BusTalk Forum Index BusTalk
A Community Discussing Buses and Bus Operations Worldwide!
 
 BusTalk MainBusTalk Main FAQFAQ   SearchSearch   MemberlistMemberlist   UsergroupsUsergroups BusTalk GalleriesBusTalk Galleries   RegisterRegister 
 ProfileProfile   Log in to check your private messagesLog in to check your private messages   Log inLog in 

Duplicative bus and subway routes in NYC

 
Post new topic   Reply to topic    BusTalk Forum Index -> New York City Buses
View previous topic :: View next topic  
Author Message
N4 Jamaica




Joined: 16 Apr 2007
Posts: 858
Location: Long Island

PostPosted: Tue Jul 25, 2017 2:48 pm    Post subject: Duplicative bus and subway routes in NYC Reply with quote

Two or three times over the past half-century, the transit administration in time of financial straits has announced they would eliminate surface routes that duplicated subway routes. The gunshot on B25 Fulton Street yesterday reminded me that the B25 is a Brooklyn route I never rode. The trolley line ran under the elevated line. The buses run above the Independent Subway A and C trains. Bus service is frequent, often 7 trips hourly. Local C train service is 6 trips hourly. The A Express and C Local easily beat the buses, but bus ridership is heavy. I recall no attempt to eliminate the bus route.
---
One bus-subway duplication that was stupidly eliminated happened on McDonald Avenue. The B67 & B69 have a south terminal where the F train rises to the Culver el. The 69 was a PCC route that connected Park Row and Coney Island for two nickels, second fare collected at Bartel-Pritchard Circle.
---
The Grand Concourse supported a bus line before the Independent was built below it. Bus service is frequent and crowded, maybe due in part to the northern and southern tails of the route.
---
Both under Fulton Street and the Concourse, passengers may feel that the stairways and lonely passageways make the trip by low-floor bus preferable. Also, the TA has done the disservice of closing entrances, as at Howard Avenue, location of yesterday's gun drop and discharge. (The culprit was in a motorized wheelchair that could not travel any subway steps.)
---
In The Bronx, when the elevated structure was built above the Jerome Avenue streetcar, the Interborough, which had the streetcar franchise, gave it up south of Woodlawn Road. The IRT was not about to compete with itself.
---
Any other examples? Queens Blvd. Jamaica Ave.

Joe
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
traildriver




Joined: 26 Mar 2011
Posts: 2452
Location: South Florida

PostPosted: Tue Jul 25, 2017 8:33 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Most subway routes seem to have a bus route or routes duplicating all or parts of it, although not a one on one for the entirety...

For example...Queens Boulevard is pretty much covered end to end by the Q-60, but the subway coverage is the F and E from Hillside, and then the R and M from 71st Avenue to Grand Avenue, and then the subway follows Broadway to either Northern Blvd., or Steinway Street, and then Northern Blvd, and disperses over several routes thru Long Island City....The 7 lines comes off Roosevelt Avenue onto Queens Blvd at Sunnyside into Long Island City.

There are lots of other examples...

I would agree that many senior's prefer the slower bus, for the reasons you mentioned...
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
N4 Jamaica




Joined: 16 Apr 2007
Posts: 858
Location: Long Island

PostPosted: Wed Jul 26, 2017 9:16 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Thanks for giving the example of the Q60, which also offers service neither the IND nor IRT provides. For two miles, from 52nd Street to Grand Avenue, the Q60 offers residents of Winfield a way to get east or west.
---
In fact, the trolleys of the Manhattan & Queens Traction route from Manhattan to Jamaica along Queens Blvd (bustituted in 1937) preceded the construction of the Roosevelt Avenue el by a few years and the Independent by about twenty. I guess that when the parish of St. Mary's, Winfield, was established in 1854, it was the railroad that connected Winfield to the ferry at Long Island City. Then the Queensborough Bridge was built and from that originated our present Q60!
---
I gripe that timers have slowed the "rapid transit" service under Queens Boulevard and traffic signals have slowed bus service.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
traildriver




Joined: 26 Mar 2011
Posts: 2452
Location: South Florida

PostPosted: Thu Jul 27, 2017 12:57 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I don't understand much about the timer signals, but the expresses still seem to go flat out at certain segments, and directions....the northbounds seem to fly past Woodhaven Blvd., and the southbounds between 65th and 36th streets on the bypass route...

Besides a lot more traffic signals slowing down buses, are a whole lot more people and traffic then there was in the '30's.... Smile
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Dan




Joined: 16 Apr 2007
Posts: 35
Location: Staten Island, NY

PostPosted: Fri Aug 04, 2017 12:28 pm    Post subject: Re: Duplicative bus and subway routes in NYC Reply with quote

N4 Jamaica wrote:
Two or three times over the past half-century, the transit administration in time of financial straits has announced they would eliminate surface routes that duplicated subway routes. The gunshot on B25 Fulton Street yesterday reminded me that the B25 is a Brooklyn route I never rode. The trolley line ran under the elevated line. The buses run above the Independent Subway A and C trains. Bus service is frequent, often 7 trips hourly. Local C train service is 6 trips hourly. The A Express and C Local easily beat the buses, but bus ridership is heavy. I recall no attempt to eliminate the bus route.
---
One bus-subway duplication that was stupidly eliminated happened on McDonald Avenue. The B67 & B69 have a south terminal where the F train rises to the Culver el. The 69 was a PCC route that connected Park Row and Coney Island for two nickels, second fare collected at Bartel-Pritchard Circle.
---
The Grand Concourse supported a bus line before the Independent was built below it. Bus service is frequent and crowded, maybe due in part to the northern and southern tails of the route.
---
Both under Fulton Street and the Concourse, passengers may feel that the stairways and lonely passageways make the trip by low-floor bus preferable. Also, the TA has done the disservice of closing entrances, as at Howard Avenue, location of yesterday's gun drop and discharge. (The culprit was in a motorized wheelchair that could not travel any subway steps.)
---
In The Bronx, when the elevated structure was built above the Jerome Avenue streetcar, the Interborough, which had the streetcar franchise, gave it up south of Woodlawn Road. The IRT was not about to compete with itself.
---
Any other examples? Queens Blvd. Jamaica Ave.

Joe


I don't know why buses never replaced the trolleys on McDonald Avenue south of Cortelyou Road. Maybe the trolley ridership south of Cortelyou was lacking so the TA saw no reason to run a bus there. The Cortelyou Road terminal itself never made any sense. If the idea was to provide a connection to the Culver IND then Ditmas Avenue should have been the terminal because that's where the token clerk was 24/7. In fact 18th Avenue terminal would have made even more sense because there you can transfer to the B8.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Display posts from previous:   
Post new topic   Reply to topic    BusTalk Forum Index -> New York City Buses All times are GMT - 5 Hours
Page 1 of 1

 
Jump to:  
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum
You can attach files in this forum
You can download files in this forum


Powered by phpBB © 2001, 2005 phpBB Group