York Region Transit: Viva service thread

[smallspy]

People who live south of 7 try to avoid the double fare by driving to Finch, walking to Steeles or otherwise taking TTC on border routes instead of paying $4 to take a YRT bus that runs right outside their home.

I doubt there's any way to know the actual numbers but I wouldn't be surprised if YRT has some sort of internal guess. With a different fare structure, there would be fewer people riding (For example) the 53 and 60 TTC routes and more on the local YRT routes, Viva etc. There's a definite financial impact, negatively for YRT and positively for TTC, right in the area that should be YRT's breadbasket.

But unless those people are riding along Steeles - and if you're reaching all the way up to Highway 7, they're not - they have to pay two fares regardless of whether it is a TTC bus or a YRT bus picking them up. This has nothing to do with the TTC, and everything to do with the political boundaries.

And for the record, I don't think that the number is nearly as high as you think it is. Ridership on the contracted TTC routes north of Steeles is pretty good. I take the 68 every day, and there is a good number of people who get off at Denison - only 850 metres north of Steeles. Prior to this I took the 35 Jane bus north of Steeles, and there were a lot of people getting on in the afternoons at Interchange Way.

Short of suggesting that we merge all of the locaal transit systems together, what do you suggest as a solution?

Dan
Toronto, Ont.

 

[Transportfan]

Brampton, Mississauga, Milton, Oshawa, Burlington are also dominated by single homes and cars.

But Mississauga and Brampton have pockets of social housing and old suburban areas, especially Mississauga. Even in the newer "sprawl" developments, there are a lot of South Asians living with several families in one house, and not all of them have cars.

 

[TJ O'Pootertoot]

But unless those people are riding along Steeles - and if you're reaching all the way up to Highway 7, they're not - they have to pay two fares regardless of whether it is a TTC bus or a YRT bus picking them up. This has nothing to do with the TTC, and everything to do with the political boundaries.

And for the record, I don't think that the number is nearly as high as you think it is. Ridership on the contracted TTC routes north of Steeles is pretty good. I take the 68 every day, and there is a good number of people who get off at Denison - only 850 metres north of Steeles. Prior to this I took the 35 Jane bus north of Steeles, and there were a lot of people getting on in the afternoons at Interchange Way.

Short of suggesting that we merge all of the locaal transit systems together, what do you suggest as a solution?

You're kind of mixing and matching things.
-I didn't say it had to do with TTC or that it's anyone's "fault" Yes, the issue is a FARE issue, not a service issue per se. But the fare issue funnels people who could take both services to only take one. So people who could take YRT to TTC avoid YRT.
Frankly (and this has been said by me and others elsewhere) it works the other way too. An empty YRT bus cannot pick up people waiting to go to Finch on the south side of Steeles. Riders have to wait for a TTC bus, because they are in Toronto.
-The contracted routes are ultimately subject the same logic; an inefficiency is created. Just because someone pays an extra fare to go 850m doesn't mean they're happy about it or that it's fair.
-There's no need to merge all the transit systems, merely to come up with reasonable fare integration, which is a topic for another thread. But you don't need to merge systems to ensure that (per the scenarios I just described) people can get on the first bus going to their destination, regardless of who is operating it, and don't have to pay a full additional fare to transfer between systems or go a few hundred metres into another municipality.

Like I said, I don't have hard numbers. But I think it's obvious people avoid the double fare when they can. Just go look at all the bikes, pretty much anywhere along Steeles, between Don Mills and Dufferin, chained to lampposts.

But Mississauga and Brampton have pockets of social housing and old suburban areas, especially Mississauga. Even in the newer "sprawl" developments, there are a lot of South Asians living with several families in one house, and not all of them have cars.

And Mississauaga doesn't have a rural area as big as the City of Toronto.

YRT would operate differently - and likely have greater frequency - if it wasn't serving Georgina and East Gwillibury (or even Newmarket and Aurora). They amalgamated by choice, and this is the situation they have to contend with but you can't just do apples-to-apples comparisons with other 905 systems.

