It is springtime in New York and everywhere bulbs are blooming. Daffodils. Crocuses. Bus bulbs.
A bus stop called a bus bulb at Broadway and Spring Street is one of several being built for faster loading and unloading of passengers.
Bus bulbs?
In a program intended to help buses move more speedily down the traffic-and-construction-clogged streets of lower Broadway, the city is building a series of extensions to the sidewalk that should make it easier for buses to load and unload. In the taxonomy of traffic engineers, these extensions are known as bus bulbs.
Although the Broadway bulbs are rectangular, not bulbous, the term actually comes from the fact that in other parts of the world where bus bulbs have been used, like London, they tend to be rounded extensions near a corner.
The Broadway bulbs are concrete islands set just off the sidewalk. They are about 130 feet long and 9 feet wide.
The first bulb on Broadway was finished earlier this month at Spring Street. Another has been completed at Grand Street. And workers are building two more, at Walker and Franklin Streets.
The idea is that buses lose a lot of time pulling over to a curb and then pulling back into traffic. The bulbs essentially bring the curb to the bus, which does not have to pull over but instead stops in front of the bulbs to let passengers on and off and then continues on its way.
That is the theory at least.
Earlier this week, as this reporter waited at Broadway and Spring Street, a taxi pulled up to the bulb to discharge a fare, just ahead of an approaching M1 bus. The bus had to wait for the taxi to move on before it could pull up. Then, once passengers had boarded, the bus was blocked by a truck that was double-parked just beyond the end of the bus bulb, forcing the bus to pull into traffic to get around.
David Woloch, a deputy transportation commissioner for the city, said that by early July the city will mark the lane that runs beside the bus bulbs as a bus-only lane, from Houston Street to Ann and Vesey Streets. And, he said, the Police Department will enforce the bus-only restriction by ticketing cars that encroach on the lane.
Bus drivers were skeptical.
“I think it’s a waste,” the driver of the M1 bus that was blocked by the cab and the double-parked truck said of the bus bulbs. He would not give his name because he said he did not want to draw the attention of his superiors at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. “It’s not going to do anything. Get rid of the cars and that’ll do something.”
On another day this week, a driver on another M1 bus was also skeptical. He said that the police do not do enough to enforce bus lanes elsewhere in the city. “That’s never worked,” said the driver, who also asked that his name not be used. “It doesn’t work on Madison. It doesn’t work on Fifth Avenue because people park in the lane. Or cabs drop off in the lane.”
As the bus continued south on Broadway, the driver pointed to the lane next to the curb, which was marked on the pavement as a bus lane. Despite that, the lane was mostly full of parked cars, most of them with city-issued placards on the dash, showing they were used by law enforcement personnel.
More than one bus stop was blocked with parked cars as well, some with placards, others with drivers sitting at the wheel. While the cars with placards are allowed to use the bus lane under the current rules, parking in a bus stop is prohibited.
“This is always like this,” the bus driver said. “And you know what’s missing? There are no ticket agents down here.”
Paul J. Browne, a deputy police commissioner, said 1,862 tickets were issued last year to drivers for using a bus lane. In addition, 4,205 tickets were issued for parking in a bus lane and 2,669 tickets were issued for parking at a bus stop.
That works out to just under 24 tickets a day in the three categories of tickets combined. He said the tickets were primarily issued in Manhattan.
So far this year, he said, 3,537 tickets have been issued for bus lane or bus stop violations.
“It may be a perception among some drivers, but in fact there is enforcement,” Mr. Browne said of the bus drivers’ complaints. “It may not be at the level they want or in an ideal world the level we want, but the fact remains we do enforce it every day.”
The new bus lane is intended to be different, partly because it will occupy the lane of traffic one lane from the curb, so it is less likely to be blocked by parked cars.
The city will spend $355,000 to create the lane and the four bulbs, which include metal fencing designed to make them more visible.
The bulbs and bus lane on Broadway are intended to encourage bus use in a stretch of Lower Manhattan where a large amount of construction regularly tangles traffic. The city plans to enhance five other bus routes, one in each borough, with dedicated lanes and high-tech equipment to make them more efficient.
“I think it’s great that they narrowed the street for the bus stop,”
said Toni Oliveri, who was waiting one afternoon this week at Spring
Street for the X27 express bus to Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. She said that
people would no longer have to jump out from the curb, as they often did,
to get the attention of bus drivers.