Bedraggled riders of the B63 bus weren’t the least bit surprised to hear that their tortoise-like ride is actually the slowest in Brooklyn — averaging less than 5 miles per hour, according to the Straphangers Campaign.
“It is very slow,” said Lewis Calor of Bay Ridge.
The B63 crawls up crowded Fifth Avenue from Calor’s neighborhood through Sunset Park and Downtown before terminating at the western end of Atlantic Avenue.
Straphangers clocked it at 4.9 miles per hour, just a tick or so faster than the average pedestrian, who motors along at a comparably brisk three miles per hour.
Some riders have become numb to the pain of a commute that takes 90 minutes from end to end — longer than an Amtrak to Philadelphia, according to the Straphangers’ report.
“It’s all right,” said Charles Gomez, a Red Hook resident. “In the early morning, it does take time, but it still gets there.”
The Straphangers Campaign speculated that the slow pace of the B63 was due primarily to traffic-flow problems.
“The B63 goes up Fifth Avenue, so once you hit a few red lights, you tend to hit red lights the rest of the way up,” said Kate Contino, a Straphangers spokeswoman. “We [also] see areas of double parking, which slows the bus down.”
But the group thinks it may have the answer.
“One measure that may improve speed would be [bus priority signals] on buses that helps switch the lights [to keep the bus on schedule],” said Contino. “Other strategies include wider lanes, and, at high- volume areas, we are suggesting pre-boarding fare machines.”
