Bill Text: NY S03144 | 2025-2026 | General Assembly | Introduced

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Bill Title: Requires accessible buses to be available within a service area measuring three miles from any bus line of the authority or its subsidiaries.

Spectrum: Bipartisan Bill

Status: (Introduced) 2025-01-23 - REFERRED TO TRANSPORTATION [S03144 Detail]

Download: New_York-2025-S03144-Introduced.html

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                STATE OF NEW YORK
        ________________________________________________________________________

                                          3144

                               2025-2026 Regular Sessions

                    IN SENATE

                                    January 23, 2025
                                       ___________

        Introduced  by  Sens.  COONEY,  ADDABBO, ASHBY, BORRELLO, BROUK, CLEARE,
          GALLIVAN, GOUNARDES, HINCHEY,  HOYLMAN-SIGAL,  MARTINEZ,  MAY,  MYRIE,
          ORTT, PALUMBO, ROLISON, WEBER, WEIK -- read twice and ordered printed,
          and when printed to be committed to the Committee on Transportation

        AN  ACT to amend the transportation law, in relation to the service area
          for paratransit transportation

          The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and  Assem-
        bly, do enact as follows:

     1    Section 1. Subdivision 4 of section 15-b of the transportation law, as
     2  amended  by  chapter  385  of  the  laws  of 1985, is amended to read as
     3  follows:
     4    4. Accessible buses. The system shall include access by transportation
     5  disabled persons, including persons in wheelchairs,  to  not  less  than
     6  sixty-five  percent  of  buses  in  the  regularly operated fleet of the
     7  authority, which shall be properly operated and maintained to facilitate
     8  their use by transportation disabled persons. To  meet  this  sixty-five
     9  percent  requirement,  all buses purchased, leased, or otherwise brought
    10  newly into service on the bus lines of the  authority  and  its  subsid-
    11  iaries,  except  buses  leased  or otherwise put into service to relieve
    12  temporary, unplanned shortages of buses in service, shall be  accessible
    13  to transportation disabled persons until the sixty-five percent require-
    14  ment  is met.  Accessible buses shall be available within a service area
    15  measuring three miles from any bus line of the authority and its subsid-
    16  iaries.
    17    § 2. Subdivision 4 of section 15-c of the transportation law, as added
    18  by chapter 61 of the laws of 1990, is amended to read as follows:
    19    4. Required level of fixed-route accessibility. a. Each transportation
    20  provider shall provide access to one hundred percent of  its  regularly-
    21  operated  buses  that  provide  local, fixed-route service. To implement
    22  this requirement on and after the effective date of  this  section,  all
    23  buses  purchased,  leased  or  otherwise brought into service on the bus

         EXPLANATION--Matter in italics (underscored) is new; matter in brackets
                              [ ] is old law to be omitted.
                                                                   LBD02142-01-5
        S. 3144                             2

     1  lines of each transportation provider shall be lift-equipped except  any
     2  bus which a provider has under contract of purchase on July first, nine-
     3  teen  hundred  ninety  for  delivery after that date. Such lift-equipped
     4  buses  shall be properly operated and maintained to facilitate their use
     5  by transit-disabled persons.
     6    b. The provisions of paragraph a of this subdivision shall  not  apply
     7  to  buses  that  are purchased, leased or otherwise brought into service
     8  that have a useful life of six years or less.
     9    c. Accessible buses shall be available within a service area measuring
    10  three miles from any bus line of the authority and its subsidiaries.
    11    § 3. This act shall take effect on the thirtieth day  after  it  shall
    12  have become a law.