NYC Adds Luggage Racks to Airport Buses But Not Service

MTA Luggage Rack

The MTA rolled out the first buses with luggage racks this week. The racks, which replace several seats toward the back of the bus, will be on the M60 route between Broadway and 125th St. and LaGuardia Airport. Eventually, the MTA will have racks on 10 buses on seven routes that include stops at LaGuardia or Kennedy Airport. The routes include B15, Q3, Q10, Q33, Q48, and Q72.

Many other cities offer luggage racks on select routes. It is an interesting balance. The M60 bus is goes from Broadway and 125th street to LaGuardia, with stops in Astoria, and is local, and runs roughly every 10 minutes. The Q48 runs from the terminus of the 7 Subway to LaGuardia, also local, and operates roughly every half hour.

The subway also offers a connection to the JFK AirTrain at the Howard Beach station(A Train), and the E,J,Z and the Jamaica LIRR station, but the connection costs $5 to take the AirTrain into JFK on top of the transit fare.

The city hasn’t redrawn the airport connections in years and he only Express Bus Service from the heart of Manhattan to the airport is privately operated New York Airport Service, which charges $12 to LaGuardia and $15 to JFK.

These shuttles should be more efficient. Why is there no shuttle that just runs from Astoria and Willets Point, the two closest subway stations to LaGuardia, to that airport? Why does the Port Authority charge $5 to ride its short shuttle train to JFK? Does that really encourage people to take the public transit option? Why is there no city-operated express bus service to the airports?

The MTA should be looking at new options, and while the luggage racks are nice, they don’t change much.