Except the part about the BQE and buses. I take the express bus to Manhattan from SI’s North Shore every single day – there are dedicated bus lanes on the Staten Island Expwy and the BQE, both of which work quite well. From the time I step on the bus until the bus arrives in Manhattan takes about 30 min. most days. Of course, this would be longer from the South Shore, but if a bus lane were built in the median of the West Shore, not by a whole lot. Of course, there’s still getting from downtown to your destination in Manhattan, but that’s another issue entirely. Furthermore, I’ve tried commuting via Hudson-Bergen Light Rail and PATH – it’s no faster than taking the express bus.

Bottom line, though, is Staten Islanders need more transit options, both locally and regionally. Putting a light rail line down Richmond Ave. AND bus lanes in the West Shore median is the best way to do this.

….only if they commute at 3 AM….. I’m assuming you mean go through Bayonne to the Holland Tunnel or into Brooklyn and take the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel. The BQE is isn’t “quick” during either rush hour and neither is the Verrrazano Narrows Bridge. I suppose they could make a bus lane in the Holland but that’s not going to be very popular. And there are no highways in Bayonne so that “quick” bus ride means a trip on local streets through Bayonne and Jersey City…. Extend the Hudson Bergen Light Rail and they can get to PATH, two seat ride but they won’t get stuck in traffic. Or use frieght ROW to connect with the Northeast Corridor line in Linden or Elizabeth. From the images on Google it looks like it’s still active in Staten Island. You either going over unused ROW to get to Linden/Elizabeth or through freight yards to Newark but there is railroad already there.

The Richmond Ave. route does not necessarily preclude park-and-rides. There’s plenty of room for park and rides at many of the stations, and there should be park and rides – in addition to pedestrian access. A West Shore Expwy route is a death knell for the latter, because nobody lives by the West Shore Expwy. Pedestrians and park-and-rides is not an either/or proposition (Huguenot SIR station, for example, is good for both).

Most of the West Shore will be occupied by a park in the future. Once again, people will not live there.

Richmond Ave. does have a decent number of buses, but they’re famously slow, unreliable local buses, at the end of the day, middle-income people – i.e., SI residents – will not ride on local buses. Hell, I don’t. But, people who will not ride on a local bus will take a train (or an express bus/BRT route). And there’s really no reason to “serve” the West Shore Expwy corridor with transit because, once again, nobody lives there.

That’s not to say they should do nothing with the West Shore Expwy. median. A better idea would be run the light rail along Richmond, and fit the West Shore median with a BRT lane, which could be used to provide South Shore commuters with a quick, one-seat ride to Manhattan – a key SI transit problem.

In any case, I think everyone agrees that the North Shore line should be a priority – and it is.

However, while the SIEDC was conducting this study and collecting public input, it seems that the majority of folks who attended stated that the West Shore expressway was their preference. I am not sure of the reasons behind this, but to speculate:
1. Nimbyism. People want the trains to run where they are furthest from homes.
2. They drive on the west shore expressway and therefore automatically assume that transit should go there, too
3. They assume that a Richmond Avenue line would be slower (which might be true)
4. SI residents want park-and-rides, not walk-up stations and TOD. There would still be opportunities for park and rides on the Richmond Avenue route, though.
5. Real estate development on the west shore. But there’s plenty of opportunity by the Mall and the shopping centers, too.
6. The one reason i’ve heard that actually seems somewhat reasonable in my opinion is that the Richmond Avenue corridor is already served pretty well by buses.

In any case, I agree with Yonah that building the North Shore line – but as an extension of the existing Staten Island Railroad rather than as a disconnected light rail line or BRT – should be the top priority.

Stops (north to south): Port Richmond, Forest Ave., Victory Blvd/CSI, Travis Ave., Staten Island Mall, Arthur Kill Rd./Transit Center, Annadale Road, Huguenot.

Most of the right-of-way for this route is either a)in medians or b)alongside Richmond Ave. (the line could run opposite the shopping plazas on Richmond in the center of the Island – there’s literally nothing there. Further north, it would skirt the CSI campus and Willowbrook Park – once again, nothing there). It would require little more right-of-way acquisition than the currently proposed route and would serve far more people. The fact that they want to run this thing down the West Shore Expressway shows a disheartening lack of creativity – or outright foolishness – on the part of the borough’s leadership. This has been Staten Island’s problem for too long. A rather obvious route is there for the taking – why not take it?

If any readers are on SI and want learn more, there’s a Community Board 3 meeting on the issue tonight: http://www.silive.com/news/advance/index.ssf?/base/news/1237203903324670.xml&coll=1 (scroll to the bottom). I’ll be there

The train lines are good in theory, but considering the point of view of the politicians, the benefit of the lines would be minimal. The first thing Borough President Molinaro said after the announcement of the project is that he is accepting suggestions for where to build the park-and-rides. It’s as if his goal is to generate more parking (and driving), not promote transit. He will of course oppose higher-density zoning changes that are necessary for the West Shore rail line to be successful.

And I agree with what Jarrett says above. The broader New York Metro Area is not at all well served by the long-outdated jurisdictional boundaries that the state lines have left us.

But you also mention in passing that the interstate nature of the project is reason to assume it could never happen.

You may be right, but the reasons for this are purely matters of turf, and transit advocates need to push back hard against those.

There are many places where a logical line runs across a jurisdictional boundary, and where it’s logical for this line to be a local service on both sides of that boundary. If we are too deferential to notions of turf such as “all transit internal to NYC is run by MTA”, we kill these ideas in the cradle, and we end up with less efficient and logical regional networks.

There are also examples of courageous political leadership overcoming these issues, and those need to be cited as needed.