Comments on: Transit ridership doubles in early days of Games

By: Jon Petrie

Jon Petrie — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 06:59:27 +0000

BC Ferries carried 1100 walk-on passengers on one Nanaimo-mainland trip the other day per a Blue Bus supervisor. Day passes for TransLink are now being sold on the ferries, an amazing high tech innovation (sarcasm here –day transit passes for the Victoria region have been available for over a year from the gift shops on the Swartz Bay run — but are unadvertised while the expensive private coach service to Victoria and the availability of tickets is, on every trip, announced on the ferry’s loudspeaker system.) A curious lack of coverage in the BC press on ferries and walk- ons during the Olympics. For a non BC source
http://www.globaltvedmonton.com/beyondthepodium/Ferries+swamped+Olympic+Games+crush/2602160/story.html

By: 2010 Streetcar

2010 Streetcar — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 19:02:54 +0000

http://stephenrees.wordpress.com/
Another interesting blog on transportation.

By: MB

MB — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 20:33:41 +0000

Overlooking the glitches to see the big picture, the fact public transit in Metro Vancouver achieved the near side of 2 million trips a day is nothing short of phenomenal. This in a metropolis of 2.3 million people.

The clear message is that we can accomplish much, much more with respect to building a city around transit in all forms. Let’s hope the politicians from senior governments are watching and listening. Transit riders are their constituents as much as the city’s.

The same applies to creating a few pedestrian-only streets in our densest centres.

The Olympics may have done more for urban design and transit planning than anything else so far. Moving the private car has had its day, now it’s time to move people and build neighbourhoods around them.

By: N

Mon, 22 Feb 2010 19:02:16 +0000

The Canada Line IS doing a great job, lots of station attendants moving people along, preventing overcrowding and helping with directions. Too bad I can’t say the same thing for Skytrain. Not on attendant to be found, crowding on platforms, etc etc.
As far as fare evasion, I think it is ridiculous to believe that it is only 3%. Listen to the talk on the train, I regularly hear people brag that they don’t buy fares. I catch the skytrain during rushhour M-F and I haven’t had my fare checked since the summer. The Canada Line does always have attendants checking tickets, but during the Olympics I have repeatedly heard their crowd control advising passengers to just buy their ticket on the other end (ya right) because there is too much crowding around the machines.

By: Westender

Westender — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 18:11:34 +0000

Jimmy O., there’s another part of that story – the pedestrian volumes on the False Creek bridges appear to be 2.3 times higher than on a summer day…but the cycling numbers at 4,000 are only 80% of normal summer traffic. Is this really something to “woot” about given the changes to convenient pedestrian access on the Burrard Bridge?

By: Lyle Stewart

Lyle Stewart — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 17:01:12 +0000

A link to support that stat: http://www.stm.info/english/info/comm-10/a-co100215.htm

By: Lyle Stewart

Lyle Stewart — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 17:00:15 +0000

Why reference only Toronto? The Montreal transit system has 2.2 million riders per day.

By: jimmy olson

jimmy olson — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 18:34:10 +0000

“Bike traffic on all three False Creek bridges
4,000
Normal summer traffic
5,000″

w00t!!! in feb they hit those numbers… just friggin fantastic!

By: Jon Petrie

Jon Petrie — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 07:19:04 +0000

TransLink does need an effective way of ensuring fines for fare evasion are paid — most tickets for fare evasion are ignored — see http://stephenrees.wordpress.com/2009/11/23/millions-of-dollars-in-transit-fines-go-unpaid/

But that said, I think too much emphasis is put on ensuring people pay fares on TransLink buses, rather than getting people quickly onto those buses.

The Bee line journeys have speeded up significantly since front door loading has been changed to all door loading. The big express bus to Horseshoe Bay, now restricted to one door loading might save 5 minutes a trip with 3 door loading and the monetary value of that saving should be guesstimated — say 60 people on the bus who value their time at ?? $12 an hour, that’s $60 a trip in transit user’s time at the cost of maybe two people on the bus who should have paid $3.75 each. (I wonder if TransLink does this kind of calculation.)

By: Denis

Denis — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 04:16:46 +0000

Withnthe road restrictions was there any other choice but make an illegal Vanoc security badge, walk or take transit.