NEW YORK—Select Bus Service finally made its way to Brooklyn.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg on Monday announced the launch of the B44 Select Bus Service route, the first of its kind in Brooklyn.
The B44 started running Sunday and is the city’s sixth Select Bus Service route. It runs along Nostrand, Rogers, and Bedford avenues, from Sheepshead Bay to Williamsburg.
The B44 route serves 40,000 daily passengers and is the city’s fifth busiest. The new service is expected to reduce travel times by 20 percent. Originally, the 9.3-mile trip from Sheepshead Bay to Williamsburg took an average of 1 hour and 11 minutes. The average trip should now take 57 minutes.
Select Bus Service routes save time by allowing passengers to pay before boarding. Passengers can then board the bus using any door. The B44 has 10 miles of dedicated bus lanes. Bus stops along the route have new panels, which display live bus arrival information and neighborhood maps.
The new service also saves time by making fewer stops. Some 20 stops were eliminated from the original B44 Limited route, which upset some Flatbush residents. Council member Jumaane Williams is calling to restore the Limited bus service on the B44 route.
The city began construction on the route in January. The project cost approximately $35 million and was funded by the Federal Transit Administration.
The project was put on high priority to ensure that as much as possible be completed before the mayor and the commissioner of the Department of Transportation stepped down at the end of December, according to a department official.
Select Bus Service was launched in June 2008 on the Bx12 route on Fordham Road in the Bronx. Since its launch, the service has received mixed reviews. Many riders had trouble with the fare collection machines and motorists are upset about bus lanes replacing old parking spots.
Bloomberg still defends the service, which was launched during his administration.
“These things, it turns out, actually do save time,” Bloomberg said. “Buses work better and traffic is better.”
Yi Yang is a special correspondent in New York.
