Is the 554 page 2015 Transit District Report typical of what's to come?

ONE White Plains documents - hidden on the city website. Monday, June 12, 2023

2015 Transit District Report 554 pages ...

CONSOLIDATED PLAN 2020-2024 148 pages

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The document is a bloated and pretentious mess. Worst of all is that, aside from a new apartment building under construction, the train station and its surrounding area remain the same dysfunctional mess they've been for decades.

The changes to the train station:

1. Corrected bad original design.

2. Made up for three decades of neglect.

Try walking down Barker Avenue, which turns into Water Street for some reason, to the train station. It gets worse the closer you get. You're faced with the same ridiculous array of confusing entry and exit lanes. It's dangerous to walk cross Ferris Avenue. It's the same as before.

There's still no plan for the surface parking lots. Does anyone know who owns the air rights above the train station?

There was a Planning Department event for citizens at the library:

One White Plains Comprehensive Plan Public Workshop - June 12th at 7PM

Was it another "Transit District" caliber attempt to get things organized? It was standing room only.

The Consolidated Plan 2020-2024 referenced above is about housing. Really. It should include other issues.

________________________

Public street made semi private while Barker Avenue is subjected to HUGE buses, trucks and eventually hundreds more cars. Friday, December 24, 2021

One White Plains or a Tale of Two Cities? Wednesday, May 18, 2022

Pedestrian Safety is administered by the Parking Department. Tuesday, February 7, 2023

Second call: NY: Plague: eliminate county benches used by homeless and worse at White Plains train station.

from: Ken
to: George Latimer <ce@westchestergov.com>
cc: digital@lohud.com,
letters@lohud.com,
"Thomas M. Roach" <troach@whiteplainsny.gov>
date: Apr 19, 2020, 8:56 AM
subject: White Plains, NY: Plague: eliminate county benches used by homeless and worse at White Plains train station.

To: County Executive Latimer​​

​CC: Mayor Roach​, ​LoHud​

https://white-plains-ny.blogspot.com/2020/03/plague-eliminate-county-benches-used-by.html

​Come on, do it! Take one day off reading three day old stats about the plague.

They have been infested and infected for years. They serve no purpose, right beside the train station. No normal person will sit on them. The wood should be burned and blasted into outer space. There is debris and abandoned clothing. It looks like the Bronx.

I have not seen a county police officer on the county path next to the White Plains train station this year. I walk there almost every day.

Clean it up. There's no excuse for the filth and health hazard.​

Kenneth Matinale

White Plains, NY

NYC closed 14th Street. What's White Plains doing?

Rhetorical question.

Major Traffic Experiment in N.Y.C.: Cars All but Banned on Major Street

The city takes its crackdown on cars to 14th Street, a crosstown route for 21,000 vehicles a day, which will be virtually off limits.

By Winnie Hu Aug. 8, 2019 nytimes.com

Cars — including taxis and those working for ride-hailing apps — will be banned from driving across a one-mile stretch of 14th Street from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m., seven days a week, under an 18-month pilot program that could be made permanent.
_______________________________

Nothing. White Plains is doing nothing. Oh wait, White Plains got itself declared a transportation hub for the lower Hudson Valley. Why? To get more money for the cheap MTA to finally improve its train station here: catching up on 30 years of neglect and correct fundamental problems with the original design.

In exchange for that White Plains gets a huge influx of regional buses, that not only go to the train station but also drive through the already overcrowded downtown streets. What percent of the passenger seats on those buses are occupied in downtown White Plains? The Hudson Link buses are a complete joke as many, if not most, have had ZERO passengers. ZERO.

Common Council members,:
- Have you ridden a bus in White Plains this millenium?
- Have you traveled to city hall in other than a private car?
- After your ten minute drive from your house to downtown do you walk more than a block from your car?

Common Council candidates and their house constituents drive to a debate at the library and talk about:
- White Plains being walkable
- sustainable White Plains.

Candidates Debate takeaway: Tuesday, June 18, 2019

The half century old White Plains car model is neither walkable nor sustainable but no White Plains decision makers show any real understanding, much less inclination to actually change anything.

