Intercity Bus Services

[reaperexpress]

The trouble with those Ottawa commuter routes is that many require a pass to ride, and don't allow single-ride ticketing. The Cornwall-Ottawa bus is one of those.

Not helpful for passengers making occasional trips - such as for medical reasons, to visit family or friends, or for students heading home on weekends or holidays.

Yes, the routes are severely commuter-oriented. On top of the monthly pass, they depart their towns around 6:00 in the morning, which is awfully early for other types of trips. Maybe they shouldn't be shown on an intercity bus map. I don't know.

I started adding them to my map, but now it is starting to look silly around Ottawa. It's hard to draw the line of "what is a bus route" when so many of Ontario's intercity bus routes have only a single trip per day. Pretty much anyone can get a van and make a bus route with that kind of frequency, which is in fact what we're seeing.

 

[T.O.Fanatic]

For me, it was always shocking how uncoordinated and infrequent our intercity transit "system" is in Ontario. One reply mentioned the Espacebus website from Quebec, which is sort of what I was hoping to see happen here in Ontario and why my colleague and I are making this map! As an aside, I don't know if complete deregulation makes sense here (in reponse to another post) what we're seeing happen is the only remaining frequent buses are directly competing with VIA (EG on the Toronto-Ottawa route) while abandoning such trips as Toronto-Owen Sound via Collingwood. That's a route with great potential (tourism in Blue Mountains!) yet with only one trip per day. Without a subsidy Greyhound may eventually cut it entirely.

 

[APTA-2048]

HMT = Hammond Transportation. They run a Barrie - Orillia commuter service. I think it was a PMCL service back in the day but don't quote me on that.

In 2010, Greyhound abandoned service to communities in the Barrie-Orillia-Penetang/Midland area (which they probably inherited from PMCL). Getaway Coach Line, purchased by the PMCL's founding family in 2007, picked up the slack. In 2014, Hammond purchased Getaway and inherited their routes.

 

[steveintoronto]

This is like a funeral service...it's a question of what remains...digging on Aboutown to see if anything was left, can find nothing, but did find reference to this:

CK Transit (Chatham Conventional) provides the conventional bus transportation in Chatham-Kent, Ontario, Canada.

There are four local bus routes within the urban boundaries of the old City of Chatham,[1] providing services every 30 minutes Monday through Saturday. For rail passengers, bus route 3 stops nearest the VIA Rail station, at the intersection of Park Avenue West and Pine Street.

CK Transit also provides bus service to outlying communities in Chatham-Kent. In October 2007, Route A, linking Chatham, Wallaceburg and Dresden, with four trips Monday through Saturday, was introduced.[2]

Interurban service was expanded to include Route D, linking Chatham to Tilbury and Wheatley in January 2009, and Route C, serving Blenheim and Ridgetown in January 2010.[3][4]

Chatham Specialized Transit Service is a personalized curb-to-curb transportation service for persons who are unable to board the Chatham Conventional public transit system.[5]

Chatham-Kent also has intercity bus services, with Greyhound Canada services to and from Windsor, London and Toronto, and through Detroit, Michigan to Chicago, Illinois. These services stop at Thamesville, Chatham and Tilbury.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CK_Transit

Which yet again underlines the necessity of a provincial map to show these routes. There must be more...

 

[T.O.Fanatic]

This is like a funeral service...it's a question of what remains...digging on Aboutown to see if anything was left, can find nothing, but did find reference to this:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CK_Transit

Which yet again underlines the necessity of a provincial map to show these routes. There must be more...

Once my map is more complete, I'll be going full bore in contacting journalists who have written on bus cuts in the past, we really do need to get a movement going.

 

[steveintoronto]

I'll be going full bore in contacting journalists who have written on bus cuts in the past

Excellent.

I'm going to dig more on this angle:

Where do Cartographers Work? - Canadian Cartographic Association
cca-acc.org/resources/where-do-cartographers-work/
Some cartographers in Canada work for the government, and details of the more important federal and provincial mapping agencies are given below.
Links - Canadian Cartographic Association
cca-acc.org/resources/links/
Government of Canada Departments; Independent Companies, Agencies or ... publish.uwo.ca/~mcdaniel/weblinks/carto.html Western Ontario (Robert McDaniel ...
‎Cartographic Education · ‎Map Libraries · ‎Web Indices · ‎Cartography related ...

Maps are wonderful things, and there's some on this site who are very good at it, at least digitally derived depictions, which of course could be printed out. It is a form of 'nerdism' and I'm one as much as anyone, you can pore for hours over good maps, they tell stories as well as tell you where you are.