 

[Transportfan]

I was comparing it to transit in York's (I think you meant that) urban area. Fair comparison.









0

 

[TJ O'Pootertoot]

I wasn't criticizing you are anyone else - It's all fine and good to complain about the frequencies etc. but people end up saying "Even Brampton has X or Y..." and so on when the comparisons aren't always fair.

YRT is a weird hybrid beast and they're hitting something of a wall these past few years while trying to be everything to everyone. Sometimes I think both YRT and YR, in general, would be better off if they split the north/rural munis off from the 3 south "urban" ones. As long as their mandate requires them to provide service on rural routes with huge subsidies, it's hard to provide enough on more popular ones. OTOH, the relative wealth of the south helps support services in the north, so what are you gonna do?

 

[Leo_Chan]

York Region is a regional municipality with 11 towns and cities and must serve all of them. Even now, the routes are basically a giant upside-down T, with all route going through Markham, Vaughan, Richmond Hill, Aurora, and Newmarket. If the low revenue routes, local and special, were completely cut, then the frequencies in the top 5 (Markham, Vaughan, Richmond Hill, Aurora, and Newmarket) can increase and provide service during the night. The main problem is that almost all YRT/Viva routes are running off subsidy except for Viva Blue (I can't find a source for this, I'm using this from memory), where it is the only one that makes money.

A bit off topic: What I am puzzled about is why vivaNext built the Highway 7 East and West Rapidways before the Yonge St Rapidway? I understand that Y1 (Hwy7 to Finch) was removed due to YNSE, but why wasn't Y2, Y3, Y4 not done first? If this route was the only YRT/Viva route making money, wouldn't it be the smartest to get the most out of it by investing to increase frequency and reliability? On the other hand, increasing reliability does help Viva Purple/Pink as Highway 7 is always congested.

 

[denfromoakvillemilton]

... And, even worse, because of the double fare, some of what should be their prime routes are cannibalized by TTC.

The issue isn't that they're terrible but that they're trying to go in many directions at once, literally and figuratively. It's easy to bash the frequencies or the fares but it's all related.

People who live south of 7 try to avoid the double fare by driving to Finch, walking to Steeles or otherwise taking TTC on border routes instead of paying $4 to take a YRT bus that runs right outside their home.

I doubt there's any way to know the actual numbers but I wouldn't be surprised if YRT has some sort of internal guess. With a different fare structure, there would be fewer people riding (For example) the 53 and 60 TTC routes and more on the local YRT routes, Viva etc. There's a definite financial impact, negatively for YRT and positively for TTC, right in the area that should be YRT's breadbasket.

But Mississauga and Brampton have pockets of social housing and old suburban areas, especially Mississauga. Even in the newer "sprawl" developments, there are a lot of South Asians living with several families in one house, and not all of them have cars.

You're kind of mixing and matching things.
-I didn't say it had to do with TTC or that it's anyone's "fault" Yes, the issue is a FARE issue, not a service issue per se. But the fare issue funnels people who could take both services to only take one. So people who could take YRT to TTC avoid YRT.
Frankly (and this has been said by me and others elsewhere) it works the other way too. An empty YRT bus cannot pick up people waiting to go to Finch on the south side of Steeles. Riders have to wait for a TTC bus, because they are in Toronto.
-The contracted routes are ultimately subject the same logic; an inefficiency is created. Just because someone pays an extra fare to go 850m doesn't mean they're happy about it or that it's fair.
-There's no need to merge all the transit systems, merely to come up with reasonable fare integration, which is a topic for another thread. But you don't need to merge systems to ensure that (per the scenarios I just described) people can get on the first bus going to their destination, regardless of who is operating it, and don't have to pay a full additional fare to transfer between systems or go a few hundred metres into another municipality.

