 gets it's inevitable shaft by the MTA in this process what should be done with the route north of Flatbush Ave? Should it continue on Ocean Ave to Empire Blvd? I personally think it should. If it does happen should it continue on Empire Blvd to Utica Ave or should it continue north on the truncated B48 route to Franklin-Fulton and terminate? Just wondering ? Carry on.

[Future ENY OP]

Two questions for all. If(when) the B49 gets it's inevitable shaft by the MTA in this process what should be done with the route north of Flatbush Ave? Should it continue on Ocean Ave to Empire Blvd? I personally think it should. If it does happen should it continue on Empire Blvd to Utica Ave or should it continue north on the truncated B48 route to Franklin-Fulton and terminate? Just wondering ? Carry on.

 

 

I think 2 options:

 

A) Have the B49 continue down Foster to New York (Which probably I think could happen) b/c the ppl on New York Ave are dependent of their bus service especially those who need to reach to Kings County Hospital and Downstate Medical Center, and since the 49 does terminate at Franklin/Futon than it could work that way, and return via Bedford/Ocean.

 

B.) Personally, I like your idea of having it via Ocean to Prospect Park, than you have it traveling it down Washington/Classon, to the terminal. One cons that this may NOT WORK is what you do tell the people that are dependent of the New York Avenue service. You are not going to tell those folks to walk 8 to 10 blocks if your down Avenue D to Rogers Ave for +B44SBS+ service especially senior citizens.

[B35 via Church]

Two questions for all.

 

If (when) the B49 gets it's inevitable shaft by the MTA in this process what should be done with the route north of Flatbush Ave? Should it continue on Ocean Ave to Empire Blvd? I personally think it should. If it does happen should it continue on Empire Blvd to Utica Ave or should it continue north on the truncated B48 route to Franklin-Fulton and terminate?

 

Just wondering ? Carry on.

 

If it came down to the two, I would lean more towards BrooklynBus' idea....

You also have some folks that believe the two current routes (B48/49) should be combined.... For what reason than to yet create a superroute, I don't know....

 

What I think should happen is to have the 49 mirror the current B44 routing b/w foster & fulton, and then onto its current terminal at Franklin.... But I don't see them doing that, for the same reason I don't think they'll have SBS 44's running up Rogers & also retaining 49's on Rogers.....

[BrooklynIRT]

Some of us lean towards making some routes rather long because our observation is that MTA is less likely to mess with routes that pick up these massive loads of people. By mess with them I mean constantly but gradually reduce service to the point where there is none.

 

When attempting to restore bus service in areas where bus usage may not be very high, I have a tendency to want to take an existing route and extend it, because my feeling is that if you do that, MTA is less likely to attempt to reduce service than they are if you just make a separate bus route in the area where there is a service gap, especially if you know the route usage in that area may not be high enough to warrant good headways (good headways meaning the next bus shows up in 8 minutes or less middays/just after rush hour/weekends during the day and about 5 mins or less during rush hours). The B48's lousy headways are/were indicative of this.

 

I also tend to lean towards SBS because I feel that SBS ridership is more sustainable than local/limited bus ridership because there are so many problems with local buses that many people eventually give up on them. Instability caused by the way they are set up because people get tired of: *The bus stops every 2-3 blocks. *The traffic around here is ridiculous. *They are supposed to show up every 15 minutes but instead two show up after I stood out here for a bloody half hour. *It makes no sense to even bother waiting; I am better off starting to walk and then I will get on if I see it (and oftentimes the walk to the destination will be completed before any buses are even seen, though I concede that it does vary from bus route to bus route). *I can walk a block or two or maybe even three in the amount of time that it takes for the bus to even PICK UP the people because they have to pay as they get on and the bus is not so frequent that two or three buses will be there simultaneously to pick up the big crowd, a la B35 and B46. Just one bus all by itself and the next one is nowhere in sight.

 

Although the preferences for SBS and longer routes are personal. It varies from situation to situation. In the case of the B32 I proposed, I proposed a line running from the Junction to Fulton Street only, because I knew that it would go through areas that are dense enough that the line would not need to operate north of Fulton or south of Junction in order to be sustainable. Once again I would prefer that the route have off-board fare collection and not stop every 2-3 blocks, but this may not be possible for whatever reason. The whole reason why I have these preferences is that most of the people I know do not wish to deal with such systems and will avoid them if possible. Again, unless the service is like that on the B35 and perhaps the B46 and similar lines. The B35 happens to be a frequent line that does not deal with traffic up the ass, so it manages to be frequent and reliable, based on what I have heard. I know the B46 is a little funny, but it is still frequent.

