Transit committee urges council to include ‘critical’ express route 418X and other improvements in budget

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The Transit Windsor Advisory Committee made a unanimous call to the city council on Tuesday to help elevate the position of bus service at the “base of the provincial ladder.”

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With four councilors sitting on the committee, the motion sets the stage for a heated battle during budget deliberations on Dec. 13 between councilors trying to maintain a tax increase that is less than half the rate of inflation and those who They are pushing to follow the Transit Master Plan that seeks to double the number of passengers and service in the coming years. The next step in that plan is the start of the new express route 418X east-west along Tecumseh Road to the new St. Denis Center at the University of Windsor. At a cost of an additional $ 1 million a year, along with various other master plan investments, they are not being recommended by management.

“This route is critical because we have to have the 418X in place before we can make modifications to some of the other routes, Transway 1C and Crosstown 2,” Ward 9 Coun said. Kieran McKenzie, chair of the advisory committee. “We are at this point where this is the next step and there is no next step.”

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The administration’s recommended Transit Windsor budget calls for a 4.8 percent increase, largely due to inflationary pressures such as rising fuel costs and wages, Ward 3 Coun said. Rino Bortolin. He predicted that at budget time, it will be argued that Transit Windsor is already getting a 4.8 percent increase, and that passenger numbers are still below 50 percent of pre-pandemic levels.

“But the reality of recovering the number of passengers is offering a service that people want to take,” he said, stating that the goal should not be to go back to 100 percent, but to 150 or 200 percent. He cited municipal benchmarking charts showing Windsor transit service in lower Ontario.

In a 2019 comparison of transit services, Windsor is tied last for revenue hours (the number of hours a vehicle is on the road charging fees) per capita, at 1.2. London, which used to be at the same level as Windsor, is now at 1.6, thanks to improvements in service that resulted in increases in passenger numbers, the committee heard. At the top of the list is Ottawa with 2.7.

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Windsor is also last when it comes to city contributions to bus services at $ 60.72 per capita, Bortolin noted.

We’re 10 percent behind London ($ 66.26) and about 30 percent behind Sudbury ($ 77.89) and that’s the other two at the bottom and it jumps to $ 90, $ 96. , $ 98, $ 100, $ 111, up to Ottawa at $ 277 per capita ”.

The committee chair, Ward 4 Coun. Chris Holt said the motion may be simply symbolic as Transit Windsor’s budget has already been endorsed by the standing committee on environment, transportation and public safety, recommended by the administration and is in the hands of city councilors. . But it is important that the advisory committee advocates for traffic and emphasizes the need to quickly implement the master plan, he said.

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“I think everyone at this table knows how important transit is as a tool for economic development, for equity and ecological purposes.”

Mayor Drew Dilkens will hold a press conference on Wednesday to “provide details on the highlights of the past year and upcoming investments in public transportation infrastructure and services.”

At Tuesday’s committee meeting, Transit Windsor CEO Tyson Cragg emphasized that the bus service is lucky the city is keeping funding where it is, despite dramatic drops in passenger numbers during the pandemic. .

“I’ll tell you I’m grateful for that,” he said, noting that many other transit services have had funding cuts.

“Of course, more is always better, but I want to make it clear to the committee that when it comes to operational investment, I am quite fortunate that I am not facing cuts in service.”

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The same kind of traffic battle was brewing last February when several councilors denounced the omission of the 518X, a fast route from Tecumseh Mall to St. Clair College, from the proposed 2021 budget. But then Dilkens met with the president of the city. university, Patti France, to work on the execution of the 518X as a pilot project beginning in September, when classes resumed, with both parties contributing $ 90,000 each. The pilot project has been considered a great success and it is recommended that the 518X be permanent by 2022.

The 518X is a big step, Bortolin said, but it’s only one step.

“And if we don’t keep pace with the transit master plan this year, we will simply continue to lag behind. And we are already behind. We are literally at the bottom of the provincial ladder when it comes to investing in transit. “

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