Transit systems in the GTA are struggling. They are struggling to build and grow. Ridership keeps going up on most transit systems but there is not enough service being added or built. There is also the issue of certain transit systems entering Toronto that can only drop off on the way into Toronto and pick up only on the way out.
Personally I think transit systems in the GTA need to re-evaluate the priorities. Most systems cater to the Monday to Friday office crowd or the student crowd. Well that is all fine and well but the thing is, colleges have classes that run until 9 some nights, and there are also businesses that have workers past 9pm. For instance in the GTA most Walmart stores are open until 11, most shopping malls are open until 9. Some grocery stores until 10 or later. All those businesses need workers and customers. The problem is a lot of workers cannot afford a car so they take transit. But in some areas there is a limited amount of public transit that gets people home.
So how do we fix things? Well it is fairly simple but also complicated. Every transit system has an operating budget, and the remaining funds are to come from things such as fare revenue. So obviously transit systems are going to prioritize transit at high volume times, and have less service when there is less ridership. But overall transit can shift priorities and still provide great service that will attract more riders later in the day or on weekends.
I have said before that in the GTA, all transit systems should either operate as one big system or work together. For instance, if all systems worked together, routes could be operated by 2 or 3 transit agencies and cross several boundaries. Fare revenue could be shared towards the funding of all the combined services. However, I believe just turning all the systems into one larger transit system would be easier. All the funding from the local municipalities could go towards funding one larger system, and the fare revenue gets split across the entire network.
What that would do is merge several systems into one. Obviously there would be divisions so transit operators do not lose seniority or lose work they are used to signing because suddenly someone more senior comes from a different area and takes that work. All systems merging in would need to cooperate and work together and union contracts would need to be modified to make everything work with minimal issues.
For the GTA I would basically take these systems and merge them into one. HSR (Hamilton), Burlington Transit, Milton Transit, Oakville Transit, MiWay (Mississauga), Brampton Transit, YRT, the TTC and DRT. I would also work with Niagara Region Transit, Guelph Transit, Brantford Transit, GRT (Waterloo region), as well as Orangeville Transit, Bradford East Gwillimbury and Barrie Transit.
By taking the main systems and merging them together would allow sharing of buses to provide service into areas where service is currently limited or where there is no service. For example from parts of Mississauga buses could operate into northern Oakville and over to the Uptown Core. Buses could also travel from Mississauga and Oakville into Milton. By partnering with other systems a bus could operate from Brantford onto parts of Hamilton such as Ancaster where it could connect to Hamilton routes. Niagara could operate a bus from St Catherines to Beamsville and Grimsby and into Stoney Creek connecting to the future LRT at Eastgate. That route could take pressure off of GO Transits route 12 from Niagara Falls to Burlington GO.
Just by creating some of these so called missing link routes it could get more riders on transit, and it could allow buses to be freed up from certain routes in certain areas, allowing the service hours of those freed up buses to be reallocated to different times of the day to potentially allow for more service in most areas until 11pm or later, and for creating a better overnight network of buses. Currently Hamilton, Burlington and Oakville have zero overnight bus service. Mississauga has some and YRT, DRT and the TTC have overnight routes. Some areas will not need much for an overnight route but there could be a bus that travels from Hamilton to Square One overnight and in Burlington and Oakville there could be one bus that travels a circle route that takes people closer to home, or to early morning work at places like warehouses where some shifts start as early as 5am or at coffee shops or restaurants where some shifts can start as early as 4am. Sure there may not be a huge demand for transit at some points overnight but there will be a use for it, especially if transit is built to be good enough to continue to grow and to help remove cars from the roads.
Another way to make sure transit stays reliable and continues to grow, is to create more bus lanes on busy transit routes, with transit signals. So if a bus is in the turn lane at a red light there could be a bus only signal that allows them to get ahead of the stopped traffic. Measures like that and bus only lanes could save several minutes on the overall trip time meaning there could be an increase of service on routes without adding additional vehicles.
This is part one of my series. I will be discussing in part two just what kind of routes could merge together and what services could be improved going forward just by making these changes.
I am also going to look into Vancouver with the $700 million shortfall that may end up causing major routes to be cancelled and other services drastically reduced.