 

B35, you probably remember when I proposed a B49 SBS that would go to Williamsburg via Ocean/Classon/Bedford/Driggs/Wythe/Franklin Aves and replace the eliminated portion of the B48. You said it was super route and you disagreed with it. Well the reason why I proposed it is that I wanted to combine Allan's idea for an Ocean Avenue line with a replacement for the eliminated portion of the B48. I also figured that if the line were SBS, it would be even more sustainable because instead of having this incredible line of people at the front door, you have three small crowds entering relatively quickly through each door, having already paid at the machines. Also the route would be pretty straight. Last thing I want is SBS with too many turns. Although my B49 SBS would be on two-way streets for a long time and would make several stops on these two-way streets (principally Ocean Av from Empire to Z, which is a very long stretch), and Ocean Ave is tight from Parkside to Ditmas or something like that. I am not sure what the traffic situation is like on Ocean (it does not seem like it would be a parking lot like Flatbush, but you know).

 

This is a long-winded explanation. Essentially it boils down to this: I do not know which is the chicken and which is the egg here. Did people develop an aversion to buses from the get-go because they grew tired of having to wait for everybody to pay and the fact that the slow boarding process adds so much time to the trip? Did they grow tired of the traffic and the unpredictability and unreliability that plagues a lot of bus routes? Was it the fault of transit agencies for not putting enough buses on the road or not filling in open runs (which usually doubles the wait time and really f*cks everything since you have no leader and now pick up almost twice as many people, and the additional delays could end up doubling the travel time and tripling or quadrupling the wait time)? And if you have a bus route operating every 15-20 minutes, of course a lot of people will not wait because they/we do not know how long they/we will really be waiting. Anything could happen: Too many people taking too long to pay, wheelchairs, walkers, some dundedun traffic incident that causes the bus to have to wait somewhere for God knows how long. Or inadequate service levels and inadequate travel time allowances that result in such erratic behavior.

 

By creating longer (note: not circuitous) routes, you create routes that have to have decent headways because they go too many places and pick up too many people for MTA to have them operating every 15-20 minutes middays and weekends and whatnot. Again it varies from situation to situation. In the case of the B48/B49, again, the reason why we lean towards sending the B49 up that way (SBS or not) is that the B49 already goes through dense, busy areas. The service levels on the line suck now, but perhaps we could kill two birds with one stone by sending it via Classon/Franklin: Give MTA an incentive to improve the headways because the line will be picking up more people, and restore bus service on Classon/Franklin Aves below Atlantic Ave. And, the new service there (B49) would have better headways than the one that used to be there (B48).

 

The B2 is in a similar situation. In order to keep it going and restore non-rush hour service it has to be extended somewhere. The Bx10 is another one, and that is a real SOB of a bus route. *Facepalm*

 

This is why I never support re-instituting the old B39 all by itself. I much prefer an extension of something to replace the B39, but again the Willy-B is F'd on the Manhattan bound side at all times, and sending the B44 or B46 over the bridge would really F either line. Sending the B24 over the bridge would F the B24 because its headways already suck.

 

Talkin' about them impossible situations.

 

This was a long-winded post, but I think you get the gist of what I am saying.

 

You go and tell people you propose a new bus route, half of them look at you like you have a third eye in the middle of your head because they have had so many bad experiences with buses that they think, "is this guy nuts, trying to invest in a bus route?"

 

To some degree I cannot blame them. If I live by Albany/Church Aves and I get MTA to create that B32, it does not do me much good if they take it upon themselves to send one bus every 15 minutes middays/weekends. They do that, of course I will just take the B35 to Nostrand for the to the shuttle to Fulton or to Rogers for the B44 SBS, if I can afford it (not transferring to something else if I do not have an unlimited). If it is a line that they operate every 8 minutes middays/weekends and 5 minutes rush hours, then there is something to talk about.

 

These things are frustrating.

[checkmatechamp13]

The thing is that there are routes that aren't frequent (to the point you described), but still get decent ridership. The B4 in Sheepshead Bay was like that before the cuts: It had infrequent service, and yet it was reasonably well-used (not like the B41/B44/B46 or anything, but it still got a respectable amount of ridership). The MTA cutting SHB service was really just an example of it doing what it wanted.

 

It's less likely that the MTA would cut a route like the B41/44/46, but that doesn't necessarily mean that long = high ridership and cost-efficiency. If there's not a huge travel market between the areas served by the B48 and B49 (by bus), then you'll just end up with a long, unreliable route, which will have its problems compounded since the headyways wouldn't be too great.

[BrooklynIRT]

It is difficult for me to conceive the idea that ridership on infrequent bus routes can be that sustainable. I am not saying I do not believe you, but I personally will never live in neighborhoods where I have to depend on infrequent bus routes.

 

I understand that the people that use the B4 write down its schedule or photograph it, but still it is one hell of a gamble dealing with such infrequent lines. One day there is an open run, the dispatcher tells everybody (bus operators) to move it up 5 minutes (leave the terminal 5 minutes early, sometimes more, and believe me, this is not uncommon). I expect the bus to show up at 7:15 and the next one is not due until 7:27, I get downstairs at 7:12 and I see the 7:15 bus (which, unbeknownst to me, became a 7:10 bus today due to the open run(s)) all the way down the road, now all of a sudden I gotta wait 15 minutes for the next one. If the next one does not deviate from its schedule.

