BILL NUMBER:  S53

 TITLE OF BILL :  An act to amend the vehicle and traffic law, in
relation to providing that in a city of one million or more flashing
purple lights may be affixed to and displayed on buses operated on a
bus rapid transit route

 PURPOSE :

To permit the use of flashing purple lights on Metropolitan
Transportation Authority (MTA) or New York City Transit Authority
(NYCTA) buses that are used on the Select Bus Service (SBS) Routes
with off-board fare collection.

 SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS :

Section 1: Amends subdivision 41 of section 375 of the Vehicle and
Traffic Law to add a new subparagraph 1-a so that MTA and NYCTA buses
that are used on SBS Routes are permitted to use flashing purple
lights when running along Select Bus Service Routes.

 JUSTIFICATION :

The Authorities' buses utilized on the SBS Routes had previously
utilized flashing blue lights to signal their approach to passengers.
However, under the current law, blue lights are only authorized for
              

use by volunteer firefighters and EMTs on their vehicles. Although
almost all of fire and EMT emergency services in New York City are
paid professional emergency responders, not volunteer, in the interest
of avoiding confusion with emergency vehicles, even relatively rare
volunteer vehicles, buses on SBS Routes should be authorized to use
flashing purple lights, which is a color not used by any emergency
vehicle under VTL section 375(41).

In addition, emergency vehicles are easy to distinguish from buses, so
the use of different colored lights is not an issue. Without the
flashing purple lights, passengers cannot easily tell when a SBS bus
is coming. This is critical for passengers boarding at stops that
serve both the SBS bus and the local bus, or are nearby. At such
stops, which are common to all SBS routes, Passengers have the option
of-purchasing their ticket from the sidewalk ticket vending machine,
which is needed to board an SBS bus, or using a MetroCard or exact
change to board a local bus. Passengers at these locations must be
able to distinguish well in advance which bus is approaching in order
to exercise one or the other option in time to board the arriving bus.

The flashing purple lights provide the necessary advance notice for
bus patrons. The absence of flashing purple lights on buses on SBS
Routes makes the commute for passengers less convenient and
unnecessarily stressful. This bill would allow the use of flashing
purple lights on buses that are on the SBS Routes that are owned and
operated by the MTA or NYCTA, thereby remedying the problem.

 LEGISLATIVE HISTORY :

S.7068 of 2014 (Hoylman): Died in Transportation
A.6076-C of 2013-2014 (Kellner): Died in Transportation

 FISCAL IMPLICATIONS :

None.

 EFFECTIVE DATE :
This act shall take effect immediately.