Busing Older Adults, New York Style

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For New York City’s 1.3 million residents age 60 and over, it’s time to hop on the school bus once again.

Yellow city school buses are now shuttling older adults to supermarkets and other shopping venues throughout the Big Apple—for free. The initiative started as a 2008 Brooklyn pilot program whose success led to a citywide rollout in September, says Christopher Miller, director of public affairs at the NYC Department for the Aging.

Some of New York’s 282 senior centers will serve as excursion staging points. “It’s a very good idea, because there are thousands of school buses that sit idle during the day,” says Bobbie Sackman, with the not-for-profit Council of Senior Centers and Services.

During last year’s trial runs in Brooklyn, the Dorchester Senior Citizens Center averaged about 35 passengers per trip. “It was an opportunity for our members to go somewhere that they couldn’t get to on their own,” says center director JoAnne Biswakarma.

Blair S. Walker, who frequently writes for the Bulletin’s In the News section, lives in Miami.