TTC Cutting Service at the end of month

[ShonTron]

So the TTC is seeing healthy ridership, has a customer service problem, and just raised fares. Yet dozens of routes are going to see rush hour service reductions!

Way to go, TTC!

If you rely on one of these routes, prepare to squish harder!

6 Bay
7 Bathurst
11 Bayview
12 Kingston Rd
17 Birchmount
20 Cliffside
35 Jane
37 Islington
38 Highland Creek
39 Finch East
45 Kipling
46 Martin Grove
51 Leslie
56 Leaside
61 Avenue Rd North
66 Prince Edward
70 OConnor
73 Royal York
85 Sheppard East (Bravo! You just cut service on that supposedly so important Transit City route!)
95 York Mills
96 Wilson
102 Markham Rd
110 Islington South
111 East Mall
133 Neilson
139 Finch-Don Mills
191 Highway 27 Rocket
505 Dundas
506 Carlton

http://www3.ttc.ca/Service_Advisories/Service_changes/index.jsp

You will see a few "service increases" in that link above. They are only a few routes, and except 509, they are all weekend and off-peak improvements.

 

[Dan416]

The Chicago Transit Authority had a service reduction in February so I'm not surprised to see the TTC do one as well.

 

[andomano]

For those interested, I've mapped the routes out: Etobicoke seems to be the hardest hit.

 

[taal]

Nice map ...

One thing I'll point out, most of these reductions are minor (not all) and probably amount to a bus or two less ... now that may sound like one too many but it really depends how well the route is managed.

Typically bunching increases inefficiency ... I'm sure we've all seen (on multiple occasions) the TTC's pack of buses, depending on the route this could be 2,3,4 even 5 (Finch east comes to mind) bunched together in rush hour. Typically the last bus is nearly empty, so eliminating that last bus or last two, doesn't have a large effect. If the routes are managed better that is, if they bunch just as much well then, we have worse service.

I'm actually hoping Steve Munro will comment on these soon as he always seems to have *inside* knowledge and a lot of the times these reductions occur for reasons such as driver / bus shortages and are not permanent. This happened last winter as well and service was pretty much restored in the next fall. Don't think this is the case here though.


Honestly I find during rush hour, TTC really needs to focus on improving the route scheduling and not so much adding / removing buses, again adding a bus to a heavily bunched route doesn't do much.

So no need for more buses ... expect on the weekend and off peak! Some routes suffer terrible off peak service for the *given* route ... that is, looking at the time only you might think a lot of the routes have *good* off peak - weekend service but a lot of these routes have very high ridership on the weekend, and we don't have enough buses on the road to provide the needed service.

 

[kettal]

I haven't gone through all of them, but a lot of them are adding 10 to 20 seconds to headways. Really inconsequential. The optimist in me hopes this is an attempt at ending bunching problems.

 

[RedRocket191]

There are 23 instances where service will increase
The highest increase sees your wait drop by 15 minutes
The lowest increase sees your wait drop by 15 seconds
On average the wait for a bus will decrease by 4 minutes, 32 seconds for the instances where service in increasing

There are 68 instances where service will decrease
The highest decrease sees your wait increase by 10 minutes
The lowest decrease sees your wait increase by 11 seconds
On average, the wait for a bus will increase by 1 minute, 36 seconds for the instances where service is decreasing

Overall, waits for a bus will increase by 3.5 seconds on average for the instance where service is changing

An instance is defined as a change made to service during a particular time of the day (AM peak, for example). If service is changing during the AM Peak and late evenings, for example, this would be two instances.

 

[eddiek]

That 96 Wilson Bus is going to hurt, It's fine all day but when that 4 o'clock hour hits, those bus's are rammed. Even when they bunch up that last bus is packed full. I had to walk to Wilson station a few times because I could not get on one due to overcrowding.

 

[299 bloor call control.]

From a few conversations, the service cuts are mainly in response to:
1) More ride counts conducted over the past year to have a better gauge on ridership - a lot of RGS adds when the loading standards were lowered were done quite liberally on older ride counts and standing counts - adjustment was needed to meet actual demand
2) Fare increase has meant a projected decrease in overall system ridership, and service levels are being adjusted for projected drops

As some of the posters above stated, the reductions on most routes are pretty minor and given the City's budget situation, fiscally prudent. The bulk of the RGS improvements are still in place, particularly the increased span of service on all routes, which is far more important in the perspective of ridership growth and fare increase justification.

 

[picard102]

I don't think the cut to the 96 is going to be a big problem. The change is from every 5 minutes 15 seconds to every 6 minutes in the afternoon. With the 165 being on the same route along Wilson I don't think the diffrence will be noticable.

 

[the_yellow_dart]

Jane is already underserviced. This is not good.

 

[eddiek]

I don't think the cut to the 96 is going to be a big problem. The change is from every 5 minutes 15 seconds to every 6 minutes in the afternoon. With the 165 being on the same route along Wilson I don't think the diffrence will be noticable.

I've timed the route standing out there waiting for that bus, it's more like 10 minutes to 15 minutes including the 165. That’s on a good day. Perhaps what the TTC's post for a schedule and what the schedule really is are two different things.

 

[doady]

Also consider that, while the overall reduction on many routes are minimal, routes are actually made of many different branches, and particular branches will be reduced more than others. And of course there is a disproportionate effect geographically as well, as andomano's map shows. Rexdale seems like it will be hit particularly hard by the service cuts, as if it didn't have enough problems already. But even with small overall decrease can have a huge negative effect since many of the routes listed are already extremely overcrowded and unreliable to begin with.

The Chicago Transit Authority had a service reduction in February so I'm not surprised to see the TTC do one as well.

The difference with the CTA is that saw it ridership decline in 2009, and therefore declines in revenue and the reduction of capacity needed. On the other hand, the TTC is seeing record high ridership, and therefore record high revenues and a need for higher capacity. CTA's ridership fell by 1% in 2009 while the TTC saw a substantial 3% increase. Mississsauga Transit saw a whopping 6% decrease in ridership throughout the first 8 months of 2009, but they still froze fares this year and avoided service cuts. What is the TTC's excuse?

 

[Jonny5]

I wonder if they are squeezing in some standard summertime service reductions a month or two early to try and save some money.

 

[Dan416]

I'm actually kinda happy the reductions are in the peak, becaues peak servic is already pretty good, so the improvements they made to off-peak service are being maintained.

 

[Chuck]

Increased bus service brings more people to the subway, which means a longer wait until you can squeeze onto a train. Decreased bus service brings fewer people to the subway, but means a longer wait until you can squeeze onto a bus. Either way, you'll have a longer wait for at least part of your trip.

Only relying on the subway, I will happen to benefit from this change by only having to wait for 3 trains to go by instead of 4 by the time I can board.

At the end of the day, the current TTC map bears a striking resemblance to the map that existed 40 years ago, at which time the city was 50% smaller. Therein lies the largest problem! In the bigger picture, it is inconsequential that a few bus routes are seeing slightly worse service.