Bus depots of MTA Regional Bus Operations


operates local and express buses serving New York City, United States, out of 27 bus depots. These depots are located in all five boroughs of the city, plus one located in nearby Yonkers in Westchester County. 19 of these depots serve MTA New York City Transit 's bus operations, while the remaining eight serve the MTA Bus Company These facilities perform regular maintenance, cleaning, and painting of buses, as well as collection of revenue from bus fareboxes. Several of these depots were once car barns for streetcars, while others were built much later and have only served buses.
Employees of the depots are represented by local divisions of the Transport Workers Union of America, particularly the TWU Local 100 or of the Amalgamated Transit Union 's Local's 726 for all depots in Staten Island, 1056 for Casey Stengel, Jamaica, and Queens Village Depots, 1179 for JFK & Far Rockaway Depots, and 1181 for Spring Creek Depot.
Buses in each division may be swapped between depots on an as-needed basis as short-term loans to cover services at these depots, including school trippers. The Manhattan and Bronx Surface Transit Operating Authority may swap between any of their depots.

History

On June 1, 1940, the New York City Board of Transportation took over the streetcar operations of the Brooklyn–Manhattan Transit Corporation, as part of the unification of the city's transit system under municipal operations. The streetcar lines would be motorized into diesel bus routes or trolleybus routes over the next two decades. In 1947, the BOT took over the North Shore Bus Company in Queens and Isle Transportation in Staten Island, giving the city control of the majority of surface transit in Brooklyn, Queens, and Staten Island. On September 24, 1948, the BOT took over the East Side Omnibus Corporation and Comprehensive Omnibus Corporation in Manhattan, receiving two depots in East Harlem. From 1947 to 1950, the BOT reconstructed numerous depots and trolley barns inherited from the private operators, and erected or purchased new facilities to expand capacity. In 1962, the New York City Transit Authority and its subsidiary Manhattan and Bronx Surface Transit Operating Authority took over the operations of the Fifth Avenue Coach Company in Manhattan and the Bronx. The Transit Authority inherited at least 12 bus depots from the company, some of which were kept in operation while others were condemned and closed. From 2005 to 2006, the remaining private operators were taken over by the MTA Bus Company. The MTA inherited eight facilities at this time, which had been built either by the companies or the New York City Department of Transportation.

Central Maintenance Depots

The MTA has two major "central maintenance facilities" that serve the New York City area. The Grand Avenue Central Maintenance Facility is adjacent to the Grand Avenue Depot in Maspeth, Queens, and the Zerega Avenue Central Maintenance Facility is located at 750 Zerega Avenue in the Bronx. Both maintenance facilities are responsible for the major reconstruction of buses in need of repair including engine rebuilding, transmission shops, and shops for body components on New York City Transit Authority's bus fleet, as well as repainting of buses. The facilities also include several employee workshops for surface transportation training and institutional instruction. In addition, Zerega Avenue CMF is responsible for registry of new buses in the fleet. The two facilities were conceived as part of the 1995-1999 and 2000-2004 MTA Capital Programs. The Zerega Avenue facility was opened in 2001, while the Grand Avenue facility was opened in 2007 along with the bus depot. Previously, the large repair shops of the East New York Depot served as the system's sole central maintenance shops; as of May 2016, East New York is considered a third central maintenance facility.

Zerega Avenue Facility

The Zerega Avenue Maintenance and Training Facility is a one-story structure located on the east side of Zerega Avenue between Lafayette and Seward Avenues in the Castle Hill section of the Bronx, sitting along the western coast of Westchester Creek. Plans for the facility were conceived around 1999, and it was constructed in 2000. The facility received an award from the American Society of Civil Engineers for design-build project of the year in 2002. Around 2002, the Zerega shops began overhauling NYCT buses to operate on ultra-low-sulfur diesel. The facility includes paint booths for MTA buses, and was designed to maintain compressed natural gas equipment. It also features numerous classrooms and a driving simulator to train MTA bus operators.

