[URBAN NOTE] "The challenge of getting to the bus stop"

[rfmcdonald]

Spacing Toronto's Sean Marshall notes the role of often overlooked, but critical, bus routes in mass transit in the Greater Toronto Area.

In the Greater Toronto Area, we have a fixation on building transit, especially subways, but we’re less interested in transit operations, especially local bus routes. But the majority of TTC riders take buses at least once daily, and the local bus stop is the first point of contact with the transit system for many riders. Sadly, there’s often very little thought put in to accessing local bus stops.

Needless to say, transit has a harder time in the suburbs. Suburbs are built for the car, laid out with crescents, cul-de-sacs and winding street systems meant to discourage through traffic in residential areas. Backyard fences line arterial roads, safe pedestrian crossings might be a ten or fifteen minute walk down the road. These factors, often known as the “last mile problem” can make it difficult for people living in subdivisions and near busy streets to easily access a nearby bus stop. GO Transit’s solution to the last mile problem was simple: it built giant parking lots and garages and developed a successful commuter rail system that expected its riders to park their cars at its stations.

Last year, Streetsblog USA asked its readers to vote for the sorriest bus stop in America, and some of the submissions are truly awful. But in the Greater Toronto Area, there are many examples of poorly designed or located bus stops. I’ll mention two: one in Brampton and one in Scarborough, but there are hundreds of stops in the Greater Toronto Area that could use some attention.

Intersections like the one at Steeles Avenue West and McMurchy/Malta Avenue in Brampton, which, granted isn’t as bad as the StreetsblogUSA submissions, is just one example of how not to get people out of cars and onto public transit. Some thought into placing bus stops and improving access to local transit is necessary.

I like Brampton Transit and what they’ve been doing over the last decade in my hometown. Since 2005, the suburban transit agency began to re-organize its routes into a grid system, improved schedules, and introduced new connections to Toronto and Mississauga. In September 2010, Brampton Transit introduced Züm, a network of limited-stop bus routes. My hometown’s bus system was no longer a joke.