MTA

Select Bus Service’s new low-floor buses will make it easier for seniors to get on and off the bus. Image: Second Avenue Sagas. Last night the MTA and DOT continued their tour of East Side community boards, presenting plans for better bus service and safer streets to the Manhattan CB 11 transportation committee. Attendance was low, … Continued

Last night NYCDOT and the MTA showed their plans for enhanced bus service and safer streets on the East Side of Manhattan to the Community Board 6 transportation committee. There was no vote, but the meeting was a chance to see how ideas like separated bike lanes and bus bulbs play in the type of public forum that, typically, is slow to embrace change.

A potential configuration for the Nostrand Avenue SBS Route. Image: NYCDOT. As Elana reported earlier today, the Obama Administration’s 2011 budget includes $28 million for the Nostrand Avenue Select Bus Service project. The announcement should help build momentum for a high-priority transit project set to launch in 2012. Nostrand Avenue SBS would ply the B44 … Continued

East Side electeds continue to express support for the MTA and NYCDOT's redesign of First and Second Avenues while pushing for a more complete corridor. In exchanges with Streetsblog this week, they called attention, in particular, to the absence of plans for separated bus lanes along the corridor.

Brooklyn's new Long Island Rail Road terminal opened earlier this month to generally positive reviews for its airy interior. Outside the station? That's an entirely different matter.

Governor Paterson released a draft budget proposal today in which the dedicated taxes and fees that fund the MTA take another big hit. In a statement, MTA Chair Jay Walder said the budget would deliver $104 million less than expected for the agency in 2010.

Elected officials gave plans for redesigning First and Second Avenues positive reviews today, tempered by the desire to improve the initial outline presented by the MTA and NYCDOT. They were faced with a complex project that defies easy categorizations. The proposal unveiled last night would constitute a historic re-purposing of New York City's streets -- but stop short of creating an urban corridor where pedestrians, cyclists, and transit take precedence over the automobile.

One configuration in the plan calls for a protected bike lane and a curbside bus lane. Image: MTA/NYCDOT The MTA and NYCDOT released an outline last night for faster bus service and safer biking and walking on First and Second Avenues. The redesign is the flagship project in New York City’s plans to enhance its … Continued

WNYC's Andrea Bernstein is reporting that plans for Bus Rapid Transit on First and Second Avenues include protected bike lanes but not physically separated bus lanes. Bernstein says the MTA would not allow the bus lanes to be separated from traffic: