The company was forced to add more buses to shore up the system's various routes.

The companies complain that a lack of city support prevents them from adding more buses.

But he said the increase was not substantial enough to add more buses.

He said the system would replace about a third of its fleet this year and would add 84 more buses in 2008.

Mr. Rosson said that the company hopes to eventually add more buses.

By 2003, he said, the department hopes to add 170 new buses with lifts and two wheelchair spaces.

The agency has been expanding its bus fleet, adding 600 buses during weekday peak service hours, to a total of 3,700, since mid-1996, he said.

But while the authority boasts that it has added 2,300 buses a day since then, that amounts to only a 5 percent increase.

In 1928 the Board sought to add more buses to its fleet to handle an increasing workload.

While there was discussion of restoring train service in the 1990s at the time it was decided to add more buses along Route 9.