Graphed: How East Side Select Bus Service Cut Trip Times and Gained Riders

More passengers are taking the M15 along First and Second Avenues, where Select Bus Service launched last year, while overall ridership in Manhattan is down. Image: NYCDOT/MTA

Yesterday, we reported on the impressive gains in speed and ridership along the First and Second Avenue Select Bus Service route. Since then, NYC DOT and the MTA released their official progress report on the project. It’s full of graphics that show the boost for bus riders even more clearly.

Along the full M15 route, Select Bus Service shaves nearly seven minutes off the time spent at bus stops and five minutes off the time stuck in traffic. Image: NYCDOT/MTA

Select Bus Service cut the length of a full trip down the M15 route by 12 minutes. Seven of those minutes were saved at bus stops thanks to faster, all-door boarding, while five were thanks to dedicated, camera-enforced lanes keeping buses clear of traffic.

Those improvements have attracted about 10,000 more daily riders to the SBS than the old M15 limited, while ridership on the M15 local is down about 5,000. All told, it comes out to a nine percent increase in ridership on the corridor, suggesting the SBS buses are picking up some former M15 local riders as well as thousands of New Yorkers who didn’t care to wait for the old limited.

Ridership is actually down slightly on the local, with Select Bus Service is far more popular than the limited was. Image: NYCDOT/MTA

ALSO ON STREETSBLOG

There are three queue jumps on the M86 route, including this one at Fifth Avenue and 84th Street. Photo: DOT

The M86 Moves Faster and More People Are Riding Thanks to Queue Jumps

By David Meyer |
While bus ridership is down citywide -- and especially in Manhattan -- there are some routes that are bucking the trend. One that's gaining riders is the M86, which got a package of upgrades from DOT and the MTA in 2015. The improvements included off-board fare collection and queue jumps -- short bus lane segments that enable buses to cut ahead of other traffic at signals.

B44 Moving 15-30 Percent Faster After Select Bus Service Upgrades

By David Meyer |
As bus speeds decline in NYC, the few routes that are getting dedicated bus lanes and off-board fare collection are bucking the trend. The newest evidence comes from the B44 route along Nostrand Avenue and Rogers Avenue in Brooklyn, where buses are moving 15-30 percent faster since NYC DOT and the MTA upgraded the line to Select […]

MTA: Don’t Ask Us to Do More for NYC Bus Riders

By David Meyer |
Bus ridership in New York City has steadily declined since 2002, and bus riders put up with the slowest average speeds in the nation. But the MTA is in no hurry to fix the problem. At a City Council hearing this morning, MTA representatives touted the agency’s piecemeal efforts to improve bus service while pushing back […]