The pressure to
boost GTA transit service is acute, and York University is a great
example. Long lineups of riders now wait to board TTC express route
196 buses that link the Keele St. campus with two stations on the
Yonge-University-Spadina subway line.
Last week Luiz
Marcio Cysneiros wrote me, “Yesterday (as happens almost every day)
at 5:30 p.m. I got to the 196A stop to find a line almost 200 meters
long! If that's not enough, the first bus showed up 10 minutes
later. Then eight minutes later (as usual) we get two buses coming,”
just seconds apart.
He writes that
when multiple buses arrive and open their doors at the same time,
not only does this, “create confusion in the line but it results in
the first bus departing less than half full.”
Senior TTC
superintendent John Chamberlain tells In Transit that personnel were
sent to the campus in April to monitor the buses and help with
loading, and will do so again this week. Plans to increase the
number of vehicles on the route have been put on hold, due to budget
shortfalls at the TTC.
While many hope
an extension of the Spadina subway line will eventually speed up
travel to York University, trains aren’t scheduled to start running
before 2016. Interim plans for an exclusive busway to campus -- an
economical and quickly built alternative -- have hit delay after
delay.
The latest
holdup threatens to postpone the opening date past September 2008,
years later than first expected. The TTC wants to use a hydro
corridor north of Finch Avenue for its buses, but the agencies
responsible for the provincially controlled land are seeking “market
rent” of $3.9 million over ten years.
Commission
chair Adam Giambrone admits the amount may not be considered “huge”,
but would be an expensive precedent for cities in Ontario. “If we’re
talking about using the hydro corridors for higher order transit or
for bike paths,” he says, “and we’re going to have to pay
substantial amounts of money to access (the Finch route), then
there’s a real issue there.”
A report before
the TTC tomorrow states that if the issue isn’t resolved by the end
of the month, the busway to York could be delayed until 2009.
Changes to land pricing would apparently require new provincial
legislation.
Wilson Lee,
spokesperson for Public Infrastructure Renewal Minister David
Caplan, says that during the Ontario election, “substantive policy
decisions can’t be made -- it just wouldn’t be appropriate.” However
he added, “I think it would be fair to say that the request is being
positively considered.”