According to the Daily News, people are taking advantage of Ikea’s free bus and ferry – without ever going into the Swedish furniture behemoth.

The coach-style buses look very nice. I see them on Fourth Avenue but they usually look empty to me. In Park Slope, you can get the bus at the Fourth Avenue F train station weekdays and weekends.

But the Daily News reports that people are using it like a free alternative to the MTA. Especially since not much in the way of public transport gets you to Red Hook. Here’s an excerpt from the Daily News story.

“It’s like a free car service,” said Bianca Colon, 19, who works at a summer program at Public School 27 on Huntington St. in Red Hook, and takes the bus from downtown Brooklyn near her home. “It takes us straight downtown and I don’t have to wait for the bus to stop every block to let people on and off.”
Colon took the city bus to her summer job for several weeks before discovering the swank Ikea alternative.

“It’s got AC; it doesn’t get overcrowded,” she said. “You have your own space. It’s strange, but people are more behaved on this bus. It’s just more relaxing.”

The free bus service transports passengers from Red Hook to stops on Court St. and to subway stations at Fourth Ave. and Smith and Ninth Sts. every 15 minutes during store hours.

Thrifty bus riders aren’t the only ones taking advantage of Ikea’s services. City residents are also saving $6 each way and taking the store’s free water taxi to and from Wall Street.

“It’s such a nice ride, I’d almost be happy to pay for it,” said Steve Riley, 40, who lives in Park Slope, takes the Ikea bus and then transfers to the Ikea water taxi for his job in SoHo. “It was so very different from the miserable experience of the subway and I got to see all four of the waterfalls.”