MTA's New, $2.2M Washer Is Too Small To Clean Its Buses: Report

WILLETS POINT, QUEENS — The MTA's new, $2.2 million bus-washing station at a Queens depot isn't large enough to get the job done, according to a New York Daily News report.

MTA workers told the Daily News that the cleaning stations, which were finished in July, don't have enough space for the three-foot power washers used to clean the buses and aren't wide enough for the panels covering the bus engines to open.

So workers at the Willets Point depot are now cleaning buses in the open area where the old cleaning station used to be, which puts their colleagues in the splash zone.

"MTA engineers designed this thing but didn't talk to the people who would use it," one worker told the news outlet.

A contractor will tweak the washing station to expand it by 18 inches, which MTA spokesperson Shams Tarek said would provide "plenty of room" for power washing, according to the Daily News.

The new washer was meant to accommodate the MTA's 60-foot-long buses, which were too long to fit in the old one, the Daily News reported.

Read the full story in the New York Daily News.