Not one downtown 4-5 lane street has been improved. Not one.

Not one downtown street corner has been improved. Not one.

White Plains decision makers have no idea how pedestrian hostile White Plains is because they don't live downtown. They only visit the city for which they make quality of life decisions.

The only issue in White Plains: residents in suburban White Plains houses being able to drive to/from downtown in ten minutes. And they think they're entitled to park for free and don't understand why that's not the policy. White Plains decision makers all know it but none will address it.

Solution: election districts instead of Common Council members being elected at large. The reality is that the house residents keep their own in power and we downtown apartment residents are too dumb and lazy to take over as our numbers would support.

So White Plains schlepps along, the convenient compromise.

Bus mania is to get train station money as hub for east-west Lower Hudson Transit Link?

New York "state's designation of White Plains as the hub for the east-west Lower Hudson Transit Link".

The article quoted below explains some of the illogical decisions by the City of White Plains government in the last five years. The author lives in a White Plains house neighborhood without sidewalks. My comments follow.

Train station renovation key to revival of White Plains neighborhood
by Richard Liebson, Rockland/Westchester Journal News Published April 16, 2019

The tract is crisscrossed by wide, three- and four-lane streets filled with cars, trucks and buses mostly heading for somewhere else...

With about 12,000 weekday riders passing through, White Plains is the busiest station in Westchester and third most active overall, behind only Grand Central Terminal and the Stamford, Connecticut, station...

The MTA originally planned to spend only a few million dollars to spruce up the terminal. The authority decided to up the ante and go all in on the renovation after negotiations with the city, and the state's designation of White Plains as the hub for the east-west Lower Hudson Transit Link over the Hudson River.

The new station, combined with Westchester County's Bee Line bus terminal and an expected influx of Transit Link bus riders from Rockland County, solidify White Plains' importance as a regional transportation center. The combination of state highways and county parkways in and around the city underline that status...

2016 ... year-long study, funded by a $1 million state grant ... zoning that envisions pedestrian- and bike-friendly streets and crosswalks ...

The new zone will create easier circulation to and from the station for vehicles and pedestrians...

The new zoning has resulted in a number of development proposals from private property owners that have been approved or are in the approval process...

Gone at the re-built southern end of the three platforms are the cold, concrete benches, the crumbling platform ceilings, the paper schedules mounted in glass cases and the scratchy, public address system that made announcements difficult to understand.
_______________________________

Mayor Thomas Roach and others have delusions of grandeur dancing in their heads. As documented here, the Hudson Link buses have had almost ZERO passengers. It's been a local, state, federal government boondoggle. The number of cars has not decreased as the number of buses continues to dangerously increase, all at the loss of quality of life for downtown residents. The mayor and almost all Common Council members for the last half century live in house neighborhoods outside downtown. They are elected at large, not by geographic district. The current bad policy is just the most recent because of that basic disconnect.

In what millenium will ANY changes happen? Not ONE street has been changed. Not one. The 4-5 lane one way monstrosities that Mayor Roach mocked many times years ago remain, with their multiple turning lanes and resulting diagonal crossing. White Plains is more pedestrian hostile than ever.

Development proposals? It takes a decade for anything to get built. Sometimes multiple decades.

Most of the train station work is neglected routine maintenance for more than three decades following bad original design. And apparently much of that is due to the city selling out and letting downtown become a giant bus terminal. Of course, none of this impacts any of the Common Council house neighborhoods.

Metro-North Railroad project manager Brad Knote should look a little less pompous and maybe fix the four sided MTA clock tower that's been broken for several years. It's a symbol of incompetence and arrogance.

Train station project mostly repairs neglect. Clock tower remains!

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) designed the White Plains train station badly in the mid 1980s and neglected it.

http://web.mta.info/mnr/wp-reno/wp-reno.html#p1

The current three year project is presented by both the MTA and the City of White Plains as a major change but no matter how many times I read the MTA's own description I come away thinking: so?

The 1980s work omitted heating and cooling and made a roof which did not cover and protect passengers from water when getting on/off trains. Fixing these mistakes is presented as a "significant makeover", yeah of MTA mistakes.