At the very least, it's a damn good question to put to the Minister of Transport's office. Since all of these bus routes operate under a provincial charter, MoT must have the jurisdiction to produce a map. You've got my juices going, it completely defies logic that we have to scrounge to find this info.

 

[Fritter]

At the very least, it's a damn good question to put to the Minister of Transport's office. Since all of these bus routes operate under a provincial charter, MoT must have the jurisdiction to produce a map. You're got my juices going, it completely defies logic that we have to scrounge to find this info.

I seem to remember that in the early 80's I had a copy of a map publication from the MTO/Government of Ontario that was an "Intercity Travel Guide" It was a map with contact info of all the rail and bus routes in the province. I think I might still have it. I'll try scaning it if I do.

 

[adma]

This is like a funeral service...it's a question of what remains...

And given the demo which intercity bus service has long been presumed to serve, I can't help getting a whiff of what the "Make America Great Again" crowd has been subliminally longing/pining for...substitute "Ontario" for "America" in this instance. Without the lifeline of a bus network in place, what you get is isolation and terminal entropy...

 

[steveintoronto]

terminal entropy

Double entendre!
It does hark back to an era bygone. I remember "Colonial Coach Line" as a newly arrived immigrant child in Port Hope. The memories...
https://cptdb.ca/wiki/index.php/Colonial_Coach_Lines

 

[adma]

Double entendre!
It does hark back to an era bygone. I remember "Colonial Coach Line" as a newly arrived immigrant child in Port Hope. The memories...
https://cptdb.ca/wiki/index.php/Colonial_Coach_Lines

And I remember investing in a Voyageur (Colonial's successor) weekend bus pass in 1991 to retrieve a bag I'd left at a friend's house in Montreal--a good alibi to throw in a quick Ottawa visit as well.

It'd seem to me, too, that this slumlordy collapse of bus networks correlates with a circumstance I noticed in the 90s: bus stations banished from the inner core to service-garagey metal sheds in the boondocks (places like Kamloops and Belleville come to mind)

 

[IRT_BMT_IND]

The Russell's Guide is probably the closest thing available to a comprehensive intercity bus map. I think the reference library still has a subscription.

 

[ShonTron]

And I remember investing in a Voyageur (Colonial's successor) weekend bus pass in 1991 to retrieve a bag I'd left at a friend's house in Montreal--a good alibi to throw in a quick Ottawa visit as well.

It'd seem to me, too, that this slumlordy collapse of bus networks correlates with a circumstance I noticed in the 90s: bus stations banished from the inner core to service-garagey metal sheds in the boondocks (places like Kamloops and Belleville come to mind)

Buses in Belleville (there are a lot fewer than there were even a decade ago) do stop downtown again, at the main bus terminal.

Though in Edmonton, Greyhound moved its terminal to the VIA station (getting out of the way of the new hockey arena precinct). The VIA station, which also moved out of downtown, has no transit service and is at the far end of the old Edmonton City Airport. It's a good way to kill your business.

Greyhound also refused to move in with Guelph Transit and GO to the new downtown terminal there, and operates out of a portable south of Downtown.

 

[Garuda]

Greyhound also refused to move in with Guelph Transit and GO to the new downtown terminal there, and operates out of a portable south of Downtown.

That's not the case anymore. Since the renovations began at Guelph Central, Greyhound uses downtown terminal. Inside the station, GO, VIA, Guelph Transit, and Greyhound tickets can all be purchased from the same kiosk.

 

[steveintoronto]

That's not the case anymore. Since the renovations began at Guelph Central, Greyhound uses downtown terminal. Inside the station, GO, VIA, Guelph Transit, and Greyhound tickets can all be purchased from the same kiosk.

I can confirm that, the 'portable' Shon refers to is now the construction hut for the Police HQ reno opposite. As to why Greyhound took so long to move to Guelph Central Station is an enduring question.

The manager for Guelph Transit in this linked article has now moved on like his predecessor. Guelph is not good at transit:
http://www.guelphmercury.com/news-s...-s-temporary-guelph-location-to-stay-for-now/

 

[T.O.Fanatic]

I'm pleased to announce to everyone that we've finally completed a "final" product of the bus map! As well, since researching and thinking about the big picture of intercity transit in Ontario lead us to bigger and bigger questions, we decided to start a long term blog project.

You can see the whole thing here: https://dudewheresmybusmap.wordpress.com/

As we go on, we're going to try and get more familiar with programs like Adobe Illustrator to create a more professional map. Anyways, leave your comments on our posts and lets start the conversation!