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Unwritten Policy Requires Women To Sit In The Back On One NYC Bus Line

CBS 2's Reporter Told Repeatedly To Move; DOT Launches Discrimination Probe

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NYC B-110 bus

NYC B-110 bus. (Photo: CBS 2)

Kathryn-Brown

Reporting Kathryn Brown

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) — An investigation has been launched into possible discrimination on board some public buses in New York City.

Women are being asked to move to the back of the buses. CBS 2’s Kathryn Brown found out first hand on Wednesday when she took a ride (see video below).

Boarding the B-110 bus in Borough Park, Brown had no problem sitting right up front. But after several stops one passenger informed her that she needed to move to the back of the bus.

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The reason, the passenger explained, was the B-110 caters to the Hasidic Jewish community running between Borough Park and Williamsburg and tradition calls for men and women to be separated.

The bus driver then asked Brown to move as well. When she resisted he seemed confused but returned to his seat.

But, one by one, passengers continued to approach Brown, telling her she could not sit in the front and needed to move to the back.

The B110 is a public bus and looks similar to other city buses. Riders pay an amount equal to Metropolitan Transportation Authority fares of $2.50, cash only, no MetroCard.

But it is what’s known as a franchise route, meaning a private company pays the city for the right to provide the public service.

After getting several complaints from passengers who had experiences similar to Brown’s — the Department of Transportation now says it is investigating the bus company — Private Transportation Corp. — for discrimination.

In a letter to the bus company’s owner the DOT says its been made aware of “serious allegations” and advises the owner that “(the) practice of requiring women to ride in the back, or allow passengers to harass women who choose to ride in any part of the bus, is not permitted on franchise buses…”

The letter goes on to say any such practice is a direct violation of their agreement.

Brown visited the bus company for its side of the story but was told no one would be available to answer her questions until next week.

A stern Mayor Michael Bloomberg was blunt about the policy.

“That is obviously not permitted,” he said, adding it may be permissible if it were a private bus.

The bus company pays the city $22,000 to operate the franchise service. The DOT says it has reached out to the company and expects an explanation, as well as a plan to prevent future cases of discrimination, by Oct. 26.

Please offer your thoughts in the comments section below.

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  • Randy

    You have to be kidding me..this is the dumbest of all dumb things I have seen from a selected sect of New York Jewish faith. As a non Jew living in a Jewish house, if I even thought about asking my Jewish girl friend to ride in the rear of the bus I would be sleeping with on eye open..

    For some reason some Jewish men think that they are placed on earth to make Jewish women their slaves and baby makers…What is more amazing is the Jewish women allow this crap to be even suggested if not put on them. It’s like the signs in Williamsburg where woman have to step to the side to allow men to pass… Give me a break..Come on women you have the right to vote, smoke in public, hold a job that pays more then a man and have children when you want them and how many you want. This is AMERICA not some third world country and if the cowardly men who think they are God and treat you like second rate citizens don’t like tell them to shove off. You were brought to your knees in the late 1930′s and 1940′s, you don’t have to live this way in 2011, in New York City which is still part of the United states of American the land of the FREE not land of the suppressed like in Brooklyn and Queens.

  • unbiased point

    Thepeople were NOT harrasing her AND they werent even aware they were being recorded! They werent even requiing her to move they just asked her and when the bus stopped, that was thebus driver who thought the seperation was required. The people were clearly unaware that the bus isnt private, thsts why they chose this bus. The men arent forcing the woman to sit in the back. It is a choice on both parts of the men and woman.

    • JImmy Dore

      Yeah, turns out that is illegal. So as reasonable as you think you sound, you are 100% in the wrong. Someone telling you to move to the back of the bus is by definition harassment What if there as a bus route that asked all the Jews to sit in the back of the bus?

      Smarten up and quit trying to pass of flawed thinking as logic.

  • a boro park woman

    This is not discrimination, it is strictly to keep the men and women seperated but not as underclassman, thoughit may appear that way. woman that use the bus most of the time understand this and do not mind. Though it SHOULD be a choice.a bo

  • David

    They should walk if they don’t like the rules.

    • JImmy Dore

      Turns out its you who should move to a new country if you don’t like the rules here.

  • Dan Te

    Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat.

  • Pam Gellar

    They’re Secret Muslims, softening us up for the imposition of Sharia Law!!!

  • Jerry_Leigh

    I wish that Rosa Parks were still alive, so that I could invite her up to Brooklyn, to ride the B110–she’d probably love it, after all these years. Just a few days ago, the City was removing signs, in Williamsburgh, which instructed women to get off the sidewalk if a man approaches. I wonder if all those buses from Monsey, that seem to be everywhere, practice the same policy–how about it, Ms. Brown? And while you’re at it, visit New Square, New York, where they have separate sidewalks for men and for women (even the Saudis don’t go that far), the women aren’t allowed to drive (there’s good money to be made for non-observant women chauffers), fire and building codes are unenforced (it’s worse than Cairo), and the rebbe’s goon squads make the Saudi religious police look like dilletantes. Holder should dispatch federal marshalls, or something–the local politicians are too scared because they vote as a bloc, like good little cultists, the way the rebbe tells them to.

  • Cathy

    Traditions that make women into second class citizens are not defendable in America. We are all equal under our law, which is NOT religious law. To all “devout” men of whatever religion preaches women are not men’s equal- and there are too many- do not dare tell me or my daughters or sisters where to go, what to put on, what to eat, or who we may or may not speak to. Period.

    • IgnoranteElephante

      You are absolutely right, except for one thing. Judaism trumps all. No other religion, no claim to civil right or liberty, no protest movement or common cause, nothing is more important than us Jews.

  • EMC

    Last I looked this was the 21st century so why is there any excuse for this archaic practice being defended. If the Hasidic group wants to segregate transportation then they must own/operate and fully pay for the busses.
    This very same issue came up a few years ago with a Rockland County bus service where Jewish women who were not Orthodox refused to be segregated.This bus service actually had put up a curtain between the men’s and women’s sections. Just as in this case, the bus service was told that they would lose the subsidy if they did not desegregate the busses.

  • Rosa Parkstein

    I lwill sit in the front next time.

    • badman

      LOL

    • RRS

      To bad Rosa Parks wasn’t Black and Jewish then maybe the 2011 Jewish woman would have pride in herself…………

  • VY

    I’m a life long Jew, born of a line of life long Jews going back to ancient times. We a long time ago gave up the idea of sexual segregation and have still maintained our ability to be active proud Jews who bring up Jewish children who grow up to look for and married other Jews.
    The actual physical separation barrier or fence used in an orthodox schule to separate the sexes is calleda “ma-cheetza”.
    I tell people, only partially meaning it as a joke, that “ma-cheetza” is an old Yiddsh word which means “women to the back of the bus”.
    Now I know it’s not a joke anymore.
    The other joke definition of “ma-cheetza” is “subjugate women because men can not keep what they are supposed to inside their pants”.
    Nothing good came out of the way eastern european Jews we treated by the governments they lived under pre WW2.
    There is no reason to worship the lifestyle and dress of dirt poor, discriminated against, small town eastern european Jews based on the 500 years prior to WW2.
    Learn about it, study it, yes.
    Emmulate it toady in modern times, absolutely not.

  • TFB

    in the 1050′s rosa parks was made to sit in the back of the bus a protest was formed in 2011 a black woman was ask to sit in the back of the bus whats the difference ………..BECAREFULL WHERE LOOK AT THIS AND WHERE IT IS GOING

    • TFB

      correction in the 1950″s becarefull jews look at where this is heading this is a public bus not a religous bus

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