With the Red Bus crisis hitting a low ebb in August, many worried about its impact as summer ends. Vacations are over, and schools are back. Things, though, Red Bus-wise are looking up.
by David Stone
The Roosevelt Island Daily News
The Red Bus Crisis
“What’s going on with buses?” a friend asked when I ran into him outside during an opening at Gallery RIVAA on Saturday.
For the first time, I felt confident offering a positive summary. RIOC has done all the right things over the last few weeks. Among those things was turning to Senator Liz Krueger through her chief of staff, Roosevelt Islander Audrey Tannen. Krueger dialed up the MTA, and within days a vastly larger, more experienced operation lent a critically important hand.
The net result is clear. When Roosevelt Islanders return to work and school after Labor Day, they’ll find Red Buses returned to 15-minute schedules. There are more changes ahead. RIOC will not return the Octagon Express of Shoppers bus yet, but both are close.
Credit goes to tireless work by Acting COO Mary Cunneen and RIOC’s Swiss Army Knife, Bryant Daniels. I asked Cunneen for her thoughts. Here is what she generously shared.
Mary Cunneen’s Message
“Let me start by saying we’re still not where we need to be, but things are moving in a better direction. The past few weeks have been difficult for everyone, and the challenge isn’t just to restore service, but to try and put us on solid enough footing to where a service interruption like this doesn’t happen again.”
“I can honestly say the RIOC team has been working extremely hard on this, across many different departments. Everyone is part of Transportation right now, and we’re all working together to get our fleet back in shape. It’s no secret that we just don’t have enough buses in our possession, which is why we ordered new ones earlier in the year. But we need to already be thinking about the next order given our current situation, in addition to how do we keep the ones we do have well maintained.
“One of the good things to come out of this experience has been the coordination between RIOC and the MTA, particularly New York City Transit, which has been immensely beneficial to us in so many different ways. I really can’t say enough about the help they’ve provided, from working to expedite some of our repair work to coming onsite to the island to review our operations and lend their expertise.
“As a huge transportation entity, they can make things happen that a smaller operation like ours just can’t. I’m hoping we can continue to keep this interagency cooperation going in some form moving forward.
“One of the things we’ve been focusing on internally for several weeks now is the start of the schoolyear on September 5th. We know that’s a critically important date. Right now, the plan is to restore 2 Red Buses for rush hour service starting Monday the 2nd and try to add more buses by the time we reach Thursday.
“One of the buses we’re hoping to put into service that day is the new Bird Bus we recently purchased, which is a smaller vehicle than a standard 40-foot Red Bus, but it has wheelchair accessibility and should be helpful in keeping people moving between Red Buses leaving the Octagon.
“Our situation still remains fluid, but I feel better today about where we are heading than I did several weeks ago, and as our service continues to adjust, we’ll make sure to keep the community aware of what changes are coming.
“Finally, I just want to say thank you to everyone in RIOC for their hard work. We have quite a few departments right now that are understaffed, including Transportation, but Eddie and his team have been working non-stop, while many others have helped fill the gaps to keep things going.
“And thanks as well to the community, whose patience we’ve tested in recent weeks with this bus issue. We know it’s been difficult, and we really appreciate your understanding.”
We will keep you posted on the Red Bus crisis was we learn more.
A Different Kind of Bet
For years, Roosevelt Island did not behave like a system constrained by limits. Internally, the budget was often treated less as a boundary and more as a reservoir to be used.