Bronx Division

The Manhattan and Bronx Surface Transit Operating Authority, a subsidiary of the New York City Transit brand, operates all the local routes in the Bronx aside from the Bx23 and Q50. The latter two routes and all express bus routes in the borough are operated by the MTA Bus Company. All depots in the division, including those under the MTA Bus Company, are represented by TWU Local 100. Although named the Bronx Division, only three are actually located in The Bronx, with the others in Inwood, Manhattan and the suburb of Yonkers.

Eastchester Depot (MTA Bus)

The Eastchester Depot is located on Tillotson Avenue near Conner Street off the New England Thruway in the Eastchester and Co-op City neighborhoods of the Bronx. It was built in 1970, and is owned by Edward Arrigoni, former president of New York Bus Service, and has been leased to the City of New York and MTA Bus Company for twenty years with an option to purchase afterwards. It was renamed Eastchester Depot upon takeover on July 1, 2005. It previously housed the mass transit operations of NYBS, which operated express service between the Bronx to Manhattan as well as school bus operations.
This depot contains a major bus overhaul and repair facility/shop for various type of buses, a major "reserve storage" facility for out-of-service buses, and a storage facility for decommissioned and wrecked buses awaiting scrapping. The latter set of buses are stripped of usable parts such as windows and engine components, as well as reusable fluids such as motor oil and fuel, before the remaining shells and unsalvageable parts are sold for scrap. The scrapping program began in summer 2008. Under the MTA, the shop was upgraded with a new concrete floor. The facility underwent further renovations in the 2010s, replacing the maintenance building's roof and improving ventilation and pollution controls including containment of fuel spills. The upgraded facility opened on August 13, 2015.

Fleet

The local routes were split from Queens Surface Corporation’s QBx1 route in 2010, which operated out of College Point Depot until 2009.

Gun Hill Depot

The Gun Hill Depot is located at 1910 Bartow Avenue near Gun Hill Road, west of the New England Thruway in the Baychester neighborhood of the Bronx near Co-op City, which a number of its routes serve.
The site was formerly a garbage and toxic waste dump, used at various times for both legal and illegal waste disposal. It was selected by the MTA for a new garage in 1979 to replace the original West Farms Depot It opened on September 10, 1989, also temporarily replacing the old Kingsbridge Depot, which closed on the same day for reconstruction. The depot also contains heavy maintenance facilities and served the Bronx's central maintenance facility upon its opening.
In 1992, the MTA built little league baseball fields on an adjacent site one block west. The MTA also owned the lot immediately south of the depot until 2014, which was leased and used as a driving range from 1999 to 2010. This land was originally planned for an expansion of the depot, or a new central rebuild facility. In June 1996, solar panels were installed on the roof of the depot. It was the first NYCTA depot to use solar energy, which now provide about 40% of the depot's power. It is also the only New York City Transit bus garage that was built on previously undeveloped land.

Fleet

The Kingsbridge Depot is located in at 4055-4060 Ninth Avenue in Inwood, Manhattan and stretches nearly two square blocks, from Tenth Avenue to the Harlem River and from 216th Street to 218th Street. The current facility opened on February 23, 1993, and consists of two separate buildings: one for maintenance and one for bus storage. The Ninth Avenue shop rebuilds individual bus components. It was the first in the city to house articulated buses beginning on September 30, 1996. The roof of the depot is a public parking facility.
The site of the depot was originally the Kingsbridge Car Barn, a streetcar barn owned by the Third Avenue Railway in 1897. This was a one-story brick structure with a basement and steel frame designed in Roman renaissance style with terracotta features. Among its designers included Isaac A. Hopper, who constructed Carnegie Hall. Across from the barn on the east side of Ninth Avenue was the Kingsbridge Power House, which was constructed around the same time and supplied electricity to the Third Avenue system. It was designed and built by Westinghouse Electric Corporation and by Hopper, with similar brick and terracotta features.
The facility became the location of the company's central repair shop in 1947 when the 65th Street Shops closed. In 1948, Third Avenue's central repair shop was moved again to a facility in Yonkers, while the Kingsbridge Depot ceased serving trolleys and began serving buses in 1948. In 1962, it was acquired by the MaBSTOA. The original 1897 depot closed on September 10, 1989, when the Gun Hill Depot opened, and was razed soon after. It had fallen into disrepair and the placement of its support columns was inconvenient for bus movements in the building.