It’s been just
over six months since blue Viva buses started taking passengers on
Yonge Street in York Region. There are now four all-day lines,
adding a whole layer of service to the York Region Transit (YRT)
network. YRT itself is new -- only a few years ago transit rides
were either on small local systems, on TTC buses north of Steeles
Avenue, or via GO Transit.
Congestion has
increased significantly in suburban areas around Toronto, and
municipal officials across car-friendly York Region have been
nurturing a small but ambitious transit revolution. Along the way,
Viva displaced a successful GO Transit bus line on Yonge Street,
both depriving GO of revenue as well as some riders of convenient
travel. While Viva is for some commuters more time-consuming than
the GO bus -- and not much faster than local YRT routes in a few
cases -- it is quite a few steps above most suburban transit
systems.
Even though
Viva’s distinctive Belgian vehicles have to travel with the rest of
traffic, all four main lines offer scheduled service at a minimum of
every 15 minutes. If you’re going to a location near one of its
limited express stops, you can almost treat Viva like a subway or
light rail system.
Just determine
which colour-coded line you must take, have some money ready to buy
a ticket before you board, and go. It’s not a guaranteed success,
but Viva may yet show how to get commuters out of their cars -- and
not just in York Region.
In January
2006, ridership on the Yonge corridor increased almost 10 per cent
over January 2005, and that factors in the former GO service. More
remarkably, the total number of boardings along Yonge went up 34 per
cent in the same period. It appears people are making use of new
two-hour transfers, which allow them to travel to their destination
and return on one fare.
This could mean
that some residents are now able to make short local trips by
transit -- something usually reserved for dense urban areas.
The 15-minute
maximum headway -- the time between bus arrivals -- is also a shift
toward making transit a real option in an area where most people
drive. Viva’s Mary-Frances Turner says that if buses come every 15
minutes or better, riders don’t tend to bother with schedules.
Each stop also
features an electronic monitor that indicates when the next bus will
arrive. On my few trips I found the times would change
unpredictably. Turner states the indicators are working properly,
and that rider feedback confirms her view.
On opening day,
a Viva ticket vending machine short-changed me by six dollars. This
and other glitches with the new transit service have apparently been
ironed out. YRT riders are welcome to write me with updates.
Turner says
Viva has prompted “considerable new interest from a whole new
generation of riders -- which is what our system is all about. Some
lines are extremely strong performers and others are ‘growing’ lines
as we would expect for anything that’s brand new.”
For travel in
York Region visit h/http://www.yorkregiontransit.ca
and
http://www.gotransit.com/publicroot/home.asp See
http://vivayork.com for in-depth
details on the Viva network and future plans.