Will jitneys move into the reconstructed Port Authority Bus Terminal?

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey (PANYNJ, the agency, not the bus terminal named after it) has been steadily moving forward with its plans to replace and rebuild the Port Authority Bus Terminal in Midtown. The goals of the plan are:

  • Replace the current structure, which has a limited remaining lifespan
  • Remove curbside bus services from Midtown streets.
  • Add more bus capacity generally

Port Authority picks architecture firms to lead bus terminal design

The current plan is to build a temporary new terminal on top of the current Lincoln Tunnel plaza, then demolish the existing bus terminal and rebuild it. One the new bus terminal is rebuilt, the temporary structure would be converted to a layover facility.

The completion date may not be until 2030, or longer. But even at this point, it is not too early to wonder what jitney service to New Jersey will look like in the near future?

During the intermediate phase of the project, when buses are running out of the temporary terminal, PANYNJ does not plan to include any jitneys According to the reconstruction project’s scoping report, curbside buses around the Port Authority bus terminal would be given access to the temporary facility, but that would “not include charter, tour-bus or jitney services.” It’s unclear to me how this applies to the two largest jitney operators (Community Lines and Express Service), which currently have official gates in the bus terminal. During construction, we can expect curbside jitney operations to continue as present. But what about in 2030ish, once the permanent new terminal is done?

My big question is,  Will jitney operators be given space in the new Port Authority Bus Terminal? Given the segmented ownership structure, can they be accommodated? Are jitney commuters’ interests being taken into account in the planning and implementation of this project?

I am not very up to date on the project planning, but I hope the leaders of this project don’t fail to take into account the hundreds of thousands of Hudson and Passaic county commuters that arrive and depart in Manhattan every day on privately-operated jitneys. Unfortuantely, I suspect that this issue is being overlooked. I did a control+F search in the Scoping Report, including appendices, and among hundreds of pages found only 9 mentions of the word “jitney,” 4 of which related to the quote above about how they will not be accommodated in the temporary terminal, and 2 of which relate to an anti-jitney public comment received in a hearing.

 

April 2018 NJ Transit changes that will affect jitney bus service

Since I interned at NJ Transit’s bus scheduling office one summer, i find it interesting to see how the timetables change every season on the various bus routes in my area. This time around, the schedules are changing for the 84 and the 123.

The 84 is a local route that uses the same streets as the Bergenline jitney bus route between Journal Square and North Bergen. The new timetable shows service on weekdays being reduced from a bus every 15 minutes to a bus every 20 minutes.

To me, this change is logical. The 84 probably has low ridership because it competes against jitney buses that run every 1-2 minutes. I have seen these buses, and they are almost always close to empty. So are the Bergenline buses at most times of day, but that’s another story.

It will be interesting to see how this change affects the jitney world. My assumption is that it means a small number of fares that would have gone to NJ Transit will now go to jitney drivers’ living. NJ Transit will benefit because they won’t spend as much money running buses that aren’t needed.

The second change is to the 123, a bus that connects Palisade Ave in Jersey City and New York to the Port Authority. Until recently, almost all morning rush hour trips started at the Congress Street Light Rail station. There was only one 123 bus every hour or so in the morning rush between Congress Street and Christ Hospital. This was probably because the Palisade – New York jitney route provides a more direct service, with fewer stops.

Now, there will be a 123 from Christ Hospital every 20 minutes or so in the morning rush. I am concerned that this will take passengers away from the New York – Palisade jitney, which is already a very small route with only a few departures a day. If the margins become too slim, the drivers may quit or find a more productive route. And the passengers won’t even be better off, because the 123 is a good 10-20 minutes longer in the mornings, because of its local stops, and the fact that it approaches the Lincoln Tunnel from the north instead of the South.

Another possibility is that the extra 123s will provide an “anchor” that will actually benefit the New York – Palisade route. This is an effect where passengers, knowing that a regular service like the 123 is available, will wait at bus stops at designated times. This allows the jitney drivers to arrive before the 123, and offer transportation to these people.  Either outcome is possible, making this an interesting natural experiment.