 

It just seems crazy to me that so many people could continue to ride the thing when there are so many things that could go wrong.

[checkmatechamp13]

Part of it is because the MTA knows it has to keep a basic level of service in neighborhoods, so they'll only cut a route if ridership is absolutely terrible. The S74 may not get a whole lot of ridership on the South Shore, but cut it and you've just left entire neighborhoods without any transit service whatsoever.

 

In any case, it's one of the things that you put up for the benefits of living in Staten Island. You get more space, and the cost of housing is lower than the other boroughs.

 

But in any case, we do things like trying to memorize the schedule of the bus (and yes, there are problems occasionally. We do have runs that go MIA and sometimes buses manage to bunch up (in fact, I saw 2 S44s come within 5 minutes of each other along Port Richmond Avenue today, when service is supposed to be every 15 minutes, so one was probably late, and one was probably early). Some people try to walk a further distance so they have more options (I've seen times when a big crowd of people got on the S44 at Walker Street/Morningstar Road because the S46/96 weren't coming, and some of those people could've come from pretty far west in Mariners' Harbor). A lot of the ridership comes from the ferry, which buses are supposed to meet, so at least going outbound, the wait for the bus isn't too long (Going to the ferry is a different story because you often have buses pulling in a minute after the ferry doors close).

 

So basically, it comes down to tolerance and what options you have. There are a lot of people who don't consider 12-15 minute service to be infrequent, because they're used to it, and know what kinds of problems it could potentially bring, and plan accordingly. Unfortunately, this often entails leaving a lot of additional time for your trip, or being prepared to be late to school, work, etc. But keep in mind that many suburban areas (and no, VG8, SI isn't truly suburban) have even more infrequent service. 60 minute headways are common in a lot of areas, and yet people manage to plan around them (and I'm sure a few get decent ridership. I know 553 Bridgeton talks about how crowded his route can get, and it runs every 30 minutes)

 

Plus, you also have to consider what options you have. In Brooklyn, if you have a frequent route and an infrequent route people will gravitate towards the more frequent route, and ridership on the less frequent route could decrease to the point where it's in danger of elimination. The same thing if you have an infrequent route parallelling the subway. But in SI, aside from the SIR, we don't have subway service (and the SIR is infrequent too). So say you're in Mariners' Harbor. You're forced to choose between the S40 on 20 minute headways, or the S46 on 12 minute headways (used to be 15). Since you're pretty much a captive rider, you're guaranteed to pick one of the routes and contribute to the ridership.

 

But if you think about it, even in Brooklyn, you have routes that aren't too frequent and get decent ridership. The B4 was actually reasonably cost-efficient in Sheepshead Bay before the MTA eliminated off-peak service, and it still gets somewhat decent ridership. Maybe if it were in Midtown Manhattan it would've gotten eliminated because there would probably be a bunch of parallel routes you could send riders to (and ridership would've shifted towards those routes anyway), but since there's nothing too close to Bay Ridge Parkway, the MTA keeps it as is. It still gets decent ridership, but not great ridership.

[checkmatechamp13]

Now that I think about it, didn't you live in Riverdale at one point? If so, then you know how the Bx10 was pretty infrequent and yet it still got good ridership.

[BrooklynIRT]

Well this is true but I get the feeling that as time goes on people become less tolerant of these things. I know I have. In affluent areas the people just use car services if they miss a bus. Or they use the express bus (feh!). Yes the Bx10 gets good ridership but the ridership is not high enough to justify much better service levels. 12 minutes is not too bad, generally speaking. I consider that fairly tolerable.

 

I guess I am one of these people who got more annoyed by this junk than most people. But the main reason why is that I wish buses were more tolerable so that more people that have buses as the only form of mass transit in their respective areas would use them rather than cars. Then there would be more of a reason to operate the buses (ideally every bus route) no less frequently than 10 minutes apart during off-hours (except overnight hours). But it seems like something that will never happen and this annoys and disgruntles me.

 

All I ever hear is that people do not care about them and want to get the hell away from them. And again, I cannot blame them to some degree. And I think one of the things that really needs to be killed off forever is on-board fare collection, given all my (and others') wonderful experiences with that. Although I will say it is becoming less of an issue as more buses get shields. And it does not look like every bus route can have off-board fare collection for economical reasons. It is not the worst thing in the world IF it does not mean a bus route that operates every 10-15 minutes sits at a bus stop for at least 3 minutes picking up people, which the Bx10 does.

 

When I saw the Bx10 leaving I would usually walk all the way from Kappock/Independence to 231 St station rather than wait for the next one. 20 minute walk was quicker than waiting 15 (or even 10 during rush hours) minutes for the bus and then the 7-10 minute ride to Corlear or KIngsbridge Ave and then the walk to the station. Yes, this is usually faster than riding the thing to Broadway and is what most people who make this trip do, since 231 is always messed up around there with all the double parked vehicles, the single lane, and the long signal at Broadway.

