Thursday, December 20, 2007

Potential New Bus Service Improvements for South Brooklyn

The MTA has announced that they kinda sorta maybe, when the moon is right and a virgin is sacrificed, MIGHT make some transit improvements to go along with the higher fares. Including this:
The changes would also create a new bus line, the M13, from the Lower East Side to East Midtown, and would extend the B71 and B77 buses from Brooklyn via the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel into Manhattan, where they would go to South Ferry.
These would be positive changes.

Michael Cairl of the Park Slope Civic Council and the Gowanus Community Stakeholders Group agrees this is a highly positive proposal, and calls on the MTA to follow through with more improvements such as
splitting the B61. I would have the "61 North" and "61 South" overlap between Jay Street and LICH, to allow people who live near the Navy Yard and work at LICH a one-seat ride. It would also afford better service along Atlantic Avenue to the waterfront. . . . . The problem with the B61 is . . . delays from street traffic and overcrowding from serving too many congestion points. . . . NYCT has addressed a similar problem by splitting the M10 into the M10 and M20; the B61 is a prime candidate for splitting. Anyone who doesn't think so should ride from LICH to the Navy Yard, and also wait for a bus at Jay Street in rush hour, to see for themselves.
One of these days I'm going to do just that. Since I ride the subway every day, I'm highly attuned to issues with the subways but not very close to the bus system. But I've been hearing a lot from our good friends in the Hook that bus service needs improvement.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

B61 bus service is horrible and is only getting worse! Something really needs to be done. I live in Red Hook and have to endure this anytime I want to go somewhere (or come back home). I waited 40 minutes for a bus on Thursday at 8:20am. Imagine having to call in late to work because bus service is so bad. Sometimes I feel as if the MTA is purposely making transportation to my neighborhood as crappy as possible.