The work that just started seems to be cleaning and painting, you know, like responsible people do for routine maintenance.

Then MTA will make the waiting areas larger. Nice touch. "On-platform vendor space" will presumably be for coffee for the commuters who really count, the ones who drive and park in the garage and don't want to descend to ground level to get a cup of coffee. That's for pedestrians who live in apartments and walk to the station. The Common Council always takes care of its own.

Oh, and replace the disgraceful restrooms.

There will be an "information dashboard", which they sort of already have. And WiFi, presumably like Hastings Tea & Coffee has had on Main Street for years. USB charging stations! Yippie!

The new side platform sounds good, whatever that is.

Since "only 11 parking spaces will be displaced", that means that the fleeting idea of removing the parking garage was dumped along with any real attempt to get residents to/from the train station other than by residents driving their cars and parking them for ten hours. Not an efficient use of resources, either personal or municipal. I guess they could take the county Bee-Line bus. Nah.

Clock tower remains! Yes, that symbol of MTA incompetence and White Plains mediocrity. The primary photo shows no substantive change in the station design and retains the clock tower, which has not kept correct time for years. About three years ago MTA simply set all four sides to noon/midnight. So in three years when this project is complete, the clock tower will be there but will time be correct? Hey, why not fix the clock NOW?

"Installation of a new sidewalk between Hamilton Ave. and the lobby entrance". Right now there is no crosswalk on the west side of Hamilton on Bank Street or west of the tracks for people on the pathway. What's happening to facilitate pedestrian crossing of Hamilton Ave. anywhere near the train tracks, including people on the Bronx River Pathway on foot or bike? Right now even project workers must wait for a traffic opening and dash across to get from one part of the work area to another. The City did not even have enough common sense to deal with that.

The new station should be a big improvement, if only because the MTA neglected the current station so much for so long. But functionally it does not seem to be very different. Maybe it will at least clear the way for the Common Council to finally put those ground level parking areas to good use, like generating tax money.

Strategic Arms Limitation Talks: the Transit District model.

Say what?

Strategic Arms Limitation Talks

The Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT) were two rounds of bilateral conferences and corresponding international treaties involving the United States and the Soviet Union, the Cold War superpowers, on the issue of arms control. The two rounds of talks and agreements were SALT I and SALT II...

The talks led to the STARTs, or Strategic Arms Reduction Treaties ... which proposed limits on multiple-warhead capacities and other restrictions on each side's number of nuclear weapons.
___________________________

Instead of reducing the number of nuclear weapons, a new higher limit was agreed to. That's what the City of White Plains is doing with its expansion and especially with the planning being done in the new Transit District near the train station and bus terminal.

The final report of the Transit District emphasizes lots of environmental stuff along with lots of growth, much of which is the addition of thousands of new high rent apartments. What's lost in all this is that the number of new parking spaces will exceed the number of new apartments.

DOWNTOWN WHITE PLAINS TRANSIT DISTRICT FINAL REPORT Sunday, March 18, 2018

Fewer parking spaces will reduce the number of cars downtown. So why add thousands?
____________________________

So rather than reigning in traffic and pollution, the City of White Plains is establishing big increases. No there's no other interpretation. But it's being presented as responsible planned growth. And it continues to ignore:

1. Decades of the City of White Plains allowing rush hour traffic to go through downtown streets, especially Hamilton Avenue. Those cars don't stop to pay sales tax, they just drive through.

2. Regional buses driving on downtown streets to/from the train station without any real explanation of how that is good for White Plains generally and downtown specifically. Most passengers are probably simply getting on a Metro North train into Manhattan. Are most of the rest getting on private buses taking them to jobs in the corporate parks along 287? That would be ironic, since the buses just got off 287, many having crossed the new bridge over the Hudson River.

Part of the problem is that proposals to have light rail along 287 went nowhere, in part, because White Plains did little or nothing to promote it. Now under the guise of public transportation, White Plains is mindlessly allowing HUGE regional buses to come all the way to the train station. It sounds like a nice regional plan but what's in it for downtown White Plains other than for politicians who live in houses in the suburbs of White Plains to feel like big shots?

