Pedestrians beat the bus — but maybe for the last time?
The annual “Man vs. Machine” race between people on foot and the 34th Street crosstown bus on Thursday afternoon ended as these things typically end: with the humans making the 1.2-mile walk faster than a bus that typically averages just 5.5 mph on the corridor, slower than walking speed.
But this year’s race came one day after Mayor Adams abandoned his opposition and approved the construction, perhaps as early as next year, of a car-free busway on the portion of 34th Street between Third and Ninth avenues.
As such, even in defeat, the crosstown bus (well, supporters of good service on said bus) took a victory lap.
“These are the slowest buses in the United States of America,” said Mayor-in-Waiting Zohran Mamdani, who made transit one of the centerpieces of his successful campaign for the Democratic nomination for mayor. “And what it behooves us to do is to leave that statistic in the past.”
Mamdani was joined in celebrating the busway plan by a Murderer’s Row of local transit-boosting politicians including Comptroller Brad Lander, Council Members Keith Powers and Erik Bottcher, and state Sen. Brad Hoylman-Sigal, who is poised to become Manhattan Borough President next year.
There was genuine glee.
“For years, Midtown bus riders have been stuck on the slowest buses in the city,” said Lander. “A busway on 34th Street will not only speed up thousands of commutes but transform the corridor into a vibrant public space for all.”
The evidence? This year’s Team Pedestrian vs. Team Bus race was a debacle for the omnibus.
Powers (and Streetsblog Summer Specialist Matthew Sage) chose the bus as his mode of transportation while Mamdani, Lander, Bottcher, and Hoylman-Sigal burned calories (and bus passengers). Streetsblog Summer Specialist Yoshi Omi-Jarrett walked the walk.
Almost immediately at First Avenue, Powers and Sage noticed the singular problem for bus travel in New York City: cars. Too many of them in general, and some of them illegally parked in the bus lane.
“If you look around us right now, we’re in a pretty tough jam here,” Powers said. “I don’t see a lot of officials getting on the bus, and if they did, they would experience this. .… They would live with buses that don’t show up in the morning and get jammed by the cars.”
Meanwhile, Omi-Jarrett marched towards the west side with a full head of steam, passing dozens of vehicles stuck in traffic. As the walkers got to Sixth Avenue, the bus was barely in sight, several avenues back.
“Someone needs to give us an update on where the bus is,” joked Lander.
At that moment, a call to Sage revealed that the bus was way back at Third Avenue.
When Mamdani, Lander, and Bottcher reached the finish line at Eighth Avenue, someone started a timer to count the margin of victory: It was an additional eight minutes.
When it did, Sage offered an expression commen to bus riders:
But it was all in good fun now that advocates had won the mayor’s support for the busway.
“Now, the almost 30,000 daily bus riders along 34th Street will have a fast and reliable ride every time,” said Ben Furnas, executive director of Transportation Alternatives, which hosted the race along with Riders Alliance. “Thirty-Fourth Street today and 42nd Street tomorrow.”
