BY KEVIN DUGGAN
The Metropolitan Transportation
Authority plans to
cut service to three Brooklyn
bus routes starting this fall.
The scheme to take busses
off the road and lengthen
waits along a whopping 23 bus
lines citywide will allow the
MTA to shave $7 million off
its operating costs, according
to internal documents fi rst
reported on by the New York
Daily News .
Following the service cuts,
commuters relying on the B38
— which runs through Bushwick,
Bedford-Stuyvesant,
Clinton Hill, Fort Greene, and
Downtown — will wait up to
three minutes longer for busses
on weekdays during the
morning and evening rush, as
well as during most times Saturdays,
and from noon to evening
on Sundays.
The nearby B54, which
runs a similar route along
Myrtle Avenue, will have
less buses weekdays during
all hours except peak hours
in the evening, while the
B15, which goes from Bedford
Stuyvesant to John F.
Kennedy Airport, will suffer
longer waits at midday on
weekdays.
The Authority chose to
strip busses off the Bed-Stuy
lines due to relatively low
ridership fi gures, according
to agency documents, which
claimed that the affect on riders
would be minimal during
morning and evening rush
hours.
And transit honchos will
monitor those routes to ensure
riders aren’t completely
screwed, according to the
memo.
“We will closely monitor
the service to ensure that the
new schedules provide suffi -
cient service to meet customer
demand,” the MTA document
COURIER L 32 IFE, JULY 26-AUG. 1, 2019 PS
LESS BUT LONGER: The Metropolitan Transportation Authority will cut service of the B38 this fall but replace
its buses with longer coaches that will hold some 20 more people. Photo by Kevin Duggan
reads.
But one straphanger said
the route is already poorly
managed, and complained of
busses that arrive in groups
of two or three, only to be followed
by long waits afterwards.
“They have enough at rush
hour but they all pull out at
the same time — it makes no
sense,” said Dyckman Welcome,
who boarded his homeward
bound bus from America’s
Downtown Monday
evening. “More space will be
helpful but they need to be
more spaced out.”
To mitigate the affect of a
smaller service fl eet, the Transit
Authority is adding longer,
articulated buses — capable of
holding an additional 20 passengers
over standard busses
— to the B38 route, according
to agency spokeswoman
Amanda Kwan. The B54 and
B15 routes, however, will not
benefi t from the bigger busses,
documents show.
MTA to slash
bus service
Plan includes cuts to three routes
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