Transportation
The Triumphant Return of the Chinatown Bus
Two years after a federal safety crackdown, the intercity option is carrying more passengers than ever.
The success of Chinatown bus carriers in the late 1990s and early 2000s announced the return of the intercity bus, accounting for millions of annual trips and giving rise to low-cost curbside options like BoltBus and Megabus. But in 2012 and 2013 the federal government, citing safety concerns, shut down dozens of Chinatown buses, including the popular Fung Wah and Lucky Star lines. It didn’t take long for people to declare that the era of the Chinatown bus had come to an end.
“We think the sector contracted 25 to 30 percent after the crackdowns,” says Joseph Schwieterman, director of the Chaddick Institute for Metropolitan Development at DePaul University, which studies intercity bus travel. “They were written off as yesterday’s mode.”