Hamilton Plaza project.

from:		Ken
to:		aley@akrf.com, hanqing.wu@rwdi.com, edyta.chruscinski@rwdi.com
cc:		planning@whiteplainsny.gov, "transitdistrict@whiteplainsny.gov"
date:		Sun, Mar 18, 2018 at 9:49 AM
subject:		Microsoft Word - 200 Hamilton Avenue_Final Scope_05012017

http://www.cityofwhiteplains.com/DocumentCenter/View/2387

​Walking down Hamilton Avenue in recent days has been VERY difficult because of the wind. Unfortunately, for 50 years it has been one of many desolate, wind-swept mega streets in downtown White Plains. It's good that wind is being considered in design. I hope it's not too late to mitigate the existing problems.

In the last two years the City of White Plains has allowed bus traffic to/from the bus terminal adjacent to the train station and the train station itself to increase dramatically. Are you aware of that and has it been factored into your design?

On a more fundamental level, has the City of White Plains even considered, much less explained, how this increased bus traffic benefits the City of White Plains? The only benefit would seem to be the sad little coffee shop at the train station that these commuters pass.

And you're adding another 1,000 parking spaces? What happened to the presumption that millennials will forgo cars? You can never have enough lanes or enough parking spaces. Try something different. Don't continue to compound the problem. 

​Just try walking around that area. Just try it. Try walking to the walking ​path on the west side of the tracks from say 4 Martine Avenue after 4 PM. Experience the impediments and danger.

White Plains is pedestrian hostile in the extreme. It's Motown on steroids. All that matters to its decision makers is for it to be convenient for them to drive and park in downtown for their amusement: shopping, restaurants, etc.

Milagros Lecuona challenges Mayor Tom Roach.

White Plains Democrat to challenge incumbent mayor

Christopher J. Eberhart , ceberhart@lohud.com Published 8:23 p.m. ET Jan. 26, 2017 Updated 2:08 p.m. ET Feb. 1, 2017

from: Ken
to: Milagros Lecuona ,

"Thomas M. Roach"
date: Sun, Feb 5, 2017 at 6:19 PMsubject: White Plains Democrat to challenge incumbent mayor

It's good to have two strong candidates. I think you both have worked hard and smart. Unfortunately, there is little to show, especially in downtown where I live. If anything, the quality of life has gotten worse, especially with all that ridiculous BUS traffic.​

I hope that specific goals will be set, which means things that can be measured and attained. That LCOR project (on Bank Street) took 8 years to start. Wasn't approval for 60 South Broadway done in the summer of 2015? The mall's been emptied out with no development in sight.

That's been a trademark of White Plains, going back at least to the silly hole in the ground created by the demolition of the train station (in the 1970s), best known for the police arresting "perverts" in the men's room. Trees started growing there before, finally, the twin towers, now known as 15 Bank Street, went up.

White Plains needs to do better. A lot better. Don't promise what you cannot deliver. Good luck to you both.

Adirondack Trailways buses continue to ROAR down Barker Avenue rather than Hamilton.

To: Common Council members

Why is it good for White Plains to have these huge regional buses go into downtown?

Why let them move on residential streets rather than restrict them to Hamilton Avenue from North Broadway to the train station?

Online Form Submittal: Downtown White Plains Transit District Study

Comments?	Why have so many more buses been moving through downtown White Plains in 2016? How is that good for residents, especially regional buses, when there are no local buses to get around WP?
Ideas?	Get rid of the buses. WP train station has become the functional equivalent of the Port Authority Bus Terminal.
Concerns?	2000-2016: what's the most imaginative thing done by WP city government? If nothing, fire commissioners like traffic and public safety.

Not so strategic is the Downtown Task Force plan.

Mayor Roach and planning commissioner Gomez led tonight's presentation. Both are energetic, intelligent and sincere. Unfortunately, the entire activity is weighed down with traditional White Plains junk, namely adhering to the wishes of the existing sources of influence: people who live in houses outside of downtown. Especially influential are the hill associations, Battle and Fisher, especially Battle.

Blah, blah, blah.