 

 

 

Service during snowstorms

On March 21st, Northern New Jersey had a snowstorm. 12-18 inches were forecast, and the total accummulation was on the lower end of that, but still substantial. It was wet heavy snow that brought down a lot of branches!

During the storm, this website received quite a number of inquiries about whether their bus was running. Of course, as an independent observer, I have no way of knowing that. My only source of information was looking out the window and seeing if a Bergenline jitney was passing by.

Since jitney drivers are independent contractors or owner-operators, there is usually no central dispatch office that tells everyone when to shut down service. A driver can decide to go home early, or they can decide to stick it out and keep working during the snow.

NJ Transit and other private bus operators in New jersey canceled service that day between 1pm and 4pm. All local NJ Transit bus service shut down at 3pm.

The roads were slushy but navigable. I saw that bergenline jitneys kept coming, less frequently than usual, but they were coming.

Lots of people wrote me emails to ask the status of their bus. I told them I did not have reliable information, but that if they caught their bus, to let me know. That way, I could tell others with the same inquiry. This was a crude way to assess the status of jitney operations during the snow, but it was very useful!

It seems that jitney service continued to be robust several hours after other modes of transportation shut down. One person wrote to me saying he got on a Kennedy Boulevard bus at around 5:00 pm. Another told me they boarded a Boulevard East bus at 6pm. The Paterson lines were also still running in the evening rush hour.

Why is this? Either jitney bus drivers are ok with working in more hazardous conditions, OR, the service is just more reliable. Another big factor for drivers is that once NJ Transit shuts down, there are more passengers the jitney drivers can transport. With the competition out of the way, the drivers can earn more money.

Thank you to all the commuters who updated me about their commutes that day!

The $15 van service from Pennsylvania to Washington Heights

I was at the GWB Bus Station on a Sunday, and discovered that there is a regular-route van service that leaves from Washington Heights to Pennsylvania! I was previously not aware of this service.

The vans advertised service from Hazleton and Stroudsburg, PA to Paterson, NJ and New York. They were boarding at the corner of 180th and Broadway. Vehicle quality ranged from somewhat old, to brand shining new vans.

There were at least two separate van companies providing this service. One was C & P Transportations [sic] . Neither seem to have an online presence. They operate on a reservation basis, with the option to pay cash on-site. The vans said C & P Transportations, but there are online reviews for C & G Transportations, with the same phone number. It is unclear if this is a typo or the company changed names.

These companies seem to provide a much lower fare than their traditional competitors, Martz and Fullington Trailways, which charge $30-$50 for tickets from New York to the Poconos. With an intermediate stop in Paterson, and customer service in Spanish and English, they also seem to serve the needs of travelers better.  I assume they have taken the majority of the market share.

There are also online reviews for a similar company called Dxt Transportation, but I could not find anything online.

Contact:

C & P Transportations: (570) 453-6926

Dxt Transportation: (570)  454-1398

 

The first jitney route on Google Maps!

For the first time ever, a jitney route has its information displayed on Google Maps/Google Transit. Now travelers can access the route and (rough) schedule of the Paterson-George Washington Bridge jitney route when searching for transit directions.

Google Transit works off of a data format called GTFS. Usually, public transit agencies convert their routes and timetables into GTFS files, which Google Transit then verifies and publishes.  Jitney companies do not have the technical expertise necessary to compile this information. In this case, the New York City Department of Transportation (NYCDOT) assisted with converting information about jitney operation into Google-friendly format.

There is an interesting issue here- how do you convert an unscheduled jitney route into a publishable bus schedule? The solution here was to provide approximate headways. The Google Transit schedule shows Paterson jitneys running every 12 minutes. This is a minimum level of service and they usually run more frequently than that.

GTFS information can be displayed on a variety of transit information platforms. Two big ones are Transit App, and Citymapper. I could not find the Paterson-GWB jitney on either of those apps.