[checkmatechamp13]

Well, from my experience, that's generally not the case that a bus will sit there for 2-3 minutes unless there's either a delay or it's a major stop (like say, Castleton Avenue/Port Richmond Avenue), and even then, a lot of that delay comes from the fact that the bus missed the light, which could've happened with a POP system. Personally, the thing that bothers me is when a bus just misses the light, which is why I feel TSP should be expanded. To me, if the bus is sitting at a stop, but you're hearing MetroCards beep and people walk on, at least you get the feeling that something's being accomplished, rather than sitting at the traffic light with the doors closed. It could just be my transit fan background, but that's just my opinion.

 

But at least as far as SI goes, the thing that bothers me is that the MTA doesn't feel limited-stop service should run outside of rush hours, and it should only run in the peak direction (the only 2 routes that have reverse-peak limited-stop service are the S89 and S93, and that's because they branch off from their local counterpart at some point). That's definitely one of the things that's holding people back from using transit in SI, and that's what's keeping service at their crappy levels.

 

If the MTA put off-peak/reverse-peak limited-stop service on the routes with higher ridership, by cutting it out of the existing local service, ridership would definitely increase. So for instance, the S46 and S48 run every 12 minutes during middays. If they reduced the local service so that it ran every 15 minutes, and then added limited-stop service every 30 minutes, the limited stops would see a boost in service from 5 buses per hour to 6. The fact that those stops have a limited (and I'd make it so the limiteds connect with the ferry, which also runs every 30 minutes) would likely encourage additional ridership, and maybe the headways on the limited could be reduced to 20 minutes or even 15 minutes, meaning that the limited stops would get good service (7-8 buses per hour instead of 5). So that's one way of improving service without spending extra money or having everybody get used to a new payment system (which might not necessarily save money because you'd have to install machines even at lightly-used stops)

 

Now, that might not work in Brooklyn. The thing is that on SI, the buses that meet the ferry are more crowded than the buses that don't so it's easier to see what time to schedule the limiteds at. But the MTA should definitely look into seeing ways that limited-stop service could be expanded. You have to admit that even if you prefer +SBS+ over limiteds, you still prefer limiteds over locals. Part of it is the fact that the MTA has those stupid guidelines that say the local and limited have to run at the exact same frequency, which shouldn't be the case.

[BrooklynIRT]

They have guidelines saying that the local and limited have to run at the same frequency? The Bx1, Bx2, B41, B44, and B46 do not have the same amount of limited-stop service as local service.

[Mysterious2train]

The Q21 LTD is every 15 minutes to the Q21 Local every half hour.

[checkmatechamp13]

I guess so. That was the only reason that made sense as to why they wouldn't want to implement the service, but if that's not the case, then I don't know what the reason is. Maybe they're just too lazy to investigate and see if things need to be changed.

[BrooklynIRT]

Also in the case of the Bx7 and Bx10 at Broadway (and Bx1 and Bx2 at Fordham, among others), the buses do actually sit there for that long doing nothing but picking up people. Those bus stops are on the far side and there are no traffic signals directly ahead, so the signals do not contribute to the 3 minutes they spend sitting there. Neither does the traffic.

 

Maybe they are using the guidelines you are referring to for certain situations only?

[checkmatechamp13]

Also in the case of the Bx7 and Bx10 at Broadway (and Bx1 and Bx2 at Fordham, among others), the buses do actually sit there for that long doing nothing but picking up people. Those bus stops are on the far side and there are no traffic signals directly ahead, so the signals do not contribute to the 3 minutes they spend sitting there. Neither does the traffic.

 

Maybe they are using the guidelines you are referring to for certain situations only?

 

 

Hmmm. I've got to get a stopwatch or something and time how long a bus spends picking up people at a major stop. I'm pretty sure it's not 2-3 minutes, but I could be wrong. In any case, it's usually just at a couple of stops, and it's made up by the fact that the streets are pretty wide and uncongested, so the B/O can speed along after it's done with the pick up.

 

And for the guidelines I have a feeling they just didn't want to. They didn't mention any specific reason, though. They just twisted up my proposal and said "That's why it won't work", but they didn't cite any specific guidelines or anything. I just figured that there might be the off-chance that there was some kind of guideline preventing them from doing it, but then again, why wouldn't they mention it to me?

[B35 via Church]

Some of us lean towards making some routes rather long because our observation is that MTA is less likely to mess with routes that pick up these massive loads of people. By mess with them I mean constantly but gradually reduce service to the point where there is none.

 

When attempting to restore bus service in areas where bus usage may not be very high, I have a tendency to want to take an existing route and extend it, because my feeling is that if you do that, MTA is less likely to attempt to reduce service than they are if you just make a separate bus route in the area where there is a service gap, especially if you know the route usage in that area may not be high enough to warrant good headways (good headways meaning the next bus shows up in 8 minutes or less middays/just after rush hour/weekends during the day and about 5 mins or less during rush hours). The B48's lousy headways are/were indicative of this.