That was pretty much the comments by all of tonight's speakers. But without realizing it, Roach and Gomez represented the narrow wishes of the geographically isolated and small number of people living on Battle Hill on the wrong side of the tracks. The city already has detailed plans for new street crossings for that constituency. Does any other neighborhood have that?

They think they got input from all sources but they only got Battle Hill, Fisher Hill and, of course, CNA, which Roach and Gomez will placate in yet another meeting tomorrow. I don't think they visited or heard from any condo, co-op or rental apartment building.

Typical telling point by Gomez: Battle Hill wants new downtown buildings angled so that Hill people can look through openings between them. No regard for the view of the new people who will be living in them; Gomez was oblivious to that. He thought he was showing open mindedness but what he actually showed was the silly undue influence of the very few people on Battle Hill who might actually have a view across the tracks of downtown White Plains. Most people on Battle Hill have no such view.

The MTA guy, who represents an entity that continues to embarrass itself and White Plains with that ridiculous clock tower with the wrong time, babbled about White Plains having all these regional buses coming into downtown. Neither he nor any of the others have ever seemed to wonder how the heck that benefits White Plains. You think someone hops off a Connecticut Transit bus and shops in White Plains or simply takes the Metro North train into Manhattan?

And those reverse commuters the mayor and MTA guy like to emphasize: are they actually coming to White Plains from Manhattan as implied or are they coming from elsewhere, both north and south? Many are leaving the train station around 11AM and walking up Hamilton Avenue or Main Street. I'm guessing that they are headed to jobs in retail sales or service, not some law office. I doubt they can afford the rents that new buildings will charge.

I walked past the dreary bus terminal at the White Plains train station today at about 4:30 PM. Many Westchester county Bee-Line buses, including doubles, were pulling in, all with almost no passengers. Who wants to live at the functional equivalent of Port Authority Bus Terminal?

These are just a few of the obvious contradictions and absurdities in the primitive plan. The mayor and planning commissioner want to dictate to developers all manner of detail. A fundamental problem is that they are way too influenced by narrow old line perspectives and worse, they don't realize it.

Irony: City asks State for money for pedestrians and cyclists! To protect them from all the HUGE buses?

Irony abounds, as do HUGE buses, many on regional routes that now slash through downtown White Plains for no apparent reason. But wait. White Plains decision makers want to protect its most vulnerable residents.

Email message received:

from:		WP Transit District <transitdistrict@whiteplainsny.gov>via mail148.suw12.mcsv.net
reply-to:		WP Transit District
to:		ken
date:		Tue, Oct 11, 2016 at 10:54 AM
subject:		Support Pedestrian and Bicycle Improvements in the White Plains Transit District

Pledge your support for proposed bicyclist and pedestrian improvements in the White Plains Transit District by clicking here.

The City of White Plains is applying for a New York State Transportation Alternatives Program Grant that proposes to fund:

• Sidewalk Improvements
• Crosswalk Improvements
• A protected bike lane on Martine Avenue
• Cycle tracks on Hamilton Avenue and Main Street
• Expanded & secure bike parking in the Transit District

Your support will strengthen the City's application and further the goals of a vibrant and welcoming Transit District. You can pledge your support below. 

For more information about the City's grant application click here.
 _______________________

You can't make up stuff like this. The current bike lanes are a joke. I've challenged the task force and Common Council to have group bike rides on the bike lanes, especially through the train station area ... without police escort. That has not occurred.

In addition to the many decades of high speed traffic on the dozen or so roads of at least four lanes that slash through downtown White Plains, there are now buses that park where bike lanes would be and drive, especially during evening rush hour, when, apparently, no Common Council member would dare to observe.

But, the current initiative can't hurt. At least it's lip service in the right direction, maybe intended to attract those thousands of millennials upon whom the City is counting to fill its coffers for decades to come but not proportionately burden its school system with, you know, children. Many of the new apartments to be built are too small for families and some are mere crash pads for transients.

Transit District scenarios A, B, C. Two demolish parking garage! Yippie!

Transmania unchained!

