Effect of 49th-50th street bus and taxiway on traffic congestion in Manhattan.

In March 1986, the New York City Department of Transportation simultaneously imposed a series of traffic regulations along 49th and 50th streets that became known as the 49th and 50th Street Bus and Taxiway. The regulations included a curbside priority lane for buses and occupied taxis, a ban on curbside pickup and delivery during selected midday hours, and a required turn for all nonpriority vehicles at the end of each block. Because the "before" data are limited, a before-and-after experimental design was conducted for priority vehicles (i.e., buses and occupied taxis) only. The findings of a study to assess the impact of these regulations suggest that measures other than curbside loading and unloading restrictions may be more effective in providing priority for selected road users. This conclusion is tempered by the unprecedented combination of tactics that were simultaneously implemented at the site and the ensuing uncertainties in discerning the causes for the observed changes in travel time.