The bus stop at Ocean Avenue and Oriental Boulevard in Manhattan Beach has been gone for almost three years now, but questions are lingering this week about who exactly requested the removal.
Questions began to crop up recently after neighborhood residents began complaining about potentially dangerous crowding at the bus stop in front Falmouth Street and Oriental Boulevard.
Last week the Bay News reported that – according to New York City Transit – the bus stop at Ocean Avenue and Oriental Boulevard was revoked back in 2005 after the Department of Transportation (DOT) received a request from at least one Manhattan Beach resident and Assemblymember Steve Cymbrowitz.
Cymbrowitz’s office adamantly denies that he made any such request, and later challenged NYC Transit’s assertions.
Andrew Inglesby, assistant director of Government & Community Relations for NYC Transit, responded to Cymbrowitz’s office by saying that, indeed, the removal of the Ocean Avenue bus stop, as well as another on Hastings Street, were initiated by the DOT with approval from NYC Transit, but that “any indication that Assemblymember Cymbrowitz had requested these removals is incorrect.”
When asked for clarification, however, NYC Transit spokesperson Deirdre Parker told this newspaper that their information regarding the revoked bus stops and Cymbrowitz came from the DOT.
“That’s the information that we have from DOT,” Parker said. “If it’s not true, then the DOT gave us misinformation.”
According to Parker, their information came directly from Tajinder S. Jassal, director, Bus Stop Management for NYC Transit.
Tajinder could not be reached for comment, but DOT spokesperson Craig Chin said that the request to remove the Ocean Avenue bus stop came from Cymbrowitz or “someone representing” Cymbrowitz — and a homeowner who complained of people sitting on their steps and littering.
Cymbrowitz spokesperson Oswalt Heymann again said this week that the office has no record of the assemblyman making a request to have the Ocean Avenue bus stop removed.
“There is no documentation in our files or any memory of that stop being removed,” he said, adding, “we know how important that bus stop was to the community.”
