DOT Proposes Lanes to Speed Buses From Borough Park to Bath Beach

The possible route along Bay Parkway and Cropsey Avenue would include loading zones and traffic calming measures such as left-turn lanes.

bus in bus stop

An MTA bus at the Bay Parkway and 79th Street. Photo via DOT

by amNY

By Ethan Stark-Miller, amNY

The city’s Department of Transportation (DOT) proposed installing bus lanes along most of Brooklyn’s Bay Parkway, one of the borough’s busiest bus corridors, on Wednesday night.

In a presentation to Brooklyn Community Board 11 on June 10, DOT officials revealed they plan to paint a mix of offset and curbside bus lanes on Bay Parkway between Avenue J and Shore Parkway, covering nearly all of the thoroughfare that runs between the neighborhoods of Borough Park and Bath Beach. The redesign would also include adding both types of bus lanes on Cropsey Avenue between its intersections with Bay Parkway and 26th Avenue.

The undertaking is just the latest of many that Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s administration has either freshly launched or restarted after being stalled by his predecessor, Eric Adams. Others include Brooklyn’s Flatbush Avenue and Linden Boulevard, as well as the Bronx’s Fordham Road.

Mamdani’s focus on adding new bus lanes stems from his campaign promise to make buses, one of the city’s primary modes of public transportation, run faster.

The Bay Parkway/Cropsey Avenue project is designed to make the combined three miles of road utilized by the MTA’s B6 and B82 bus routes faster for their roughly 80,000 daily riders. The routes are the first- and fourth-busiest in the borough, respectively, according to DOT.

Fifty-two percent of those living along the corridor commute to work via public transit, according to 2023 U.S. Census data cited by the agency.

In a statement, DOT Commissioner Mike Flynn said buses on the two routes can at times travel at just three miles per hour — slower than the pace of walking.

“Bus riders deserve a fast, dignified commute, and we’re ready to speed things up,” Flynn said. “This redesign will increase bus speeds and reliability on two of Brooklyn’s busiest bus routes while enhancing safety for pedestrians and better organizing traffic for drivers.”

The redesign is also aimed at making stretches of the streets safer for cyclists and pedestrians, as DOT has dubbed both priority corridors under the city’s Vision Zero program to reduce traffic deaths and serious injuries.

Between 2021 and last year, 30 people were killed or seriously maimed in traffic crashes along the sections of road DOT seeks to reconfigure, according to the agency. Two of those deaths occurred in 2025 alone.

One of the plan’s safety features is the installation of designated left-turn lanes at 14 high-demand intersections and left-turn restrictions at others, the locations of which will be chosen based upon feedback from Brooklyn Community Boards 11 and 12. Left-turn lanes have been shown to reduce pedestrian and bicyclist injuries by 15% where installed, while left-turn restrictions have decreased by 41%, the agency said.

The project also calls for DOT to add up to 18 new pedestrian median islands and extensions on both roads, including accessibility upgrades to ramps and signals. The agency will paint curb extensions at some intersections as well.

The bus lanes, which are mostly offset, will minimize the loss of parking spaces, DOT said. The agency will also retime meters to ensure parking is available and add spots around the corners from busy blocks.

Moreover, it will designate loading zones for pickups, drop-offs, and deliveries.

Editor’s note: A version of this story originally ran in amNY. Click here to see the original story.

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