Like I said, I don't have hard numbers. But I think it's obvious people avoid the double fare when they can. Just go look at all the bikes, pretty much anywhere along Steeles, between Don Mills and Dufferin, chained to lampposts.

https://www.yorkregion.com/news-story/5527065-newmarket-councillors-dismayed-over-empty-yrt-buses/



And Mississauaga doesn't have a rural area as big as the City of Toronto.

YRT would operate differently - and likely have greater frequency - if it wasn't serving Georgina and East Gwillibury (or even Newmarket and Aurora). They amalgamated by choice, and this is the situation they have to contend with but you can't just do apples-to-apples comparisons with other 905 systems.

I wasn't criticizing you are anyone else - It's all fine and good to complain about the frequencies etc. but people end up saying "Even Brampton has X or Y..." and so on when the comparisons aren't always fair.

YRT is a weird hybrid beast and they're hitting something of a wall these past few years while trying to be everything to everyone. Sometimes I think both YRT and YR, in general, would be better off if they split the north/rural munis off from the 3 south "urban" ones. As long as their mandate requires them to provide service on rural routes with huge subsidies, it's hard to provide enough on more popular ones. OTOH, the relative wealth of the south helps support services in the north, so what are you gonna do?

York Region is a regional municipality with 11 towns and cities and must serve all of them. Even now, the routes are basically a giant upside-down T, with all route going through Markham, Vaughan, Richmond Hill, Aurora, and Newmarket. If the low revenue routes, local and special, were completely cut, then the frequencies in the top 5 (Markham, Vaughan, Richmond Hill, Aurora, and Newmarket) can increase and provide service during the night. The main problem is that almost all YRT/Viva routes are running off subsidy except for Viva Blue (I can't find a source for this, I'm using this from memory), where it is the only one that makes money.

A bit off topic: What I am puzzled about is why vivaNext built the Highway 7 East and West Rapidways before the Yonge St Rapidway? I understand that Y1 (Hwy7 to Finch) was removed due to YNSE, but why wasn't Y2, Y3, Y4 not done first? If this route was the only YRT/Viva route making money, wouldn't it be the smartest to get the most out of it by investing to increase frequency and reliability? On the other hand, increasing reliability does help Viva Purple/Pink as Highway 7 is always congested.

Right but again, Mississauga and Brampton are about 1.3 million together. You can say Peel doesn't serve Caledon or Orangville, but both systems manage to provide night and sunday service on most of their coverage areas. Durham Region has quite a few rural areas, but you don't necessairly need to rely on a car if you live Pickering, Ajax, Whitby or Oshawa because they bus right there for most those cities for most of their populations too. To blame rural areas is not really fair. If they cut service, then there is an uproar. I don't think YRT should have contracted out service or merged if they knew they were not going to serve their critical routes. Especially in places like Newmarket, not everyone that works in Toronto has a car and that kind of defeats the point of the subways going uo there or the increasing urbanization if YRT isn't pulling their weight.


Another example is here, Pine Valley, Vaughan. https://www.yrt.ca/en/schedules-and-maps/resources/12.pdf

This route would have sunday service in Whitby

Here, Martin Grove is a bit better, but no sunday service. https://www.yrt.ca/en/schedules-and-maps/resources/7.pdf

And Another example, Bristol, Newmarket https://www.yrt.ca/en/schedules-and-maps/resources/44.pdf

Early and no sunday service. I'm sure a lot of people in that circle don't own a car.

 

[TJ O'Pootertoot]

York Region is a regional municipality with 11 towns and cities and must serve all of them.

Erm, 9. But the point stands.

A bit off topic: What I am puzzled about is why vivaNext built the Highway 7 East and West Rapidways before the Yonge St Rapidway? I understand that Y1 (Hwy7 to Finch) was removed due to YNSE, but why wasn't Y2, Y3, Y4 not done first?

The phasing plan never changed aside from, as you managed, the deferral of Y1.
Highway 7 East was done because of Markham Centre and Highway 7 West to hook up with the subway and benefit VMC.
Right now, RH, Markham, Vaughan and Newmarket all have rapidways. If they'd done Y2-4 first, RH would be the only municipality with bus lanes, eh.
Also, Highway 7 was easier construction than Yonge; less expropriation, wider ROW etc.

