{"id":296516,"date":"2026-07-15T12:54:55","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T12:54:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/296516\/"},"modified":"2026-07-15T12:54:55","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T12:54:55","slug":"mamdani-moves-forward-on-stalled-bronx-busway-kicks-off-public-engagement-for-slew-of-brooklyn-bus-projects","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/296516\/","title":{"rendered":"Mamdani moves forward on stalled Bronx busway, kicks off public engagement for slew of Brooklyn bus projects"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mayor Zohran Mamdani is wasting no time in moving forward on his freshly released \u201cNext Stop\u201d<\/a> plan for making city buses faster \u2014 announcing Wednesday that he is greenlighting several projects included in the roadmap.<\/p>\n

Chief among those undertakings will be the Bronx\u2019s first busway o<\/a>n Tremont Avenue<\/a>. Mamdani\u2019s office said it would begin work this fall on the project, which had been shelved last year by former Mayor Eric Adams\u2019 administration.<\/p>\n

The mayor also revealed that his administration will begin the public engagement process to shape proposals for three \u201crapid bus corridors\u201d the plan envisions for Central Brooklyn\u2019s Flatbush, Utica, and Church Avenues.<\/p>\n

In a statement, Mamdani said that once they are finished, all four projects will quicken bus trips for around 200,000 daily riders.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cNew Yorkers should not lose hours of their lives sitting in traffic on a bus. From the Bronx to Brooklyn, we\u2019re building streets that move people instead of sticking them in gridlock,\u201d Mamdani said.\u00a0\u201cThese\u00a0projects will make commutes faster, make our streets safer and return precious\u00a0time\u00a0to\u00a0nearly 200,000\u00a0New Yorkers\u00a0every single day.\u00a0That\u2019s\u00a0exactly what public transit should do.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

The release last week of Next Stop \u2014 a joint city and state plan with the goal of shaving six minutes off bus trips along 50 \u201cpriority corridors\u201d \u2014 marked Mamdani\u2019s most sweeping gesture yet toward making good on his campaign promise of speeding up city buses. However, the plan does not address the other and more controversial aspect of his campaign pledge, to make buses fare-free<\/a>, though he said last week that he still intends to get that done.<\/p>\n

Busway on Tremont Avenue
\n\"FILEFILE \u2013 Mayor Zohran Mamdani announced four new bus routes to be restored in the South Bronx on Feb. 16, 2026.Photo by Lloyd Mitchell<\/p>\n

The Tremont Avenue effort promises to speed up commutes for the roughly 39,000 daily bus riders who frequent the corridor. Seventy-two percent of households living along the corridor do not have access to a car, while 78% commute to work by public transit, biking or walking, according to the city Department of Transportation.<\/p>\n

Tremont Avenue is home to the Bx36, an essential crosstown route for the Bronx. But while the Bx36 serves as one of the borough\u2019s few east-west transit options, it currently languishes at speeds as slow as five miles per hour.<\/p>\n

Busways \u2014 a design that restricts traffic to buses, paratransit, emergency vehicles, and large trucks \u2014 are an effective tool for speeding up buses by clearing roadways of private vehicles they normally have to jockey with, DOT says. They have boosted bus speeds by as much as 60% accross the city, according to the agency.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The project will add half-mile-long busways to the stretch. One will run eastbound from 3rd Avenue to Southern Boulevard, and the other will be westbound from Southern Boulevard to Belmont Avenue.\n<\/p>\n

It will also include a shared offset bus and bike lane running eastbound between Webster and 3rd Avenues.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

The busways will operate seven days a week from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m. During those hours, the road will only be open to private vehicles for local access, meaning they must exit at the next available right turn. The busways will be enforced by stationary and bus-mounted cameras, which will ticket drivers they catch obstructing the lanes, as well as the NYPD.<\/p>\n

Additionally, DOT will add a slew of features aimed at making the road, one of the Bronx\u2019s most dangerous, safer. There were 630 people injured on Tremont between 2020 and 2024, with 46 severe injuries and four deaths over the same period, according to the agency.<\/p>\n

The safety enhancements DOT plans to add include painted sidewalk extensions, which shorten crossings and ease vehicle speeds. Those will be reinforced by some hard infrastructure including flexible delineators, granite blocks, and bike parking.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want New Yorkers to have faith in our outreach, and that starts with actually delivering on projects promised years ago, like on Tremont Avenue, where riders deal with unreliable, over-packed buses every day,\u201d Transportation Commissioner Mike Flynn said in a statement.<\/p>\n

Central Brooklyn bus plans\u00a0
\n\"MTAAn MTA bus traveling on Brooklyn\u2019s Flatbush Avenue.Photo by Lloyd Mitchell<\/p>\n

In Brooklyn, the city is kicking off public engagement for projects along the three corridors, which together carry roughly 150,000 daily riders along 13 routes at a pace as slow as five mph, included in the plan right away. DOT and the MTA will work together to develop both near-term changes along the three corridors that can be installed as soon as next year, while drafting plans for longer-term overhauls.<\/p>\n

The administration has said it plans to complete the rapid bus corridor on Flatbush Avenue by 2030. The design, based on the bus rapid transit model, will combine features like center-running physically protected bus lanes and bus stations with amenities to give riders a faster and more comfortable experience.<\/p>\n

To that end, the city launched of an online feedback portal on July 15, which will be live through Oct. 31. It will begin in-person events at 6 p.m. on Aug. 6 \u2014 those wishing to attend can RSVP to the agency at organize.nyc.gov\/fastbuses.<\/p>\n

It will also begin surveying local stakeholders \u2014 including pedestrians, businesses, and education institutions \u2014 and conduct outreach at events like open streets and block parties.\n<\/p>\n

The agency said it intends to unveil plans informed by the feedback this fall.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cWe look forward to discussing the possibilities for fast buses through Central Brooklyn this year as we develop exciting proposals for critical bus corridors in the area,\u201d Flynn said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mayor Zohran Mamdani is wasting no time in moving forward on his freshly released \u201cNext Stop\u201d plan for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":296517,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[98,100,99,98768,43991,81244,22925,9,24,112942,63,112943,112944],"class_list":["post-296516","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn-headlines","tag-brooklyn-news","tag-department-of-tranportation","tag-dot-commissioner-mike-flynn","tag-fast-buses","tag-mayor-zohran-mamdani","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-next-stop-plan","tag-nyc","tag-rapid-bus-corridors","tag-tremont-avenue-busway"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/296516","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=296516"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/296516\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/296517"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=296516"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=296516"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=296516"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}