to 8th Street. Both lines turned left onto East 8th Street (also known as St. Marks Place) east towards Broadway. The current M5 and M55 follow a similar route, except the M55 does not run on Broadway north of St. Marks Place after the pedestrian plazas were implemented.
M5
The M5 starts at 31st Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues, using Sixth Avenue northbound and Fifth Avenue southbound until it reaches Central Park South. This corridor is shared by the
M7. There, the M5 runs crosstown along Central Park South (West 59th Street) and uptown along Broadway from Columbus Circle to West 72nd Street, where it crosses over to the southern terminus of Riverside Drive. This Broadway section is shared by the M7 and M104, and 72nd Street is shared by the street's M72 crosstown bus route, as well as the M57. The route shifts to Riverside Drive, parallel to Broadway and runs the entire length of the street. This portion is not served by any other bus route. At 135th Street, the bus route goes back to Broadway, where it meets the M4 route, and continues up that street until Fort Washington Avenue, where the M4 shifts on that street to head to The Cloisters while the M5 continues up Broadway until the George Washington Bridge Bus Station at 178th Street.[4]
M55
An M55 Nova Bus RTS-06 bus at its northern terminal in Midtown.
Northbound M55 route begins at South Ferry and runs uptown on Church Street and Sixth Avenues until 44th Street, where it terminates. Southbound M55 buses run along Fifth Avenue to East 8th Street, turned left onto East 8th Street (also known as St. Marks Place) east towards Broadway. At Broadway, M55 turned right and terminates at Whitehall Street along the Staten Island Ferry Whitehall Terminal bus loop.[5]
The M5 is based out of
Michael J. Quill Depot
.
During the daytime on weekdays, all M5 buses make limited stops between 135th and 157th Streets, as well as between 72nd and 42nd Streets. M5 Limited buses serve all local stops south of 42nd Street, between 72nd and 135th Streets and north of 157th Street. When the M5 Limited is running, there is no M5 local service.[4] The M55 runs local at all times.[5]
History
Streetcar service
Getting on the Broadway trolley at Herald Square, 1913Bond of the Broadway Surface Railroad Company, issued 1. July 1884
The
8th Street, north of which both directions used University Place to Union Square. North of Union Square, tracks were built in Broadway to north of Times Square, where it merged with the Broadway and Seventh Avenue Railroad's other line, along Seventh Avenue, to end at Seventh Avenue and 59th Street
.
On May 8, 1884,
conduit
in May 1901.
The Broadway and Seventh Avenue Railroad was leased by the
Manhattan and Bronx Surface Transit Operating Authority
took over operations in 1962.
Reroutes along north-south avenues
When Broadway from
Church Street.[7] Following the one-way conversions of Sixth Avenue below 34th Street to one-way northbound, and of Broadway between 34th and 23rd Streets and between 14th and Canal Streets to one-way southbound, on November 10, 1963, the NYCO's Sixth Avenue bus (numbered 5) was discontinued and absorbed into the 6, now designated the Broadway-Seventh Avenue-Avenue of the Americas Line, and later M6.[8]
DesignLine EcoSaver IV
bus on the M5 in Greenwich Village (2009)
Meanwhile, the
one-way southbound between Columbus Circle and Herald Square in 1957, requiring the northbound 5 to turn at 57th Street onto Eighth Avenue en route to Columbus Circle.[9]
Bus service
In the first decade following MABSTOA's 1962 takeover of all Fifth Avenue Coach and
Theater District south of 47th Street and around Herald Square in 2009 resulted in major changes to the M6's southbound service, with the northern half of the route shifting to Seventh Avenue before returning to Broadway in the vicinity of Union Square. On July 13, 2009, southbound M6 service was rerouted to run across 23rd Street instead of 14th Street to provide more consistent service.[14] On June 27, 2010, due to budget problems, the M6 was discontinued and the M5 was extended to South Ferry via Broadway to replace former M1 and M6 service south of Houston Street.[15]
In January 2016, it was proposed to split the M5 into two routes. The uptown section would continue to operate as the M5, running between Washington Heights and West 37th Street in Midtown. The downtown section would be the M55, a new route between Midtown and South Ferry.
Penn Station and Herald Square; the M55 would run between West 44th Street, two blocks north of Bryant Park, and South Ferry, starting on January 8, 2017.[18] The new route would provide 88% of M5 customers to have reliable service without transferring, since many customers from both ends wanted to retain service to Midtown (the area between 34th Street and 59th Street). The M5 would continue to have limited-stop service during the daytime, while the M55 would operate local at all times.[18] Other ideas to improve reliability, which included restoring the M5 and M6 to their pre-2010 services and converting the M5 into a Select Bus Service route, were rejected. A three-legged transfer was provided to M5 and M55 customers along Fifth and Sixth Avenues.[18][19] The split M5 and M55 services began on January 8, 2017.[19]
from the original on February 6, 2020. Retrieved February 6, 2020.
^"Manhattan and Bronx Surface Transit Operating Authority: The First Ten Years." Motor Coach Age, May 1972.
^"M6 Southbound Route Revised". mta.info. Metropolitan Transportation Authority. July 13, 2009. Archived from the original on September 15, 2020. Retrieved March 13, 2020.
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Media related to M5 (New York City bus) at Wikimedia Commons