Also, don't forget things got delayed when McGuinty cut the Phase II funding (same time the back end of Transit City got put on hold).

Right but again, Mississauga and Brampton are about 1.3 million together. You can say Peel doesn't serve Caledon or Orangville, but both systems manage to provide night and sunday service on most of their coverage areas. Durham Region has quite a few rural areas, but you don't necessairly need to rely on a car if you live Pickering, Ajax, Whitby or Oshawa because they bus right there for most those cities for most of their populations too. To blame rural areas is not really fair. If they cut service, then there is an uproar. I don't think YRT should have contracted out service or merged if they knew they were not going to serve their critical routes.

Well, they are serving those routes - just not with great frequencies. Ultimately, it's a big chicken egg thing and it's not the "fault" of rural communities. The built form and age of the communities is what it is. Durham most certainly also has a (sub)urban and a rural area, for example, but the geographic distribution (especially in relation to Toronto) is different. The Peel example would be easier if Brampton and Mississauga were part of the same larger system - as Markham and Vaughan are with YRT.

Everyone wants greater frequencies etc. but every wants cheaper fares too. YR's strategy, for better or worse, has been "It's better to have a bus run on-time every 30 minutes than scheduled for every 15 but often be late and/or run empty." I don't have the answer and I don't envy them the balancing act but every municipality's challenges are going to be unique.

 

[denfromoakvillemilton]

Erm, 9. But the point stands.




The phasing plan never changed aside from, as you managed, the deferral of Y1.
Highway 7 East was done because of Markham Centre and Highway 7 West to hook up with the subway and benefit VMC.
Right now, RH, Markham, Vaughan and Newmarket all have rapidways. If they'd done Y2-4 first, RH would be the only municipality with bus lanes, eh.
Also, Highway 7 was easier construction than Yonge; less expropriation, wider ROW etc.

Also, don't forget things got delayed when McGuinty cut the Phase II funding (same time the back end of Transit City got put on hold).




Well, they are serving those routes - just not with great frequencies. Ultimately, it's a big chicken egg thing and it's not the "fault" of rural communities. The built form and age of the communities is what it is. Durham most certainly also has a (sub)urban and a rural area, for example, but the geographic distribution (especially in relation to Toronto) is different. The Peel example would be easier if Brampton and Mississauga were part of the same larger system - as Markham and Vaughan are with YRT.

Everyone wants greater frequencies etc. but every wants cheaper fares too. YR's strategy, for better or worse, has been "It's better to have a bus run on-time every 30 minutes than scheduled for every 15 but often be late and/or run empty." I don't have the answer and I don't envy them the balancing act but every municipality's challenges are going to be unique.

Right, but how does this match with the density being built and the subway. If people are just driving to the subway, it kind of defeats the point.

I think that routes like Aurora south, https://www.yrt.ca/en/schedules-and-maps/resources/32.pdf should probably have way more service then they have now. I mean it can't be all about the VIVA and the subway. You have to encourage people to use local public transit as well, and York simply is not getting it done.

 

[TJ O'Pootertoot]

Right, but how does this match with the density being built and the subway. If people are just driving to the subway, it kind of defeats the point.

Are you asking about the Yonge subway? That adds huge density (as in, 100K people, per the plans, in the the UGC and along Yonge) within walking distance of the subway. It will also stop the hundreds (thousands?) of people who drive to Finch now but won't have to anymore. There will be a lot at Langstaff, yes, but more people will be feeding in by bus (especially if they actually build the Transitway one day).

So that's my answer to that, though I think it's a bit of a red herring. The network south of, say,the Oak Ridges Moraine, functions fairly differently from the system to the north. The former subsidies the latter. But, like they say, there's only one taxpayer.