 

I also tend to lean towards SBS because I feel that SBS ridership is more sustainable than local/limited bus ridership because there are so many problems with local buses that many people eventually give up on them. Instability caused by the way they are set up because people get tired of: *The bus stops every 2-3 blocks. *The traffic around here is ridiculous. *They are supposed to show up every 15 minutes but instead two show up after I stood out here for a bloody half hour. *It makes no sense to even bother waiting; I am better off starting to walk and then I will get on if I see it (and oftentimes the walk to the destination will be completed before any buses are even seen, though I concede that it does vary from bus route to bus route). *I can walk a block or two or maybe even three in the amount of time that it takes for the bus to even PICK UP the people because they have to pay as they get on and the bus is not so frequent that two or three buses will be there simultaneously to pick up the big crowd, a la B35 and B46. Just one bus all by itself and the next one is nowhere in sight.

 

Although the preferences for SBS and longer routes are personal. It varies from situation to situation. In the case of the B32 I proposed, I proposed a line running from the Junction to Fulton Street only, because I knew that it would go through areas that are dense enough that the line would not need to operate north of Fulton or south of Junction in order to be sustainable. Once again I would prefer that the route have off-board fare collection and not stop every 2-3 blocks, but this may not be possible for whatever reason. The whole reason why I have these preferences is that most of the people I know do not wish to deal with such systems and will avoid them if possible. Again, unless the service is like that on the B35 and perhaps the B46 and similar lines. The B35 happens to be a frequent line that does not deal with traffic up the ass, so it manages to be frequent and reliable, based on what I have heard. I know the B46 is a little funny, but it is still frequent.

 

B35, you probably remember when I proposed a B49 SBS that would go to Williamsburg via Ocean/Classon/Bedford/Driggs/Wythe/Franklin Aves and replace the eliminated portion of the B48. You said it was super route and you disagreed with it. Well the reason why I proposed it is that I wanted to combine Allan's idea for an Ocean Avenue line with a replacement for the eliminated portion of the B48. I also figured that if the line were SBS, it would be even more sustainable because instead of having this incredible line of people at the front door, you have three small crowds entering relatively quickly through each door, having already paid at the machines. Also the route would be pretty straight. Last thing I want is SBS with too many turns. Although my B49 SBS would be on two-way streets for a long time and would make several stops on these two-way streets (principally Ocean Av from Empire to Z, which is a very long stretch), and Ocean Ave is tight from Parkside to Ditmas or something like that. I am not sure what the traffic situation is like on Ocean (it does not seem like it would be a parking lot like Flatbush, but you know).

 

This is a long-winded explanation. Essentially it boils down to this: I do not know which is the chicken and which is the egg here. Did people develop an aversion to buses from the get-go because they grew tired of having to wait for everybody to pay and the fact that the slow boarding process adds so much time to the trip? Did they grow tired of the traffic and the unpredictability and unreliability that plagues a lot of bus routes? Was it the fault of transit agencies for not putting enough buses on the road or not filling in open runs (which usually doubles the wait time and really f*cks everything since you have no leader and now pick up almost twice as many people, and the additional delays could end up doubling the travel time and tripling or quadrupling the wait time)? And if you have a bus route operating every 15-20 minutes, of course a lot of people will not wait because they/we do not know how long they/we will really be waiting. Anything could happen: Too many people taking too long to pay, wheelchairs, walkers, some dundedun traffic incident that causes the bus to have to wait somewhere for God knows how long. Or inadequate service levels and inadequate travel time allowances that result in such erratic behavior.

 

By creating longer (note: not circuitous) routes, you create routes that have to have decent headways because they go too many places and pick up too many people for MTA to have them operating every 15-20 minutes middays and weekends and whatnot. Again it varies from situation to situation. In the case of the B48/B49, again, the reason why we lean towards sending the B49 up that way (SBS or not) is that the B49 already goes through dense, busy areas. The service levels on the line suck now, but perhaps we could kill two birds with one stone by sending it via Classon/Franklin: Give MTA an incentive to improve the headways because the line will be picking up more people, and restore bus service on Classon/Franklin Aves below Atlantic Ave. And, the new service there (B49) would have better headways than the one that used to be there (B48).

 

The B2 is in a similar situation. In order to keep it going and restore non-rush hour service it has to be extended somewhere. The Bx10 is another one, and that is a real SOB of a bus route. *Facepalm*

 

This is why I never support re-instituting the old B39 all by itself. I much prefer an extension of something to replace the B39, but again the Willy-B is F'd on the Manhattan bound side at all times, and sending the B44 or B46 over the bridge would really F either line. Sending the B24 over the bridge would F the B24 because its headways already suck.

 

Talkin' about them impossible situations.

 

This was a long-winded post, but I think you get the gist of what I am saying.

 

You go and tell people you propose a new bus route, half of them look at you like you have a third eye in the middle of your head because they have had so many bad experiences with buses that they think, "is this guy nuts, trying to invest in a bus route?"