While not precisely accurate, having information about the hours of service, frequency, and stops for a jitney route is a leap forward for transit information in New Jersey. This is a model that could be applied to other jitney routes in future.

Georgia Bus Line: my trip to Atlanta

In October, I was in Atlanta for a few days, for the APTA Expo, which was a public transit industry convention and trade show.  On a slow day during the convention, I snatched away a few hours to make an inspection of Georgia Bus Line.

I ubered over to Buford highway, the main road served by this company. A bright orange minibus showed up, and i made a round trip. The driver correctly identified me as a tourist. From him, I was able to gather the essential facts about the route.

What was dismaying, but completely expected, was that no other APTA Expo attendees I met had even heard of this transit service.

This company which, as far as I know, is the only jitney bus operation in Georgia, or the South as a whole. Essentially, it is exactly the same as a jitney bus back in New Jersey.  The story is similar. The company was founded in 2001 in order to provide convenient transit service to the Hispanic immigrant communities northeast of Atlanta.  It parallels a public MARTA bus route, the 39. You can read the Wikipedia article here.

Challenges to jitney bus service in this part of the country are a little different than in New Jersey. Population density is much lower. Most of the route can be characterized as suburban sprawl. Not exactly a transit-friendly environment, but they make it work.

According to Wikipedia, in 2006 “Three of its buses were burned shortly after the company had provided free bus service to a pro-immigrant rally”

There was a random chunk of asphalt and wood block at the front of the bus being used as paperweights of sorts

The interior was just like the buses back home in New Jersey. Oddly soft seats, air a little too warm, loud engine, etc.

The route runs along Buford Highway between Lindbergh Station and Don Quixote Grocery Store in Doraville. The driver made an announcement asking if anyone was going to Doraville Station, but no one responded, so the driver didn’t go down the station driveway.

Other particulars: The fare is $1.50, and the schedule shows the bus running approximately every 20 minutes. The driver had a handwritten timetable of departure times, but there was no public copy. In typical jitney fashion, I saw several jitneys in the other direction driving directly ahead of the MARTA 39. The service operates approximately 6am to 7pm, 7 days a week.

Overall, I find it heartening that jitney buses can survive in suburban Atlanta. To me, this indicates that the business model can work in many more areas, outside the densely populated city neighborhoods it is associated with in New Jersey and Brooklyn.

Further reading:

Ramos, Rachel Tobin (17 January 2005), “Private bus service on a roll”, Atlanta Business Chronicle.

Buford Highway and the Royal Bus Lines”  Profiling Atlanta Transportation. November 27 2011.

Mysterious Market Street – Route 46 – Teterboro Route

Seen on 40th Street: Jitney bus with a sign reading “New York: Route 46 East Junior Ave/ Paterson Market St. / Teterboro Union City: 42th St. & 8th Ave”

I asked the driver if, in fact, he had come from Paterson via Teterboro, but he said no.

This raises the questions:

  • Is this an actual route?
  • If so where did it go (other than Route 46 and Market Street)?
  • Was this a previous route that is now defunct?
  • Where is Junior Ave? I couldn’t find any such street on Google maps

Jitney bus observations

In my work as an outside observer of the jitney bus system, I have realized that much of the information I gather is too anecdotal to publish as fact. I have also developed a considerable body of personal opinions on the jitney industry.

This type of information isn’t especially relevant for the informational part of the website, which is mostly route names, maps, frequency and fares. I decided to make a blog post section of the website, which I hope will be a more appropriate venue for:

  • The broadcast of my thoughts and general market observations
  • News articles
  • Research on private transit systems that are not New Jersey jitney buses
  • Mysteries about the jitney system that I have not unraveled
  • Changes to the main website about genera jitney information (this will serve as a change log)
  • Pictures of jitney bus signs with amusing typos

I aspire to become the writer of the only (and therefore, the best) jitney bus blog. This, with persistence, will not be hard.