New Jersey Buses to Boost NYC Express Bus Service for Congestion Pricing, Even as State Sues (2024)

While Garden State politicos try to put the brakes on congestion pricing, the MTA is buying buses from New Jersey Transit in advance of the vehicle-tolling program’s June 30 start date, THE CITY has learned.

An MTA spokesperson confirmed that the agency paid $100,000 to NJTransit for 15 used coaches whose parts will now be used to help maintain the 1,030 express buses that connect borough neighborhoods not near the subway system with Manhattan.

The transaction took place as the MTA gets set to increase service next month on six express bus routes that run between Staten Island and Manhattan and Brooklyn and Manhattan — and after critics last year called on the MTA to boost express bus options ahead of the congestion pricing launch as a way to lure motorists out of their vehicles and onto mass transit.

“Isn’t that a great irony?” John Samuelsen, international president of the Transport Workers Union and an MTA board member, told THE CITY. “New Jersey is suing over congestion pricing and now, here they are giving buses to the MTA and to New York.”

Samuelsen has been among the most vocal proponents for expanding express bus service prior to the start of the long-delayed Central Business District Tolling Program. State lawmakers initially approved the tolling plan in 2019 as a way to reduce congestion and raise billions of dollars for the upkeep and expansion of the transit system.

Advocates are hoping that expanding the $7-per-trip bus service to and from neighborhoods far from Manhattan’s core will entice motorists to not drive into the city’s most congested parts.

“It’s exactly what I was calling for five years ago,” Samuelsen said. “It is a time to try to get this to be a paradigm shift in how commuters think about getting into the city from the outer boroughs.” Still, he sees more work to be done in a system with some 80 express bus routes in all.

MTA officials last month announced that the tolling program will begin June 30, when most passenger vehicles with a valid E-ZPass will be tolled $15 once a day to go south of 60th Street in Manhattan from 5 a.m. to 9 p.m. on weekdays and 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. on weekends. Rates will drop to $3.75 during overnight hours.

Trucks and some buses, depending on size, will be charged $24 or $36 during the day and $6 or $9 after 9 p.m. Taxi fares would go up by $1.25, too, for any ride that starts, ends or travels within the zone, with fares for app-based for-hire vehicles rising by $2.50.

But the congestion pricing plan is facing continued legal opposition from motorists and elected officials — including New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy — with multiple lawsuits filed in federal courts on both sides of the Hudson River that aim to halt the first-in-the-nation tolling system.

The MTA announced in April that trips will be added to express bus routes that have the highest ridership during any single hour of an average weekday. The $880,000 needed to add service comes from the Outer Borough Transportation Account, which state legislators created in 2018 to spend $50 million annually to improve transportation outside of Manhattan.

But Streetsblog reported that more than $40 million in the transit improvement fund has barely been touched.

“As we prepare for the commencement of congestion pricing, the new service will give commuters on higher ridership express bus corridors in Brooklyn and Staten Island additional trips to get to and from Manhattan,” Richard Davey, president of New York City Transit, which runs the subways, buses and paratransit vehicles, told members of the MTA board’s transit committee last month. ”We hope to see a rise in ridership.”

While MTA officials have repeatedly said that all bus routes entering the so-called congestion relief zone have ample capacity to accommodate an expected influx of new riders once the new tolls kick in, increased frequency is seen as a way to draw more passengers to mass transit.

The six express bus routes receiving additional service are:

• BM2 (Canarsie/Spring Creek – Downtown/Midtown)
• BM5 (Spring Creek – Midtown)
• SIM1C (Eltingville – Midtown)
• SIM4C (Huguenot – Midtown)
• SIM23 (Annadale – Midtown)
• SIM24 (Prince’s Bay – Midtown)

Multiple sources told THE CITY that the parts from the newly acquired NJTransit buses can play a vital role in propping up the MTA’s existing express fleet.

“They wouldn’t be bringing coach buses in if they didn’t need them,” Samuelsen said.

It’s not the first time the MTA has looked elsewhere for equipment that transports its riders. Michael Cortez, an MTA spokesperson, noted that the MTA purchased Orion V buses from Westchester County in 2009, while in 2017, the Long Island Rail Road leased train cars from the Maryland Area Rail Commuter system to meet demand for increased summer ridership.

A representative from an express bus riders’ organization said commuters need reliable service most.

“It says a lot about the lack of maintenance,” said Vittorio Bugatti of the Express Bus Advocacy Group.

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