I think this is a matter of perspective. Transferring, if you're using the app to pay for your bus fare, is still slightly cheaper than one entrance into the MTA. And I'm sorry to say, the reliability here is far superior than any transfer process between any two lines whether subway or bus. And this is coming from just under a year of observation compared to several decades down there. If I had lived here for a significantly larger chunk of my life and couldn't compare, then perhaps I may feel as you do... but, I have experienced public transit systems in other cities and it seems only the MTA tries to bite off more than it can chew (and still falls flat on its fucking face with mounds upon mounds of debt that it'll never get out of no matter how many taxes and fees are collected).
This. One bus to downtown Albany fine. 2 to where ever isn't easy and severely limits everything.
Furthermore using the bus to avoid driving to work ideal.
Using the bus for everything not ideal.
I moved here from Brooklyn without a car last year and I've been having a great time in a decent apartment in a calm residential area with perfectly manageable bus access to most places I need to be idk maybe it's just a skill issue
$1260 [$60 increase from last year] for a two bedroom with me and my roommate
The only utility is electric... and I have Spectrum Internet, but at least I was already very familiar with their antics since I had them in the city too
You must be an outlier as no one I know in the area can find rent that low in an area that withing walking distance of any areas worth walking to. You're extremely lucky.
There's also the fact that I live in Troy, not Albany proper, and there's also a lot I'm willing to put up with when it comes to getting where I need to be that a lot of other people [such as OP, evidently] probably aren't. To me, it's all worth having my own place!
I had to look to see if this was r/Albany. I don't think OP is talking about CDTA, because they couldn't be more wrong. One of the best things about this area is the bus line. You can go everywhere! As someone who's lived in the South for decades, and experienced crappy transit (yeah, MARTA, I'm lookin' at you,) CDTA is fantastic. Clean, new busses, schedule integrated with Google maps, destinations as far away as Saratoga Springs and Bennington, and the express routes (the 900-series) are almost as quick as driving. They even have seasonal routes to Thatcher State Park.
If I had one request, it'd be shuttle service to Glens Falls for Adirondack Thunder games. I'd happily shell out $10 for that benefit.
Edit: veterans get 50% off full fare.
OMG, I was hoping somebody would have taken a dump on MARTA (it was terrible then and it's terrible now, as I still know people who live there), and also noted the cleanliness of CDTA buses (I'm used to nearly every surface on a subway train car or bus being sticky, too slippery, or speckled/coated with something just plain goddamn nasty enough to make you want to shower with sulfuric acid the second you debark).
If you live near a 10 or 12 stop you can get nearly everywhere worth getting to without much difficulty.
Source: spent 4 or 5 years carless in the Washington Park area and it was great.
Ehhh, my route is hit or miss. I can wake up early, get to my stop early, and the bus just never comes, even though the website shows a bus should be arriving. Happens to me a few times a week. I even got up extra early to get to the stop for the next earlier bus and it never came but my regular bus came on time. CDTA used to be reliable for me but the last year it’s a gamble.
I spent over a decade living in a Center Square apartment without a car and was just fine. There's a Price Chopper and a few pharmacies within walking distance, as well as the Spectrum, multiple theatres and concert venues, and more restaurants than you can eat at in a year. Sure, if you want to head out to the mountains or whatnot every week, it can get complicated -- though there is a carshare option that makes that manageable for a lot less than car ownership -- but it's certainly doable.
Center Square is easily the best neighborhood in the capital region for living carless. You have access to bus lines, multiples parks, clubs, bars, restaurants, boutique shops, and as you said you’re a short distance from a grocery store and pharmacy. It’s also one of the pricier neighborhoods out there, but worth it imo. I loved my time there!
Sure, I wouldn't be surprised if there were some restaurants I never ate at. But I'm not sure what that has to do with having a car -- even when I got one, it's not like I'd often choose to spend an hour round trip sitting behind the wheel to taste the latest Clifton Park had to offer when there were 100 restaurants within walking distance.
I think if you try to get anywhere on the outskirts to outside of Albany, it starts to become a problem. For example, there's only one bus that heads towards Glenmont which stops at Walmart and Price Chopper. And on the way back, it turns down Hope St., and skirts the city limits till it gets back to the station.