 

To some degree I cannot blame them. If I live by Albany/Church Aves and I get MTA to create that B32, it does not do me much good if they take it upon themselves to send one bus every 15 minutes middays/weekends. They do that, of course I will just take the B35 to Nostrand for the to the shuttle to Fulton or to Rogers for the B44 SBS, if I can afford it (not transferring to something else if I do not have an unlimited). If it is a line that they operate every 8 minutes middays/weekends and 5 minutes rush hours, then there is something to talk about.

 

These things are frustrating.

 

p1 & p7- You & others that may think like that would be playing right into the MTA's hands.... To advocate for longer routes serving multiple neighborhoods in hopes that they'll yield massive loads - so that'd (maybe) thwart the MTA into not (or being less likely to) tinker w/ its physical routing and/or service levels..... I mean, that pretty much describes the purpose of a subway line.....

 

Then what happens when our bus system is comprised of a sea of superroutes - and the MTA still has to "address a budget".... Instead of "not so many will be affected" (or however the MTA likes to word any meager cut in service in their (PDF) reports), you will have a hell of a lot more people affected when they start screwing with service on some superroute.... This is one reason why we have to push for keeping the intermediate & smaller distanced routes we have now... Each route has a particular purpose, and unlike the MTA's thinking, it's not just a numbers game - There are real people with real needs riding these routes.....

 

Quite frankly, I'm appalled at the idea of forcing more people onto longer distanced routes.... and there is no guarantee that service levels will be like that of the B35 or B46 on such routes either.....

 

 

p2- Ok, but suppose extending some random route somewhere doesn't do patrons in a certain community any justice, then what's the point..... you'll simply have (what I like to call) a "go nowhere" route; a route that travels a greater distance that the majority of the route's riders don't, or wouldn't have a real use for....

 

Put it to you like this.... You'll have a couple bus routes that aren't bringing in millions of riders a year, but the routes are still necessary for coverage purposes (i.e. the B31, Bx18, etc).... Sometimes there's nothin you can really do with a route to have it bring in loads of riders a year..... To me, there's nothin wrong with routes that fit this category as being part of the network..... Sure, ideally, we'd all like our routes to run on 5 min. headways all day, regardless if it runs through some commercial, low or high density area..... But of course, ideal & being realistic are two different things.....

 

 

p3- I can agree to this point in general..... On top of the advantages they do have compared to local routes, the overpromotion of SBS is a factor as to why ridership is sustainable.... Well that, and quite honestly, the idea that "hey, I can board the back of the bus at my own free will"..... No one ever really talks about this, but the idea of boarding a bus anywhere that isn't at the front of the bus - is still viewed as having beat the system.....

 

It's funny to see people bombard the back of the bus like they got one over on the driver/MTA.... but when that eagle team shows up or w/e, these be people with receipts as well.... I look at people that do that like, nzzzzzz, you paid just like I did !!!!

 

On top of the whole Rogers/New York av discussion, one thing I don't like about SBS being brought to the B44 is that, it's gonna come with artics.... When I see artics being introduced to a route, the first thing that comes to mind is less physical buses on the route..... Not gonna advocate for increased headways on a high-ridershipped route like the 44 just for the sake of SBS.....

 

 

p5- yes, I remember that proposal of yours..... I still do not see the justification behind combining those two routes..... As much I (by the idea itself) don't particularly care about sending the 49 up ocean where it currently doesn't serve, and then across empire, at least that addresses a service gap.......

 

What exactly would combining the B48/49 solve bro, b/c I'm not seeing it?

I presume all that B48 riders would like to see happen with that route, is that it reverts to serving Prospect park subway.....

 

 

p6 (and your last 2 paragraphs)- I don't think it's people wanting to avert buses, as much as it is the MTA making taking the subway being more conducive (while making taking buses less conducive).....

 

On the grandest of scales, so it seems - More people on subways = less buses you have to put on the road..... I mean, by bringing up the negative aspects of surface transportation (in question form), only reinforces the (unfair) equation...... That would be like some agency's head honcho bringing up the homeless, the rats, the rancid stenches, the decrepit stations, the delays, etc. in our subways - and throwing their hands up at wanting to improve our subway system, and forcing riders onto local & express buses instead.....

 

There is no balance..... The promotion/favoritism/prevalence of the subway, compared to the bus is so one sided in this city, it's not even funny....

[BrooklynIRT]

You said that last thing with reference to this city. Why might it be different in other cities that are similar? Most bus routes in other cities are less frequent than those here. Although perhaps the bus networks are better in other cities? Still, it seems to me that buses are generally better in this city than they are in most other cities around the country. Especially since this city is denser than many/most others. The other difference between this city and a lot of other cities, within this country, is that the rail network seems less extensive in other cities.

 

Also the Bx12 and M15 LT were less frequent or as frequent as the Bx12 and M15 SBS, according to the most recent schedules I found (for the Bx12 and M15 LT) via the internet archive. They said they would operate the B44 SBS every 3 minutes during the rush and 7 off-peak. I am not going to hold them to this because we all know who we are dealing with; I expect them to operate the B44 SBS a little more frequently than they currently operate the B44 LT.

