A Concrete Plan to Speed Up Buses in Traffic

.It is springtime in New York and everywhere bulbs are blooming. Daffodils. Crocuses. Bus bulbs.

In a program intended to help buses move more speedily down the traffic-and-construction-clogged streets of lower Broadway, the city is building a series of extensions to the sidewalk that should make it easier for buses to load and unload. In the taxonomy of traffic engineers, these extensions are known as bus bulbs.

Although the Broadway bulbs are rectangular, not bulbous, the term actually comes from the fact that in other parts of the world where bus bulbs have been used, like London, they tend to be rounded extensions near a corner.

The Broadway bulbs are concrete islands set just off the sidewalk. They are about 130 feet long and 9 feet wide.

The first bulb on Broadway was finished earlier this month at Spring Street. Another has been completed at Grand Street. And workers are building two more, at Walker and Franklin Streets.

The idea is that buses lose a lot of time pulling over to a curb and then pulling back into traffic. The bulbs essentially bring the curb to the bus, which does not have to pull over but instead stops in front of the bulbs to let passengers on and off and then continues on its way.

That is the theory at least.

Earlier this week, as this reporter waited at Broadway and Spring Street, a taxi pulled up to the bulb to discharge a fare, just ahead of an approaching M1 bus. The bus had to wait for the taxi to move on before it could pull up. Then, once passengers had boarded, the bus was blocked by a truck that was double-parked just beyond the end of the bus bulb, forcing the bus to pull into traffic to get around.