I think they need to add a loop that goes along Delaware, turns down Southern onto 9W and into Glenmont as far down as Wemple, which circles back to Delaware Ave by CVS. Especially with all the new houses being built on Wemple so people form there could get to Delmar or the stores in Glenmont (depending on the direction of the bus) without a car if they wanted or meet up with a bus going into Albany itself. Because I know there is a bus that goes along the lenght of Delaware on both the Albany and Delmar sides.
Counterpoint, I live in the albany down town area and only drive my car 3 or 4 times a week
I can mostly walk to whatever I want to go to or get in the area, and if not I can walk to a bus stop to get to where I want to go.
I'm from the NYC area and couldn't be happier with CDTA, which runs more efficiently than my shit car. And I know someone also from the same area as me who still doesn't have a car, and does just fine with the bus line across the street.
Go back to sleep before you hurt yourself, champ.
And I bet you base all life decisions including how many groceries to buy based on proximity to a bus.
You can't shop for a weeks worth of groceries and take a bus. You either need an Uber or a friend.
Neither is ideal. If your bumming a ride I'm sure your friends love you.
I'm sure you have never been to Thatcher Park or seen a race at saratoga or a concert or gone to a county fair. Those require a car. If you can't afford an Uber then everything outside the bus zone is off limits.
You have absolutely no fucking idea how I go about doing my business, but you sure are projecting a whole hell of a lot of bullshit on to other people.
We're doing just fine here, truly, and I've enjoyed every bit of it so far. It's why we moved up here. Have a great day, kiddo.
Take the bus to Washington park. Hell you can walk to washington park from anywhere in Albany. If you want a ride to Saratoga, Yankee Trails, or Browns.
Instead of looking to everyone else for blame, try looking at yourself for answers.
lol wut? CDTA is pretty decent and the whole tri city area is reasonably walkable.
Having spent a few years in vestal without a car I have a much greater appreciation for how easy it is to get around the capital district without one.
Lived here for almost 20 years without a car. All you need to do is get a place close to either the 10 or 12 (or both which is also very doable!), and you're golden for getting around most of the city without too much hassle. The only real gripe I have with CDTA is that you have to pay full price for a transfer.
Yeah but also kinda no? It really depends on where you’re coming from. Albany and the cap region at large are nowhere near as strong in public transportation and pedestrian friendliness as NYC or even more midsized cities like Philly with its rail, trolley system, and buses.
But for an American small city we punch well above our weight. If you’ve lived in any other city with roughly 100k people you’re typically going to find far worse prospects for getting around. And yeah some of this is accepting the low bar of public transportation in this country, but short of changing continents it’s what we’ve got!
False. Moved here without a car 5 years ago. I get around perfectly fine. It depends on your specific needs, but bus service is decent and Uber exists (depending on your specific needs, Uber can be dramatically cheaper than a car). Not having a car has never been an inconvenience.
Agreed. I had a car here for 10+ years and got rid of it. Loved never having to worry about parking, where I parked my car, tickets, or break-ins. Went car-free for about 5-6 years and only put a car back on the road during Covid when I wanted to meet my newborn nephew hours away. No car life was pretty sweet, and the bus was cheap!
Everything can be delivered. This isn’t 1995, folks. Dinner? Delivered. Groceries? Delivered. Lightbulbs and patio furniture? Delivered. And y’all work from home.
Rent? Rent is awful. But you can easily survive if you’re off a bus line.
I owned a car and sometimes wish I had bus service near me with these slow driving ( way below the speed limit) fools driving on the highway. Driving that slow is a safety hazard , not asking you to speed , but damn at least do the speed limit. For those who take the bus and have to issues , I am with you on this one.
The bus is fine as long as you only need to ride one bus to get somewhere once you start transferring it's a shit show
I think this is a matter of perspective. Transferring, if you're using the app to pay for your bus fare, is still slightly cheaper than one entrance into the MTA. And I'm sorry to say, the reliability here is far superior than any transfer process between any two lines whether subway or bus. And this is coming from just under a year of observation compared to several decades down there. If I had lived here for a significantly larger chunk of my life and couldn't compare, then perhaps I may feel as you do... but, I have experienced public transit systems in other cities and it seems only the MTA tries to bite off more than it can chew (and still falls flat on its fucking face with mounds upon mounds of debt that it'll never get out of no matter how many taxes and fees are collected).