 

It is interesting that you said that not boarding at the front of the bus is viewed by some as beating the system. That is such a strange leap of logic on their part. o_O

 

I wanted to send the B49 to Williamsburg (and beyond the B44 terminal) to improve connectivity between the north and the south, and because Williamsburg is a very popular neighborhood. I originally thought of it because I wanted to have a north-south bus route that connects to the and goes to various places that may be places of interest but are not easy to reach by subway from points south of Fulton.

 

Not that I am gung-ho about sending the B49 via Classon/Franklin. Ocean, Empire, and Utica to perhaps Eastern Pkwy is good too. Hell, it might be a good idea to send it to Broadway Junction since it is currently not easy to get from Utica/Eastern to Broadway Junction using transit even though the only roads a vehicle has to use are Eastern Pkwy and Atlantic Ave or Fulton St. And both areas are major transit hubs.

[B35 via Church]

I don't know of any other cities (or the situations surrounding them) that push subway usage & deter bus usage as much as it's done here..... Not to say that there's none that do, I just don't know of em.... So I won't attempt to opinionate on the goings-on of other transit systems as far as that aspect of it.....

 

As far as other cities running less bus service than we do here, you basically answered your own question.... Not many other cities have to try to address 8 million people across 5 counties.... I forget who it was back on straphangers, but a concept was blurted out there that I never really forgot..... Sometimes I wonder how things would be, if each county (each borough) ran their own separate transit systems..... The only borough I think that would have as many total routes as they currently do, is the bronx....

 

 

But steering this back to the B44 SBS.... lets say they will run SBS B44's every 3 mins during the rush.... You already have the B41/41LTD's parading up flatbush av.... I would hate to be the poor soul driving around the vicinity of the junction w/ all those buses about the area.... The one thing I never quite understood regarding rogers av is that, the traffic situation is quite deceptive... what I mean by that is there are days when rogers av is dead as a doornail (regardless of time of day), and there are days that it gets heavy like I don't know what; the more north on rogers you go, the worse it gets..... Nostrand av, pfft, that's traffic bogged no matter what.... New York av can get pretty bad, but nothing like nostrand av, or (rogers av at its worst)...... Basically what I'm trying to draw a parallel to is, how much time will really be saved with an average commuter's time w/ the NB SBS' on Rogers...

[BrooklynIRT]

But Rogers and Nostrand are not parking lots like Flatbush is in several locations. Where on Rogers is the traffic the worst? Is it so bad that there will be a red signal and a traffic queue at a particular intersection, and then a vehicle arrives at the back of the traffic queue just as the signal is changing to green and misses the signal because the traffic is moving too slowly?

 

Nostrand does not get like that anywhere except around Atlantic Ave (when there is a huge truck parked in front of that supermarket at Herkimer St) and of course around Flatbush Ave. Those are the only places where the traffic is in parking lots.

 

Eastern Pkwy and Linden Blvd have long green signals, but the traffic on Nostrand and Rogers approaching those streets is not in parking lots. The traffic volumes are high, but not to the point where the vehicles are in parking lots.

 

1st Ave gets a lot more congested than Nostrand/Rogers/Bedford Aves yet the M15 SBS takes 40-43 minutes to make 14 stops over 6.1 miles on that street during rush hour. And of course 1st would get more congested than Rogers/Bedford/Nostrand, because 1st is connected to a high-volume bridge and a high-volume tunnel, among other reasons. I actually rode the M15 SBS once during the rush hour and it made the trip from 2nd St to 125 St in 39 minutes even with the heavy traffic.

 

Even if not everybody respects the bus lanes along the B44 SBS, it still should be able to get from one end to the other in less than 50 minutes at most. There is nothing that could possibly cause a full trip to take longer to complete. The average distance between stops is greater than that of any SBS route, there are practically no turns, and the streets are clearer than those on the other SBS routes. North of Junction the stops are on average almost 0.5 mile apart and for the whole route they are about 0.58 mile apart. I predict it will take no longer than 21 minutes to get from the Junction to the Fulton in both directions and no longer than 14 to get from Fulton to Church in both directions.

 

On New York Ave below Midwood St/East New York Ave, I cannot imagine that the signal sequencing could be as good as that on Nostrand/Rogers/Bedford Aves, because signals on one-way streets are much easier to sequence than those on two-way streets. Is this not one of the reasons for one-way streets?

 

And if the lanes are camera-enforced, then so much the better. The Junction is easily the place where the B44 hits the worst traffic; the best way to fix that would be to do this:

 

I have been noticing that the traffic on Nostrand around the Junction gets worse than I thought it could get sometimes. I also notice a decent number of vehicles going southbound on Nostrand that will actually go into the opposing lane to make a left turn onto Glenwood. You can get a handful of them doing it at once too, and the funny thing is that while they are doing this, I see [practically] no vehicles heading north on Nostrand from Flatbush. And we all know that northbound traffic on Nostrand approaching Flatbush is usually pretty light, while the southbound traffic approaching Flatbush is always heavy. More southbound vehicles want to make the turn onto Flatbush, rather than continue straight down Nostrand.

