[URBAN NOTE] "Sufferin’ on the Dufferin"

[rfmcdonald]

Torontoist's Sarah Niedoba reports on the state of the 29 Dufferin bus. I would agree that the bus has improved in recent years.

Rider complaints with the 29 are many and varied, from general busyness to the buses tendency to “roam in packs.” By and large, however, they can be broken down into a few main categories.

Steve Munro, a Toronto transit advocate and Torontoist contributor, has used TTC vehicle tracking data to review the 29 Dufferin’s operation between 2011 and 2015. In his report on the route he identifies a few key failures in performance: headways (or time in between vehicles), bunching, and short turns.

Headways give riders an idea of when they can expect the next bus to arrive. Regular service, according to the TTC, means a vehicle every five to 10 minutes. According to Munro, “Headways may look good on paper, but if the service arrives unreliably, or if some of it never reaches the destination thanks to short turns, then the advertised service is a polite fiction.”

Short turns are used by drivers to ensure that they are keeping to their scheduled running times. If they can’t complete the full route in the scheduled time, they’ll short turn and return to the station early, frustrating riders who are unceremoniously dumped off before arriving at their chosen destination. Munro notes that the 29 Dufferin will often short turn at College, meaning those who are looking to use the service southbound find themselves stranded.

“The route is constantly changed without warning, one moment you are on a bus headed south to Dufferin gates and the next you are being kicked off at minus 20 to stand on the corner of College Street to wait and try and make it onto the people-filled bus trailing behind,” wrote one disgruntled Yelp reviewer.