An interpretation of public presentation by White Plains planning commissioner Chris Gomez Sept. 28, 2016. Derived from video at transitdistrict.com

There is also PowerPoint stuff: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0ByAWC5bf9-kYRVNoWXNWN056QzA/view

Four WP city owned parcels east of train station:
- firehouse
- parking garage
- station lot (drop off/pick up)
- Bronx Street lot

Long Term Scenarios:
A:
- firehouse: no change
- parking garage: no change
- station lot (drop off/pick up): buildings
- Bronx Street lot: park

B:
- firehouse: building on south edge?
- parking garage: demolish garage; buildings
- station lot (drop off/pick up): park
- Bronx Street lot: buildings

Babbling about new "bus rapid transit" something. Argh.

C:
- firehouse: building on south edge?
- parking garage: demolish garage; buildings
- station lot (drop off/pick up): park and building
- Bronx Street lot: buildings
______________

Add parking on firehouse lot in B and C?

There are two private things immediately east, which were not mentioned:
- parking garage with the infamous county Bee-Line bus terminal on street level
- surface level parking lot north of Hamilton Avenue.

East of the private surface parking is church property that could be developed.

Demolition of the train station parking garage has been recommended here previously, so it's encouraging that demolition is being considered.

Also welcome was there was no mention of a new train station building. Wasting valuable space on such a relic would be foolish.

Millennials to the suburbs on bikes?

Wow, the mayor and planning commissioner must be right:

Bike Lanes Are Bringing More Millennials to the Suburbs by Clare Trapasso July 20, 2016 6:00 am ET realtor.com

It’s what passes for conventional wisdom these days ...
_____________________

The task force and/or Common Council should do a sanity check.

Mount up as a group and ride bicycles around downtown White Plains on the bike lanes. Be sure to ride through the Transmania train station and bus depot area. Try it along the streets with the most buses.

Go ahead, I dare you. Then report back to the public on your experience.

What's that, you know improvements must be made? Improvements so massive and unimaginable by current planners, decision makers and administrators, that such a group ride would not be attempted without a police escort.

Until you've done this simple common sense thing, you have not even begun to deal with transforming the Transmania into something Earthlings might recognize as positive.

Reduce parking to reduce traffic.

It's pretty basic common sense stuff. If you want to increase traffic to and near the Transmania train station and bus depot complex, continue to do what the City of White Plains seems compelled to do:

- establish and maintain massive multi-lane high speed roads
- build and maintain massive parking structures
- encourage and/or allow a sudden massive influx of buses to invade downtown with apparently no restrictions, oversight or even awareness.

Oh, wait. The buses are some rocket scientist's idea for reducing traffic. Yeah, that might seem to make sense in the abstract but here on planet Earth, Westchester County, people middle class and up wouldn't be caught dead on a bus. It's not at all like Manhattan.

On the other hand, if you reduced parking, such as by demolishing the municipal parking garage, then people would naturally figure out other ways to get to the Transmania. Why not let them, instead of bureaucrats, elected officials and consultants pretending to do that? Commuters might then demand stuff like Uber, buses that work for buildings and neighborhoods, whatever. Or they could simply ride the current buses. Those buses are almost empty almost all the time in White Plains. Of course, the buses might then need to run at times when people actually need them.

Bus commissioner?

Who the heck is in charge? Neither Westchester County nor the City of White Plains seems to have a responsible adult who knows why downtown White Plains is inundated with buses (public and private), many of which have taken to residential streets near the train station - bus depot area.

Many, maybe most, of these buses have either no passengers or hardly any passengers, which makes an inquiring mind wonder what the heck is actually going on. Is there any oversight? For the county Bee-Line bus system, who, if anyone, knows how and why our tax money is being spent?

http://transportation.westchestergov.com/contact-us

Department of Public Works and Transportation
100 East 1st Street
Mount Vernon, New York 10550

BeeLine@westchestergov.com

Smart Commute Program

Lawrence Cunningham, Program Specialist (914) 813-6718 llc7@westchestergov.com
Mary Ellen Burns, Program Specialist (914) 813-7741 mbb4@westchestergov.com

Planning Studies

Naomi Klein, Director of Planning (914) 813-7758 nkk3@westchestergov.com
Craig Lader, Principal Planner (914) 813-7759 cmla@westchestergov.com

