I need to get to my office on time. But what if I live far away? I don’t want to have to take the train — I live in New York. But not all trains are on time and, for some reason, it seems as if there are always delays. How do I figure out where my bus stops so I can find it? And who is in the driver’s seat? Will it be a computer or a person? And are there other buses waiting for me?
C.J., New York
The six-letter sign-off is “Bus 44.” It looks like a bird, but actually signifies a bus with the name Bus 44 printed on it. In public transportation, a bus denotes all the buses on a route, so if an urgent request for “Bus 44” is made, all buses with the acronym 44 — or of 27 or 37 — will make the loop around Madison Square Park.
Depending on your locale, your favorite bus line could be on the bus of the same name, however, these lines can also be referred to as the Q, which translates to bus 44, or bus 60, as illustrated in the Picasso of the world, Henri Matisse’s painting, “Bus #54,” a 30-minute underground walk from Central Park. All of the major tourist destinations are served by bus 59, which belongs to Astoria and Queens. For an easy way to figure out where a route is, call the MTA’s travel map. There, do a search for the name of your bus and see if it appears. If it does, check your address. (It might be harder in Manhattan, because it takes longer to search than the Bronx and Staten Island.) When looking at a map, keep in mind a bus stop can be spelled “B” or “C,” and bus stops can also be along streets.
Once you know where your bus stops, you can dial the number on the back of the bus. Or you can put down the phone and go and check your route on our interactive map, which will show the bus stops, directions to them, and why you’re there, and what’s ahead of you.
Then there are the important questions: Who’s in the driver’s seat? How many buses are waiting for you? And how long will it take to get where you need to go?
Our helpful Google map pin points New York City’s bus routes and stops, and brings up an entry for bus 44, built by the Google Map Maker tool, which allows users to make changes in maps, just as people make changes in Wikipedia. By adding any event, person, location, landmark, street or location, people add information about a public space or a neighborhood. Over the past 10 years, the Map Maker tool has added more than 800,000 edits that include things like store numbers, places to eat and strollers.
To edit a map, click on “Edit,” scroll down, and click “Share.” This will link you to the Map Maker hub at the Google website and allows you to easily share your edits with the Map Maker community. If you are an editor who added something but does not have the correct info, don’t fret — you can post it to the Map Maker site as well.