About 200 East Harlem residents rallied to oppose the reopening of NYC Transit's E. 100th Street bus depot yesterday. The demonstration was led by NYC City Council member Phillip Reed and State Assembly member Nelson Dennis. The MTA plans to reopen and expand the depot, which was closed last year. The demonstrators pointed to East Harlem's very high asthma rate and the fact that Harlem hosts most of the bus depots in Manhattan.

"It's going to remain a bus depot. We need it now more than ever," MTA representative Al O'Leary told the Daily News, citing ridership pressure on NYC Transit's bus fleet.

Environmental, civic and business groups have called on the MTA to invest more in compressed natural gas (CNG) buses and fueling facilities, and to stop buying diesel buses. The Natural Resources Defense Council points out that the MTA's capital program proposal includes construction of two new diesel bus depots and expansion of six others, including the E. 100th Street site. The depot work and need for bus fleet expansion are opportunities the MTA could use to move decisively away from reliance on diesels, but the agency's planned CNG bus purchases may not even keep pace with the fleet's expansion.

Pressure from neighborhood and city-wide environmental groups on the clean-fuel bus issue is expected to increase as the legislature weighs the capital program proposal. For more information, see www.nrdc.org

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