_____________________________

http://www.cityofwhiteplains.com/index.aspx?nid=97

White Plains Parking and Traffic

John Larson Commissioner jlarson@whiteplainsny.gov

Thomas Soyk Deputy Commissioner/City Transportation Engineer tsoyk@whiteplainsny.gov

255 Main St. (Annex Building)
White Plains, NY 10601 Ph: 914-422-1232

______________________________

Let's send messages at all of them.

from: Ken
to: BeeLine@westchestergov.com,
llc7@westchestergov.com,
mbb4@westchestergov.com,
nkk3@westchestergov.com,
cmla@westchestergov.com,
jlarson@whiteplainsny.gov,
Tom Soyk <tsoyk@whiteplainsny.gov>
cc: transitdistrict@whiteplainsny.gov,
Rob Astorino <ce@westchestergov.com>,
letters@lohud.com,
news12wc@news12.com,
Benjamin Boykin <benboy78@aol.com>,
Alfreda Williams <awilliams@westchesterlegislators.com>
date: Tue, Jul 12, 2016 at 12:14 AM
subject: White Plains, NY - Bus commissioner?

Rename train station "Port Authority Bus Terminal like mess".

Might as well make it accurate and descriptive. The City of White Plains apparently has no interest in controlling the impact of regional issues that have encroached into its train station area, the one where it supposedly is trying to introduce something novel in White Plains: imagination.

It has all the imagination and charm of the mid town Manhattan Port Authority Bus Terminal.

The area looks like it has been invaded by bus driving creatures from outer space. Like some really bad 1950s science fiction movie with no plot, just empty buses deployed for no apparent reason. Hey, maybe they drove here from another planet. That would make more sense than a governmental entity planning and/or approving such activity.

Can the city influence the routes of county Bee-Line buses?

Rhetorical question. Obviously, not, either because it's incapable or oblivious.

A couple of days ago at about 5:30 PM I observed a "Not in Service" Bee-Line bus speeding down residential Barker Avenue heading towards the Transmania bus depot at the train station. Nice. That bus could, of course, have been driven down non-residential Hamilton Avenue just as easily but given the binary decision the greater evil was chosen.

There appears to be complete and perfect apathy by White Plains policy makers. Residents of downtown apartments are necessary extras in their unimaginative script. We are not real. And the script calls for thousands more, ever younger and far more affluent. The well educated affluent young would never accept the old apartment buildings that are substandard in both their electrical and plumbing systems. All the new apartment buildings planned will have both electric stoves and washing machines in each overpriced apartment.

But will such millennials accept the treatment of current residents?

Hamilton Avenue needs to be TWO way for cars as well as buses.

This is an absolute for whatever changes are made in the train station area. Instead of having all those cars speeding out of the garage onto Water Street, which becomes residential Barker Avenue, have them exit onto multi lane Hamilton Avenue.

In recent decades Hamilton Avenue has been one way from Martin Luther King Blvd. towards the train station. Obviously, this is to move cars through downtown White Plains as quickly as possible during the evening rush hour. Keeping it that way is assumed by almost all WP office holders and those seeking to become. That uniform thinking must end.

Final analysis of Trainsmania mess: probable disaster.

Email Sent:

White Plains, NY: Trancenter task force: three points of failure.

from:		Ken
to:		transitdistrict@whiteplainsny.gov
date:		Mon, Jun 20, 2016 at 4:41 PM

http://white-plains-ny.blogspot.com/2016/04/trancenter-task-force-three-points-of.html

​This is pretty much my final analysis. Everything is pointing to total failure. Trying to protect the current city center is part of the problem. Another is the willingness of decision makers to let the train station area become even more a downtown armpit than it has been for decades with the delusion that millennials will save the day and live in the armpit with all the charm of the mid town Port Authority Bus Terminal.

________________________

Wednesday, April 6, 2016

Luxury rental apartments near: train station cool, bus depot NOT cool.

Port Authority Bus Terminal Manhattan

NOBODY is his/her right mind wants to live near a bus depot, which currently exits at the White Plains train station ...

________________________