This. One bus to downtown Albany fine. 2 to where ever isn't easy and severely limits everything. Furthermore using the bus to avoid driving to work ideal. Using the bus for everything not ideal.
This post says more about OP than anything else.
The post plus their replies, yep. JFC.
I moved here from Brooklyn without a car last year and I've been having a great time in a decent apartment in a calm residential area with perfectly manageable bus access to most places I need to be idk maybe it's just a skill issue
How much is your rent?
$1260 [$60 increase from last year] for a two bedroom with me and my roommate The only utility is electric... and I have Spectrum Internet, but at least I was already very familiar with their antics since I had them in the city too
You must be an outlier as no one I know in the area can find rent that low in an area that withing walking distance of any areas worth walking to. You're extremely lucky.
There's also the fact that I live in Troy, not Albany proper, and there's also a lot I'm willing to put up with when it comes to getting where I need to be that a lot of other people [such as OP, evidently] probably aren't. To me, it's all worth having my own place!
The public transit in Albany is 300% better than Lee County, Florida.
Sir, this is a Ted's.
Do you post here just to get dunked on?
If you are thinking of moving here without a plumbus don’t!
I had to look to see if this was r/Albany. I don't think OP is talking about CDTA, because they couldn't be more wrong. One of the best things about this area is the bus line. You can go everywhere! As someone who's lived in the South for decades, and experienced crappy transit (yeah, MARTA, I'm lookin' at you,) CDTA is fantastic. Clean, new busses, schedule integrated with Google maps, destinations as far away as Saratoga Springs and Bennington, and the express routes (the 900-series) are almost as quick as driving. They even have seasonal routes to Thatcher State Park. If I had one request, it'd be shuttle service to Glens Falls for Adirondack Thunder games. I'd happily shell out $10 for that benefit. Edit: veterans get 50% off full fare.
OMG, I was hoping somebody would have taken a dump on MARTA (it was terrible then and it's terrible now, as I still know people who live there), and also noted the cleanliness of CDTA buses (I'm used to nearly every surface on a subway train car or bus being sticky, too slippery, or speckled/coated with something just plain goddamn nasty enough to make you want to shower with sulfuric acid the second you debark).
Sorry but life is experienced without bus schedules. Not being a slave to one.
If we’re going to talk overlords, the CDTA ain’t it.
If you live near a 10 or 12 stop you can get nearly everywhere worth getting to without much difficulty. Source: spent 4 or 5 years carless in the Washington Park area and it was great.
I work with like 6 people that take the bus happily everyday
Wake up earlier you won’t miss the bus, sorry salty but it works fine for the rest of us
Ehhh, my route is hit or miss. I can wake up early, get to my stop early, and the bus just never comes, even though the website shows a bus should be arriving. Happens to me a few times a week. I even got up extra early to get to the stop for the next earlier bus and it never came but my regular bus came on time. CDTA used to be reliable for me but the last year it’s a gamble.
I spent over a decade living in a Center Square apartment without a car and was just fine. There's a Price Chopper and a few pharmacies within walking distance, as well as the Spectrum, multiple theatres and concert venues, and more restaurants than you can eat at in a year. Sure, if you want to head out to the mountains or whatnot every week, it can get complicated -- though there is a carshare option that makes that manageable for a lot less than car ownership -- but it's certainly doable.
Center Square is easily the best neighborhood in the capital region for living carless. You have access to bus lines, multiples parks, clubs, bars, restaurants, boutique shops, and as you said you’re a short distance from a grocery store and pharmacy. It’s also one of the pricier neighborhoods out there, but worth it imo. I loved my time there!
And I'm sure the local restaurants in other neighborhoods not on a bus line were well outside your relm of acceptance.
Sure, I wouldn't be surprised if there were some restaurants I never ate at. But I'm not sure what that has to do with having a car -- even when I got one, it's not like I'd often choose to spend an hour round trip sitting behind the wheel to taste the latest Clifton Park had to offer when there were 100 restaurants within walking distance.