 

It seems to me that it could still take longer than 4-5 minutes to get from Newkirk to H at certain times, even though the B44 SBS is not stopping at Glenwood. To get an idea of how long it would take a B44 SBS bus to get from Glenwood to H, I recently took note of how much time it took a B44 LT to get from Glenwood to H when I was at the Junction on a Sunday afternoon. It took exactly 4 minutes for the bus to travel from Glenwood (the bus started moving as soon as the signal changed to green there) to H. It left 40 seconds after it arrived at H, as soon as it had a green signal again. A SBS bus probably would have picked up the people quickly enough to make it through before the signal became red, but it definitely would not be able to do anything about the traffic approaching the Junction. I figure it takes about 45 to 60 seconds to drive from Newkirk to Glenwood, and while I was standing at the Junction I noticed that damn near every vehicle on Nostrand (including every B44) had to stop twice between Glenwood and Flatbush. That means that in the worst case scenario, it would still take a B44 SBS about 5 minutes just to travel that little distance from Newkirk to H. That is rather pitiful.

 

In light of all this, I believe DOT should make Nostrand one way southbound between Farragut and Flatbush. This way there is dedicated space on Nostrand for vehicles that want Flatbush Ave southbound (or want to make a left on Glenwood) and dedicated space for vehicles that want Nostrand Ave southbound. The proposed curbside peak hour bus lane between Farragut and Flatbush can still be created.

 

I also believe that Nostrand Ave northbound between H and Flatbush should be permanently closed off to any vehicle that is not a MTA bus. Note that this would mean that they would not be able to put a curbside peak hour bus lane on Nostrand between I and H.

 

It would also mean that the dollar cabs that always line up on the northbound side of Nostrand would have to line up heading southbound rather than northbound if they were to remain on that side of the street. They would have to turn around via Nostrand, Flatbush, H, and East 31/32 or New York Ave to head back north to wherever they generally go. B44 locals would either operate via H and New York or Flatbush, Glenwood, and New York, rather than Farragut and New York. Probably the latter option.

 

Vehicles that want to travel from points along Nostrand south of H to points along Flatbush west of Nostrand should travel via H and Flatbush.

 

The alleviation of the traffic issues on Nostrand between Farragut and Flatbush would mean that they could keep the number of parking spaces on Nostrand the same. As I have stated before, the way to fix Flatbush is to simply ban parking and standing between H or I and Nostrand heading northbound and between Farragut and Nostrand heading southbound.

 

Thoughts?

 

 

Actually not only should they ban parking on Flatbush around the Junction; they should also ban it on Glenwood between Flatbush and Nostrand. Westbound. The eastbound curb is all bus stop space.

[B35 via Church]

They don't have to be "parking lots" like flatbush av... I mean, you are basically conveying to me that since (traffic on) Rogers & Nostrand aren't like Flatbush, then traffic on Rogers & Nostrand aren't bad (which is a dismissive tactic).... I can't agree with that....

 

Traffic is at its worst on Rogers during the morning rush (but like I made a mention of in the last post, it's not every morning rush; it's not a daily thing)... during the PM hrs, not nearly as bad.... When Rogers does get backed up, the point where it's at its worst, I'd say is b/w empire & over there where rogers meets bedford.....

 

I don't sit & analyze traffic signals, so your 2nd, 3rd, and second-to-last paragraph I'm not going to address....

 

Your 4th & 5th paragraphs are addressing the end-to-end (or, those otherwise riding longer distances) time savings of a B44 SBS.... that's not what I'm doubting or questioning, bro.... Not necessarily to you, but ultimately what I'm inquring is the difference in time to having (what will soon be) SBS 44's on Rogers, compared to LTD 44's on NY Av.....

[Future ENY OP]

They don't have to be "parking lots" like flatbush av... I mean, you are basically conveying to me that since (traffic on) Rogers & Nostrand aren't like Flatbush, then traffic on Rogers & Nostrand aren't bad (which is a dismissive tactic).... I can't agree with that....

 

Traffic is at its worst on Rogers during the morning rush (but like I made a mention of in the last post, it's not every morning rush; it's not a daily thing)... during the PM hrs, not nearly as bad.... When Rogers does get backed up, the point where it's at its worst, I'd say is b/w empire & over there where rogers meets bedford.....

 

I don't sit & analyze traffic signals, so your 2nd, 3rd, and second-to-last paragraph I'm not going to address....

 

Your 4th & 5th paragraphs are addressing the end-to-end (or, those otherwise riding longer distances) time savings of a B44 SBS.... that's not what I'm doubting or questioning, bro.... Not necessarily to you, but ultimately what I'm inquiring is the difference in time to having (what will soon be) SBS 44's on Rogers, compared to LTD 44's on NY Av.....

 

 

Just want to add, with the Rogers traffic in the AM rush hour.. b/w hours of 9AM and 12noon, there's a lot of commercial/delivery traffic for businesses on Rogers which could be as worse as Flatbush Ave Traffic, and that's between Beverley Road and Church Avenue.