I don't disagree with your point about greater frequency. I've seen some YR discussions in the past and have seen the chicken-egg thing at work. It's probably no surprise but one thing the councillors get called on a lot from residents is "How come all day I see these buses going by and they're empty?!" Run more buses and more of them will be empty. And since most people in YR drive, they find paying taxes for those buses even more irksome.

They could knock the fare down to $3.50 and increase times, but then they'll also be passing a 5% tax increase, or something.

They're trying to turn a big ship around. It's fair to say they're not pulling it off yet or doing it right, I just don't think there's an easy solution they're missing.

 

[denfromoakvillemilton]

Agreed. The YRT is falling behind. York Region has 1.3 million people. It is extensively growing with city centres, subways, and rapidways.

Yes, I agree 100% - and Hi! welcome to UT.

Are you asking about the Yonge subway? That adds huge density (as in, 100K people, per the plans, in the the UGC and along Yonge) within walking distance of the subway. It will also stop the hundreds (thousands?) of people who drive to Finch now but won't have to anymore. There will be a lot at Langstaff, yes, but more people will be feeding in by bus (especially if they actually build the Transitway one day).

So that's my answer to that, though I think it's a bit of a red herring. The network south of, say,the Oak Ridges Moraine, functions fairly differently from the system to the north. The former subsidies the latter. But, like they say, there's only one taxpayer.

I don't disagree with your point about greater frequency. I've seen some YR discussions in the past and have seen the chicken-egg thing at work. It's probably no surprise but one thing the councillors get called on a lot from residents is "How come all day I see these buses going by and they're empty?!" Run more buses and more of them will be empty. And since most people in YR drive, they find paying taxes for those buses even more irksome.

They could knock the fare down to $3.50 and increase times, but then they'll also be passing a 5% tax increase, or something.

They're trying to turn a big ship around. It's fair to say they're not pulling it off yet or doing it right, I just don't think there's an easy solution they're missing.

Yes I'm talking about Yonge. Not everyone takes viva, most will use local transit so there has to be support for them coming in the night after work hours. I'm glad you agree, but I think if they have to pass a tax to increase service, then do it. Or it's time for a provincial subsidy. The buses would be less empty if there was an actual plan and they could be used on time

Here's an article about empty buses in Newmarket from yorkregion.com - https://www.yorkregion.com/news-sto...avis-drive-give-system-time-york-region-says/

 

[denfromoakvillemilton]

Yeah, never liked the YRT except the rapidways.

I think Viva is great imo, it's the rest of the systems that's a problem.

@TJ O'Pootertoot it's not just frequency, it's late night service as well. Halton, Peel and Durham have no issues with this either.

 

[TJ O'Pootertoot]

I think Viva is great imo, it's the rest of the systems that's a problem.

@TJ O'Pootertoot it's not just frequency, it's late night service as well. Halton, Peel and Durham have no issues with this either.

Yeah, I get that. I was lumping that in with frequency - it's still "not enough buses."

We agree the problem is they're building this nice spin but not feeding into it adequately. That's what I meant with the push/pull, chicken/egg thing. They're moving forward and doing good, progressive things, but at a cost to the local service.

 

[denfromoakvillemilton]

Yeah, I get that. I was lumping that in with frequency - it's still "not enough buses."

We agree the problem is they're building this nice spin but not feeding into it adequately. That's what I meant with the push/pull, chicken/egg thing. They're moving forward and doing good, progressive things, but at a cost to the local service.

Of course, but I think YRT could reorganizes at this point and figure just where needs support. I would start with the more working class areas of the big five.

 

[denfromoakvillemilton]

Yeah, at least it could get more funding from the provincial government or possibly the 407 since the toll highway makes over billions of dollars each year. The YRT is so behind. It does not keeps up the region's growth. Other places smaller than York Region like Brampton, Kitchener/Waterloo, and London, Ontario have more frequent transit systems.

And that's it right there. Brampton has the same issues yet there residents know the bus will be there for them when their 3-11 shift is done. Newmarket? Vaughan? I rest my case.