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As part of its "Extending Transit's Reach" plan, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) is trying to make life a little bit easier for cyclists around town by installing a number of bike racks at subway stations, commuter rail stations throughout the Metro-North and LIRR territories and on the front of some buses.
Specifically, you can expect front-of-bus bike racks to be added to the S79 SBS, Q44 SBS and M60 SBS routes—respectively crossing the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge, the Whitestone Bridge and the RFK Bridge. The apparatuses are already part of four other routes.
The agency has also announced a partnership with the New York City Department of Transportation (DOT) to install rack clusters at 37 different subway stations that, according to the official plan, "do not currently have bike parking within 100 feet of the station entrance." The same process will unfold at 18 commuter rail stations within the LIRR and Metro-North territories.
Perhaps even more excitingly, the MTA is planning on extending access to its bike-sharing services, further ameliorating the city's commuting situation.
Bridge improvements are also on the docket: three ramps are being built on the Robert F. Kennedy Bridge to provide better access between Randall's Island, Manhattan and the Bronx while the lower level of the Henry Hudson Bridge will finally be made wider so that ADA-compliant ramps could eventually be installed on both the north and south side of the bridge.
"It's time for the MTA to fully embrace bicycle, pedestrian and micromobility access as we plan and expand New York's transit system," said MTA chair and CEO Janno Lieber in an official statement. "Extending Transit’s Reach provides a framework to better integrate MTA subway, bus, and commuter rail service with the ways that New Yorkers are increasingly using to get around. It will enable the MTA to attract new riders to the system, and to harness increasingly popular modes of transportation to essentially expand the transit system."
This isn't the city's only push towards cycling-related upgrades. Back in November of last year, the DOT announced its plans to install a parking-protected bike lane on almost 40 blocks of 10th Avenue, for example.
A few months before that, governor Kathy Hochul signed a bill mandating that all would-be New York drivers learn about pedestrian and bicyclist safety.
The city is clearly making a point.