Staten Island’s bus service is getting a boost, with newer rides replacing close to half of the borough’s fleet by the middle of next year, MTA officials said Monday.
Transport Workers Union Local 100 officials said the newer reinforcements for Staten Island are arriving at the expense of bus service elsewhere in the city, with the more reliable coaches brought in as a result of swaps with the Flatbush and Ulmer Park depots in Brooklyn.
“You can’t fix Staten Island by having buses breaking down in Brooklyn,” JP Patafio, a Transport Workers Union Local 100 vice president for Brooklyn bus operators, told THE CITY. “That’s not an appropriate fix.”
MTA officials confirmed during a New York City Transit Committee meeting Monday that the changes to Staten Island’s often-beleaguered bus fleet are part of a multi-year series of investments in the borough’s local and express bus service.
The moves follow complaints from riders, Borough President Vito Fossella and Amalgamated Transit Union Local 726, which represents Staten Island bus workers.
Demetrius Crichlow, president of New York City Transit, said close to 200 Staten Island buses have been replaced since 2018 and that 130 more will be arriving by the midway point of 2026. In all, he said, that accounts for 40% of the fleet serving Staten Island.
“When customers aren’t happy, I personally get calls, I get emails, we get letters,” Crichlow said. “If it’s a priority for them, it’s a priority for me to ensure that we continue to work as a team to provide the service that we need.”
Crichlow said he had recently met with Fossella, a frequent critic of Staten Island bus service, to discuss “strides” being made by the MTA.
Crichlow added that New York City Transit operates 45% more buses per million riders on Staten Island than any other borough and pointed out that delays have dropped by 10% since the start of congestion pricing in January, while ridership has ticked up by 5%.
“To the people of Staten Island, you deserve world-class transportation service and we are committed and excited to deliver that for you,” he said.
Nicholas Thompson, a Fossella spokesperson, said the borough president told MTA officials at a meeting last week that the status quo on bus service was not satisfactory, with agency text alerts showing that more than 1,100 bus trips have been canceled since the start of June.
An analysis of MTA data shows that Staten Island express buses delivered 87% of scheduled service during peak hours last month. In comparison, Brooklyn, The Bronx and Queens had 96% service-delivery rates.
“Simply put, the status quo was and is unacceptable,” Thompson said in a statement.
The complaints about service extend beyond the express routes that shuttle Staten Island bus riders to and from Manhattan.
In April, THE CITY reported that MTA data showed that Staten Island’s local bus routes last year had excess wait times — which measure how long riders are at stops beyond scheduled waits — that nearly doubled the citywide average.
MTA data also revealed that Staten Island’s 19 local bus routes last year delivered 90.6% of peak-hour trips, down from nearly 96% elsewhere in the city.
The MTA’s latest numbers show that Staten Island’s local buses delivered only 89% of scheduled trips running during peak hours in June, while local routes in the other boroughs held a 97% service delivery rate.
New numbers from the MTA’s latest “Customers Count” survey show that Staten Island riders gave local bus service higher marks than last fall, with 55% of borough riders saying they were satisfied — an 11% increase from the fall 2024 survey.
Satisfaction increased 10+ points in four of the five boroughs; Staten Island (55%, up 11 percentage points), Bronx (60%, up 13), Brooklyn (61%, up 11), and Queens (68%, up 12). Manhattan customers remain the most satisfied at 72% (up 7).
During the public speaking forum at Monday’s transit committee meeting, board members heard from MTA bus operator Robert Whittaker, who complained that the bus swaps are shorting riders who are not from Staten Island.
“They paint them up so they make them look nice, but they’re really broken,” he told THE CITY.
Even with the continuing changes to the makeup of Staten Island’s bus fleet, rider advocates said the situation remains dire in terms of canceled trips and wait times.
“I am happy to see action being taken,” Vittorio Bugatti of the Express Bus Advocacy Group. “But we need to see continued improvements on Staten Island, as express bus service has been atrocious now for quite some time.”
Mia Hollie contributed to this report.
