NYC Transit

New York City buses serve more than two million trips on an average weekday -- more than twice the ridership as Los Angeles, which has the nation’s second-largest bus system.

On Sunday, Select Bus Service launched on a route that stretches from 125th Street in Harlem to LaGuardia Airport. Public officials marked the occasion -- the first SBS route to debut during the de Blasio era -- at a Harlem press conference today. With off-board fare collection and dedicated bus lanes (on part of the route), the upgrades will speed cross-town trips for 33,000 bus riders daily, on both the M60 SBS route and local routes that will benefit from the bus lanes only.

New York City Transit has updated its annual list of bus crashes, and 2009 data show E. 57th Street and Third Avenue, mapped above, to be the most dangerous intersection citywide, with 29 collisions. Sutphin Boulevard at Archer Avenue in Queens saw 20 crashes last year, while Brooklyn's Flatbush Avenue and Avenue U was the site of 19 bus-involved incidents. Manhattan's E. 59th at Third Avenue and Roosevelt Avenue and Main Street in Queens round out the top five, with 17 crashes each.

Following up on the recent series of Bus Rapid Transit workshops, DOT and New York City Transit have posted an online survey to collect more public input on existing and future Select Bus Service routes and amenities. It's a fairly detailed questionnaire with several opportunities to submit comments, so you may want to block out 10-15 minutes to make the most of it. It will be posted until September 4.

Tonight and Thursday, DOT and New York City Transit will conduct the last of their spring and summer Bus Rapid Transit Phase II workshops. The workshops are intended to allow DOT and NYCT to educate the public on Select Bus Service, and gather feedback on neighborhood transit needs, as the agencies plan future routes and service improvements.

Preparations for the next phase of Bus Rapid Transit in New York City ramp up tonight with the first of seven public workshops to gather ideas for future routes. Tonight's workshop gets underway at 6:30, at the College of New Rochelle (it's in the Bronx -- 332 East 149th Street, between Morris and Courtlandt Avenues).

In the second installment of our interview with ITDP director Walter Hook, we look at the package of bus improvements implemented last year along the Bx12 line, and how it stacks up against full-featured Bus Rapid Transit. Read the first part of the interview here. Parts three and four will examine how full BRT could operate in New York.

I've long bristled at the word "subsidies" that is applied so frequently to subways, buses and trains, and so infrequently to driving, even when the latter is "subsidized" much more lavishly than the former.

When NYC Transit President Howard Roberts announced Monday -- to some ridicule -- that certain subway lines are overcrowded with little to no relief in sight, it was reported that the system would not be able to handle the influx of commuters who are expected to switch to transit should congestion pricing be implemented.