Letter: Nassau buses should take bills

Long Island Bus. The MTA wants to unload the service, leaving Nassau County to face a $26 million expense. (June 23, 2009) Credit: Newsday / Howard Schnapp
The Nassau Inter-County Express bus system is a failure on many levels [“$500 million in NY, LI bus subsidies restored,” News, Dec. 2]. The fares must be paid in quarters, which are hard to obtain because none of the stores in Hempstead will give you change.
I have traveled to many cities, and most municipal buses will take a dollar bill. I’m interested in civil rights history, and I’ve traveled to Montgomery, Alabama, and stood in the pulpit from which Martin Luther King Jr. preached and visited the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, Tennessee.
I think Rosa Parks’ memory deserves a cleaner bus station than the one that bears her name in Hempstead, and it should have a way to provide riders with change.
A quarter machine would improve services for those of us who can’t afford MetroCards and need to get to work on time.
Stephen W. Abadie, South Hempstead