Squeaking, lurching and hissing city buses are as much a part of the Manhattan soundtrack as cab horns and Ramones tunes coming up through the floor from that skinny guy in 2D.

But a pilot program from the MTA unveils some buses that are conspicuous in their silence. The New York Times reports that three of them, at $559,000 apiece, are currently on the road.

When the DesignLine stops short, or takes off from a light, there is little more than a low groan. An onboard air-conditioner usually drowns out any sound from the engine.

The other day, one block north of Astor Place, James Sollecito sat down behind the wheel and gradually eased the bus onto Fourth Avenue for a 90-minute trip to Washington Heights. The engine hummed softly as its driver peered out from the extra-large Plexiglas windshield, a sheer single pane that resembled an astronaut’s visor writ large.

“I never drove anything that accelerates like this,” Mr. Sollecito, who has driven city buses for 15 years, said approvingly, as the bus glided along the street jerk-free.

Silence, that rare commodity on the city streets, is achieved by throwing out the most basic element of automobile design: internal combustion. Instead of a noisy, piston-based engine, the DesignLine operates on a spinning turbine that recharges a lithium-ion battery, a green energy source more commonly found inside laptop computers. That means fewer moving parts, and fewer ways to create a racket.

It being New York and all, some riders were not impressed. Others dug the quiet–and apparently sweet-smelling–buses.

Malachai Williams, a second grader at Public School 171 in East Harlem, put it more bluntly. “This bus is awesome!” he said, plopping into a seat toward the back. “It smells like a bus that takes you to different countries and states.”

Number of words uttered by grim-faced M1 busdriver after I boarded and said “Good morning” today: 0

Number of times grim-faced M1 busdriver honked her horn as the M1 plodded through construction-induced congestion on Park Ave. South between 40th and 38th: 6

Number of times grim-faced M1 busdriver honked her horn as the M1 seemed to be making good progress down Park Ave. South between 38th and 28th: 2

Number of words uttered by grim-faced M1 busdriver after I said “thank you” and “have a nice day” upon exiting: 0

I’m waiting for the green at 27th and Park about 10 minutes ago. A man is settling up a cab fare with a cabbie who’s rested his car just west of 27th on Park, right up against a parked car.

The transaction is taking longer than it should; the former rider, slicked back brown hair, 35, blue sweater, jeans, cigarette dangling from his lips, is counting singles like a parolee given an allowance for a strip club.

A bus is behind the cab, waiting to hit 27th but blocked from doing so. The bus is blocking the whole of the southbound lanes on Park, every motorist treated to a huge bus ad about a Lincoln exhibit at the New York Historical Society that says “The Most Beloved Leader That New York Ever Hated.” The bus driver is not happy.

Still, the transaction goes on. The former rider is gesturing to the irate bus driver behind them, and more traffic behind the bus. His movements say, let’s settle the f*** up, a**hole!

Cigarette Man and the driver are feuding over the cost. Cigarette Man gestures again to the mounting traffic and escalating horn noise and says, “You’re the reason for all this!”

Finally, they settle up. Cigarette Man is furious. He slips the singles into his wallet and scoots through the narrow passageway between the cab’s rear bumper and the bus behind it. The cigarette dangles from his lips as his eyes shoot daggers.

You can see where this is going. As they say in the theater, if you’re showing the audience a gun in the first act, you have to use the damn thing in the third act. Indeed, Cigarette Man removes the cigarette from his lips and flicks it at the driver. The butt rolls around on the cab’s hood and stays, like a punt spinning to a stop on the 1 yard line.

Against all logic, the cabbie remains parked, long line of traffic behind him, because of him. 

The bus driver has had enough and climbs down. He’s a solid black man of about 45, looks a bit like Cedric the Entertainer.

He goes over to the cabbie’s window.

“Fuck the way!!!” he yells, a bizarre shorthand for “Get the fuck out of the way!”

“Fuck the way!” he repeats, then climbs back into his rig.

Finally, the cabbie does indeed fuck the way, and New York gets moving again.