Queens Bus Routes Get First Major Redesign In A Century

QUEENS, NEW YORK — A new MTA plan will dramatically change Queens' sprawling bus network for the first time in a century.

The MTA on Monday released a draft of its plan to redesign the network of 107 bus lines that move more than 714,000 weekday riders throughout Queens.

“We are very excited about this draft plan for Queens buses because it is a true reimagination of the routes,” said MTA NYC Transit President Andy Byford.

The plan, which calls for cutting under-used bus stops and combining redundant routes, draws recommendations from an Existing Conditions report and Queens commuters' feedback.

View the proposed Queens Bus Network here.

But several Queens commuters took to Twitter Tuesday to express their dismay.

Twitter user Kim objected to shortening the QT66 route so that it no longer extended into Astoria.

"These changes are HORRIBLE for residents," tweeted Kim. "Please help stop this."

Joby Jacob noted a new QT12 "Boro Transit" service — slated to head down the Horace Harding Expressway — would take more than an hour to get from Bayside to Elmhurst, a journey of less than 20 minutes by car.

"That’s insane!" Jacob wrote. "There needs to be a bus lane here."

The MTA is still taking feedback and hopes commuters will post comments to the MTA's feedback page, interactive map or attending a series of public forums slated to take place in Queens in 2020.

The agency announced the redesign in April and hoped to have finished this first draft in November for a final plan in April 2020.

New York City's buses have suffered from declining ridership and fare-beating, with one in five bus riders skipping the fare, according to New York City Transit President Andy Byford.

But the struggling bus system is a particularly urgent issue in Queens, where many live out of the subway system's reach.

The borough's buses crawl at an average speed of 8.9 miles per hour, and ridership dropped 2.5% from 2016 to 2017, the MTA says. Many Queens buses follow old trolley routes, according to the MTA, so they no longer make sense for modern-day travel needs.

The bus redesign project is part of the MTA's Fast Forward plan, a sweeping initiative launched in May 2018 to overhaul the city's subway and bus systems.