UTTRI associated faculty Professor Matti Siemiatycki underscores the importance of Canada’s public transit networks in “‘Build it and they will come’: Canada’s public transit looks to rebound from COVID-19,” Toronto Star, December 16, 2020.
Transit ridership is down owing to COVID-19 but drastic service cuts are not anticipated in Canada, unlike other countries such as the U.S.
The transportation policy expert said there were fears transit agencies in Canada would have to make drastic service cuts. “Public transit networks have been among the most impacted sectors in the economy from the pandemic,” he said in a recent interview.
Instead, provincial and federal funding rescued the country’s transit systems from the verge of collapse, he said. In the United States, however, public transit systems are facing the “dreaded transit death spiral,” Siemiatycki said, where cuts lead to further declines in ridership, which lead to further cuts and declines.
While some Canadian transit agencies have made cuts, some, including the TTC, have committed to maintaining service at at a high level even while ridership is low, and have expansion projects planned.
In the country’s largest city, the Toronto Transit Commission said service during the week of Dec. 4 was at 95 per cent of pre-pandemic levels. The transit agency said it will maintain the same level of service in 2021. The Ontario government is also moving forward with a $28-billion plan to expand transit in the Toronto area.
Siemiatycki said that while ridership is down, the health crisis has shown the importance of public transit. “Even through the pandemic, transit played a critical role in our economies,“ he said. ”Transit was a lifeline service for people to reach their front-line place of employment.“