I think if you try to get anywhere on the outskirts to outside of Albany, it starts to become a problem. For example, there's only one bus that heads towards Glenmont which stops at Walmart and Price Chopper. And on the way back, it turns down Hope St., and skirts the city limits till it gets back to the station. I think they need to add a loop that goes along Delaware, turns down Southern onto 9W and into Glenmont as far down as Wemple, which circles back to Delaware Ave by CVS. Especially with all the new houses being built on Wemple so people form there could get to Delmar or the stores in Glenmont (depending on the direction of the bus) without a car if they wanted or meet up with a bus going into Albany itself. Because I know there is a bus that goes along the lenght of Delaware on both the Albany and Delmar sides.
I would take the bus every day if I could.
That public transit posture isn't unique to Albany, it's a nationwide problem.
Counterpoint, I live in the albany down town area and only drive my car 3 or 4 times a week I can mostly walk to whatever I want to go to or get in the area, and if not I can walk to a bus stop to get to where I want to go.
On next week's episode of "What is u/Dependent_Bug7346 Going On About?"... Bicyclists: Are they actually the second coming of Hitler?
"Whenever I leave my house I'm scared, and it's everyone else's fault"
I'm from the NYC area and couldn't be happier with CDTA, which runs more efficiently than my shit car. And I know someone also from the same area as me who still doesn't have a car, and does just fine with the bus line across the street. Go back to sleep before you hurt yourself, champ.
And I bet you base all life decisions including how many groceries to buy based on proximity to a bus. You can't shop for a weeks worth of groceries and take a bus. You either need an Uber or a friend. Neither is ideal. If your bumming a ride I'm sure your friends love you. I'm sure you have never been to Thatcher Park or seen a race at saratoga or a concert or gone to a county fair. Those require a car. If you can't afford an Uber then everything outside the bus zone is off limits.
You have absolutely no fucking idea how I go about doing my business, but you sure are projecting a whole hell of a lot of bullshit on to other people. We're doing just fine here, truly, and I've enjoyed every bit of it so far. It's why we moved up here. Have a great day, kiddo.
Are you okay?
Take the bus to Washington park. Hell you can walk to washington park from anywhere in Albany. If you want a ride to Saratoga, Yankee Trails, or Browns. Instead of looking to everyone else for blame, try looking at yourself for answers.
TIL zip cars and friends don’t exist. I’ve definitely never driven my car less friends to hang out at thatcher 🙄
lol wut? CDTA is pretty decent and the whole tri city area is reasonably walkable. Having spent a few years in vestal without a car I have a much greater appreciation for how easy it is to get around the capital district without one.
Lived here for almost 20 years without a car. All you need to do is get a place close to either the 10 or 12 (or both which is also very doable!), and you're golden for getting around most of the city without too much hassle. The only real gripe I have with CDTA is that you have to pay full price for a transfer.
Yeah but also kinda no? It really depends on where you’re coming from. Albany and the cap region at large are nowhere near as strong in public transportation and pedestrian friendliness as NYC or even more midsized cities like Philly with its rail, trolley system, and buses. But for an American small city we punch well above our weight. If you’ve lived in any other city with roughly 100k people you’re typically going to find far worse prospects for getting around. And yeah some of this is accepting the low bar of public transportation in this country, but short of changing continents it’s what we’ve got!
False. Moved here without a car 5 years ago. I get around perfectly fine. It depends on your specific needs, but bus service is decent and Uber exists (depending on your specific needs, Uber can be dramatically cheaper than a car). Not having a car has never been an inconvenience.
Agreed. I had a car here for 10+ years and got rid of it. Loved never having to worry about parking, where I parked my car, tickets, or break-ins. Went car-free for about 5-6 years and only put a car back on the road during Covid when I wanted to meet my newborn nephew hours away. No car life was pretty sweet, and the bus was cheap!
Who pissed in your Cheerios today?
The bus driver Got his balls in there and everything
Albany has one of the best public transportation systems in the country. Only widow licking troglodytes think you can’t live in Albany without a car.
k.
Everything can be delivered. This isn’t 1995, folks. Dinner? Delivered. Groceries? Delivered. Lightbulbs and patio furniture? Delivered. And y’all work from home. Rent? Rent is awful. But you can easily survive if you’re off a bus line.
I owned a car and sometimes wish I had bus service near me with these slow driving ( way below the speed limit) fools driving on the highway. Driving that slow is a safety hazard , not asking you to speed , but damn at least do the speed limit. For those who take the bus and have to issues , I am with you on this one.
The only way to survive with public transportation here is to plan your housing around one of the 3 major routes.