MTA plans to kill two bus routes in the name of transit equity

Queens Chronicle

Two bus redesign Zoom meetings held last Thursday and Monday included proposals for changes to several lines throughout East and Southeast Queens. The meetings were among the last in a series held by the MTA and focused on Community Districts 12 and 13.

The Q1 bus had major proposed changes that were relayed by Tori Winters, the principal transportation planner for the MTA. The bus route currently starts in Queens Village on Springfield Boulevard and Jamaica Avenue and ends at the 165th Bus Terminal in Jamaica, though some buses leave the terminal and end at Bellerose at Braddock and Jamaica avenues, instead of returning back to Queens Village.

The proposed new route would start at Bellerose, eliminating the main starting point in Queens Village and all but one Springfield Boulevard stop (Springfield Boulevard and Hillside Avenue) and 12 stops on Hillside Avenue, but it would take over the Q6 route and extend to the JFK Cargo Plaza in South Ozone Park by skipping the terminal and going through Downtown Jamaica and then down Sutphin Boulevard. The route would keep the 179th Street and Hillside Avenue F-train stop and it would also pass by the E, J, Z train stop on Jamaica Avenue and the Jamaica Long Island Rail Road on Archer Avenue. The proposal would more than double the weekday peak service frequency of the bus from 10 minutes to 4 minutes, and nearly double the off-peak frequency from 15 to 8 minutes.

“We will be replacing the two routes with one higher-frequency route,” Winters said about the Q1 in a slideshow presentation. “Local service along Springfield Boulevard will be provided by the proposed Q78. The Rockaway Boulevard segment of the existing Q6 would now be served by the proposed Q7.”

The proposed Q45 would take over the Q36 route and the Hillside Avenue portions of the Q1 that would be axed and start at the Little Neck LIRR. The route would conclude in Jamaica on Archer Avenue and Sutphin Boulevard, expanding its train service connections to the E, J and Z lines, the Long Island Rail Road and AirTrain similar to the Q1.

The Q75 is a newly proposed route that would go from Jamaica to Queensborough Community College via 188th Street and Horace Harding Expressway, replacing the Union Turnpike to Jamaica Avenue stops along the Q17 and taking over the Q30’s primary role as a route to the Bayside school. The Q31 bus would pick up the Q30 line’s Utopia Parkway stops.

The suggested Q82 would replace the Q36 service along Hillside Avenue and combine with sections of the existing Q110 that goes along Hempstead Avenue to get to the UBS Arena in Elmont. Instead of servicing 212th Place in Queens Village, the route will serve Hollis Court Boulevard, and any existing Q36 stops east of 213th Street would be picked up by the Q57.

“The new Q82 route would mostly run nonstop alongside Hillside Ave.,” said Winters. “The service will no longer provide a route to Jamaica Ave., as the existing Q36 does.”

Buses with suggested minor changes include the Q44, which would maintain most of its route in Jamaica on Merrick Boulevard and Archer Avenue, but instead of concluding its route at the Bronx Zoo, it would go to Fordham Avenue Plaza at Fordham University; the Q43 in Jamaica, which would make less frequent stops as it extends farther out to Long Island Jewish Medical Center in Glen Oaks; and the Q2, which would maintain its route though shifts in where it would stop between the 165th Street Bus Terminal and Elmont were proposed.

Legislation is being drawn to suspend evictions for the rest of the year

Gothamist

 Responding to dire predictions that thousands of New Yorkers, unable to make rent because of COVID-19, could soon wind up on the street, a group of state lawmakers want to block landlords from evicting tenants until the end of the year.

The new legislation would extend Governor Andrew Cuomo's moratorium on evictions, which is set to expire on June 18th, for an additional six months from when the State of Emergency is declared over.

"That moratorium, while welcome, is not enough," Manhattan Senator Brad Hoylman, who introduced the legislation on Tuesday, told Gothamist. "We have to create this safe harbor to give tenants time to get back on their feet."

The bill would ensure tenants cannot be removed from their homes for unpaid rent for the duration of the public health crisis. It would not suspend rent altogether, as other state lawmakers have proposed, and would still allow landlords to sue delinquent tenants for monetary judgements.

But housing attorneys said the bill is a critical first step in addressing a looming evictions crisis that Cuomo has largely waved off.

"Without any state action, there are going to be New Yorkers across the state who will be unable to pay their rent, and very soon the courts are going to reopen and the cases will start piling up," said Ellen Davidson, a staff attorney with the Legal Aid Society. "This is a step in the right direction to ensure we don't end up with hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers in the street at a moment when coronavirus is wreaking havoc on the homeless population."

Expert predict that as many as 40 percent of New York tenants may be forced to skip April rent payments, as COVID-19 containment measures have pushed unemployment to historic levels. Bronx Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz, who introduced a companion bill in the State Assembly, said that tenants who'd lost income during the pandemic were now facing "a ticking time bomb."

For his part, Cuomo has repeatedly insisted the "rent issue" was solved through the three-month eviction moratorium. He has declined to support a bill with bipartisan support that would cancel rent payments and provide relief to landlords as well.