BusTalk

[Mr. Linsky]

'A Love for Public Transit of the Aboveground Variety'



By CHRIS PALMER - New York Times 10-01-12

There are some New Yorkers for whom the word ?bus? can conjure unpleasant memories of long delays. Or perhaps an unpleasant sojourn in the bowels of the Port Authority Bus Terminal. Or maybe in a less ominous connotation, simply a poor alternative to the subway.

However, in Brooklyn this weekend the New York Transit Museum displayed vehicles both from bygone periods and more contemporary times that seemed to be crowd pleasing.

The festival, now in its nineteenth year, also displayed four trucks and heaps of bus paraphernalia, including models, bus maps and books about buses.

A bus fan from Manhattan said that passengers were more friendly on buses than they were on the subway.

Those New Yorkers were in short supply in Downtown Brooklyn on Sunday, where a block of Boerum Place was dedicated to showcasing the bus, a seemingly unglamorous mode of transportation.

Eleven buses, and those who loved them, were stationed between State Street and Atlantic Avenue to celebrate the annual event.

There were older buses (like the Yellow Coach Company ?Z Model,? a mustard-and-green double-decker that traveled along Fifth Avenue from 1931 until 1947) as well as more contemporary examples (the Nova Bus LFS model, introduced in 2010 and currently in use along the Bx12 and M15 Select routes in the Bronx and Manhattan).

There were four trucks on display, including a current bus tow truck, and heaps of bus paraphernalia, including model buses, bus maps and books about buses.

?I have been and always will be a bus person,? said Bob Neuwirth, 72, a lifelong resident of the Upper West Side who, to his displeasure, had to ride the subway to get to the festival. Mr. Neuwirth took delight in educating a reporter on the minutiae of New York City bus models from a bygone era, and enthusiastically recounted riding in an open double-decker bus up the West Side of Manhattan as a child, before transferring to the Ogden Avenue trolley to visit his grandmother in the Bronx.

He said that people on buses were ?a lot friendlier? than on other modes of transportation, and added that he liked to look out the windows as the vehicle wove through the neighborhoods.

?I like to look at my surroundings,? Mr. Neuwirth said.

Another loyalist was Tina Portelli, 63, from Cobble Hill, Brooklyn, who pointed to a vintage green bus behind her and declared, ?See those buses? I used to ride those!?

Ms. Portelli, who has written nostalgic essays about the Brooklyn of her childhood for a Web site, Mr. Beller?s Neighborhood, said she would ride buses from Cobble Hill to Fulton Street with her mother to go shopping as a child, and that the buses ?just remind me of being a kid.?

The memories that people associate with buses are what can make the seemingly mundane mode of transportation special to people, said Larry Rivers, 54, a bus driver who has driven various routes in Brooklyn since 1981.

?Each bus you see here has its own era and history,? he said, leaning against the windshield of a green General Motors bus from the 1960s. ?You get people who can relate any bus to a part of your life.?

Steven Korowitz, 46, of Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn, visited primarily because his 2-year-old son, David, loved buses, and when asked if they preferred the bus or subway, he hesitated. ?We both are subway people,? he said, saying it was generally faster. ?We?re subway people, but barely.?

Note; more great photos of the festival can be seen by Bill D. today in the Photographs, Bus Logs and Route Suggestion Ideas thread.

Mr. Linsky - Green Bus Lines, Inc., Jamaica, New York


Photo for the NY Times by Yana Paskova