Just two weeks after county funding for Long Island Bus was saved, the Hudson Valley Journal-News reports that Westchester County’s Bee Line service may drastically reduce service on certain bus routes.

The county says it is trying to figure out how to fund the system and deal with increasing employee and other administrative costs. Furthermore, ridership, which accounts for about 48% of Bee-Line’s revenue, is projected to decline by about 6% this year as a result of big fare hike riders saw in March.

Although Westchester says no entire routes will be cut, time between buses will increase. At present, no routes were exempt from possible service cuts.

Westchester DOT told the Campaign this week that funding would not be an immediate problem if, when it came to bus funding, the state treated Westchester like other jurisdictions with non-MTA transit systems, such as Nassau, Buffalo, and Albany. The Journal-News reported that since 1998, state aid for Westchester bus service increased 21.4%, while state aid increased 144% to Albany, 63.6% to Buffalo, 52% to Nassau, and 42.3% to Rochester.

In general, non-MTA bus systems downstate are living hand to mouth, and some sort of new funding deal between state government and the responsible county and city governments needs to be struck.

The details of the Westchester funding plan will be released this Friday, when County Executive Andrew Spano releases the proposed Westchester budget for next year. The county budget must be approved by December 27. 

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