Public Transit

Happy Monday. Plans for Veterans Day Weekend. Election Day Next Week. Got Sick Last Week. Bright and Sunny Morning.

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Good Morning! Happy Monday. So we go around in the grand circle of things. Next weekend, I will be downstate for work, but the following I am planning to take a trip to somewhere. Moose Plains, or maybe Central NY with a one day jaunt down to Pennsylvania for a visit some of the parks in Endless Mountain Country. A lot depends on weather, and whether or not they already have snow at Moose Plains.

Election Day Next Week. I will probably drive or take a bus up to the Board of Elections and vote by absentee ballot, and get it done. Your supposed to be out of the county during election day if you vote by absentee ballot, but if I happen to be in the county, I can either go and vote on lever machine or risk my ballot getting tossed out if I get hauled into court to testify about my whereabouts. The absentee rules in NY State are kind of dumb – they should allow everybody to participate in early voting if they so choose, by absentee ballot.

Got Really Sick Last Week. It just was a really bad cold. But tell that to somebody who is feels as sick  as dog. I slept most of Thursday and Friday, with a sore throat, aches, and dizziness. But so be it. Finally on Saturday, had enough energy to spend some of the day awake, working on some code, and then going down to the library to upload photos, and then finally, for my evening walk. At least it was just a cold, so once the virus let up, I didn’t have to go to doctor or spend money besides getting some soup and buying more nyquil, which will probably last most of the winter.

Through the Gulf

But A Nice Bright and Sunny Morning Today. It’s a Monday, and good to stay positive. To make sure I wouldn’t get hungry until mid-afternoon, I made a good breakfast up of hash browns from Empire Plaza farmers market potatoes, sweet peppers, and mushrooms, some crappy pre-cooked sausage, scrambled up a couple of eggs, and some cheese. Not to bad. Made the regular bus I normally catch with relative ease, and today the bus is a brand new Gillig Hybrid, a 4112H. Life is good.

Google Maps Added to the Blog. I have for some time been sharing Google Maps on the blog, but I never had a Google Maps of the Day feature. I built in hooks for the Google Maps of Day and full KML integration into the blog. There is still some minor bugs in the code, but I hope to post some many new and interesting maps over the cmoing months.

People Rely on the Suburban Evening Bus Service

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I missed the Capital District Transportation Authority bus this morning. Drove down to Four Corners in Delmar, New York, left my truck there, and caught the bus. As I took the express bus home, I didn’t have my truck. Caught the 9:30 bus downtown to fetch my truck.

Ran into a older lady — probably a housekeeper or babysitter — or had some kind of evening job in suburbs. She didn’t own a car, but she rides the bus, with the later evening service back home. She talked about how difficult it is to get around on the buses, especially in evening — and how important the Route 18 evening bus, all the way to Cherry Avenue is to her. There actually where several people on the bus when I got on it, most appearing to be of working folks.

I found it interesting, as there was no late bus service after 6 PM to Cherry Avenue before November 2011, and it only ran hourly to Four Corners. That was a real inconvenience when I worked late, or wanted to go out for a drink after work. For me, having evening service on bus is a nice thing. But for many working folks, without cars, having reliable evening bus service in suburbs is a a necessity.

CDTA Albany Route Restructuring Plan Comments

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Ross Farrell
110 Watervliet Avenue
Albany, New York 1220

(via electronic mail)

Dear Mr. Farrell:

I am writing you with my comments and concerns about the proposed CDTA Albany County Route Restructing. I am a regular rider of the Route 18 and Route 19 CDTA buses to and from Downtown Albany where I work for the NYS Assembly. I ride over 3,000 miles per year on CDTA, which allows me from having to avoid driving my big pickup truck in the city or paying for parking.

During session nights I frequently work after 9 PM or have a risk of working after 9 PM. Continuing service until 11 PM, reduces my need to drive downtown except for rare occasions. I was quite happy to see service expanded to later nights.

Ramps

Public’s Right to Know.

1) I would urge CDTA to extend the comment period for the Albany County Route Restructuring until at least August 21, 2011.

2) CDTA must disclose proposed schedules and further details on proposed route changes, rather a broad overview of plans. The public must have right to review detailed plans, and offer suggestions for improvements — such as start times, routing, placement of bus stops. Simply putting GIS data online might be valuable to interested users, and would avoid unnecessary Freedom of Information Law requests.

3) The public has the right to know about plans for so-called suburban and express bus service. Will the Route 19 service be canceled or reduced? How will it interact with Route 18 local service?

Unlawful Segmentation of Albany County Bus Service Plan.

4) The exclusion of “Suburban Bus Service” and “Urban Bus Service” in the proposed Albany County Route Restructuring is an unlawful segmentation of the Albany County Restructuring Project under both the National Environmental Policy Act and the State Environmental Quality Review Act.

CDTA, unlike the Metropolitan Transit Agency, is not exempt from SERQA. Any negative declaration given to this proposed restructuring is therefore illegal, and could be subject to Article 78 CPLR action by citizens against CDTA. See Concerned Citizens for the Environment v. Zagata, 243 AD2d 20 (3d Dept 1998) and Aldrich v. Pattison 107 AD2d 258 (2d Dept 1985).

Hybrid Bus

Route 18 Improvements: Needed and Sensible.

5) I support the expansion of Route 18 service until 11 PM. However details are not provided. Will the service go all the way to Price Chopper until 11 PM, or will the buses turn around at the Four Corners ? How frequent will the service be? CDTA should disclose such information to the public on it’s website.

There should be at least hourly service in evenings, with last bus leaving Albany around 11 PM, and the service should go all the way out to Price Chopper, and allow easy transfers between Route 13 and Route 18 until the last buses run in the evening.

Later night service is handy for the many legislative employees who work late into the evenings, and need a convenient way to get home after the last 9 PM bus runs out to Delmar. It also is great for those of us who attend functions after work, and do not wish to drive home after having a couple of drinks.

6) I support the plan to consistently route buses through Delmar via Cherry and Delaware. This will make it less confusing, and adds additional services to the many apartments along these roads.

7) I support having the Route 13 and Route 18 hub out of Price Chopper in Slingerlands. Will this occur all day long, including evenings? Will Route 18 buses become Route 13 after layover, to allow riders to continue on the same bus, after a short layover to destinations off of New Scotland Ave?

8) I am not opposed to reducing service to Grove Street to the Route 19 Express service. Grove Street in Slingerlands has minimal ridership.

9) I am neutral on expanding service to Sundays. For senior citizens or those without cars, this is a good thing.

10) While not part of this plan, I would encourage a rationalization of the times that the Route 19 Express service runs. I would encourage the Route 19 start times to change to the following: 7:15 AM depart Voorheesville (arrive at Orange and Broadway at 7:57 AM), and 8:15 AM depart Voorheesville (arrive at Orange and Broadway at 8:57 AM). The schedule times that Route 19 bus runs in the evening are acceptable, but consider possibly running a 6 PM bus if revenue hours permit it.

Thank you for considering my comments.

Sincerely,

Andy Arthur