Transit

The threat of service reductions and fare increases always loomed large over the transfer of Long Island Bus service to a private operator. After Nassau County refused to assume its share of costs for the service, international private transit provider Veolia Transport was brought on to take over from the New York MTA at the beginning of the year.

Staten Island's North Shore is one of the city's great sites of opportunity. The neighborhoods along the Kill Van Kull are twice as dense as the rest of Staten Island, but lack any transit option beyond the bus. There are historic town centers at St. George and Port Richmond, but car-centric planning deadens street life. The waterfront, much of which still hosts a vibrant maritime industry, is only accessible to the public at three locations in six miles.

The New York City Council doesn't like the MTA's budget. And really, who would? Fares and tolls are scheduled to rise in 2013 and again in 2015, bus lines cut in 2010 aren't scheduled to ever come back, and the MTA is assuming net zero increases for transit worker compensation. It's a product of worldwide financial crisis and Albany fiscal skullduggery, and it isn't pretty.

Looks like the Cuomo administration is starting to feel the heat for taking transit out of plans for the new Tappan Zee Bridge. A press release yesterday from the Thruway Authority shows the agency looking a bit defensive about its transit-free bridge, which has been criticized by an ever-growing number of Hudson Valley residents, municipalities and elected officials.

Last night, hundreds of Rockland County residents gathered at the Palisades Mall to tell the Cuomo administration that a transit-free replacement Tappan Zee Bridge isn't acceptable. In Westchester, too, support for transit across the bridge is running high. Three more local governments have passed unanimous resolutions supporting Tappan Zee transit: the city of Yonkers, the town of Greenburgh and the village of Dobbs Ferry.

Support for transit ran high at the first of two public hearings on the Tappan Zee draft environmental impact statement at the Palisades Mall in Rockland last night.

Governor Andrew Cuomo may have axed plans ten years in the making to build transit across the Tappan Zee Bridge, but hey, at least he promised to consider turning the old structure into a park, right?

As advocates for transit on the Tappan Zee Bridge take to the airwaves, the media are starting to ask questions about the Cuomo administration's ever-shifting and unexplained cost estimates for the project.

In a speech this morning at NYU's Rudin Center for Transportation, City Council Transportation Committee Chair James Vacca laid out his agenda for the coming year. His remarks focused on efforts to support Select Bus Service outside the Manhattan core and to improve pedestrian safety. Also on Vacca's list were curbing placard abuse and enforcing existing regulations on commercial cyclists.