Well I found out some fun and exciting news in the past few days, both about public transportation. Both are positive in my view, but one is not positive to public transportation. The first is about the new expansion of the Grand River Transit into the countryside. The other is about the O-train that was stopped and now the blame is going around. There is also a possible transit strike as well.
So the positive story is about the proposed expansion of bus service in the Waterloo Region. This expansion will affect the whole region. Grand River Transit will be having a trial bus service to Elmira this fall. This will of course be a trail program which would only run during the rush hours, going from Conestoga Mall to Elmira with a stop in St. Jacobs. This is truly new idea for the Region of Waterloo to have bus service to the outer communities. This bus may not make a lot of money and have the ridership to keep it in service. On the other hand the GRT is pushing the envelope of public transit. There has been the idea floated around that the new Rapid transit system would be extended to along the same route at some time. This could be a way for the GRT to build up ridership so when it goes into place there is already ridership. That is what is happening with the Ixpress, increase ridership along the route with out putting in a lot of capital of a whole system. The Region is currently looking into their options for a rapid transit system. They are looking at the routes and the type of technology, I do not know too much about the route but they should go with LRT. I hope by the end of this year they will announce what their final decision will be.
The other Public transit issue is with O-train, one of my favorite topics ever. What a terrible example of what you should do with public transit, ie it is bad, really bad. The whole process is being controlled by the politicians who are trying to one up each other, and that's not a good thing. So the new news about the issues is that the current environmental minister is under an probe about how he could have influenced the municipal election.
To give some background on the issue the O-train is LRT located in the Nations capital. It was a pilot program that did go from nowhere to nowhere, but there were more riders than they expected. So the former city council voted in favour of putting the system in place with expanded route and service. They signed a contract and were going to start it but then the municipal election occurred. This is when Mr. Baird comes in, he was asked by one of the people running in the election to with hold the money the federal government was going to spend on the system. This caused the candidate that was for the system to lose the election, which caused the system to loose a vote after the election.
If you thought it was that simple you are wrong, it is fairly complicated. Mr. Baird had no legal write to do the actions that he did, and some believe he did to get back at the former mayor who ran against Mr. Baird many times. The city had already signed a contract so they are now facing lawsuits from the companies that have signed the contracts, they want their money. The LRT was voted on twice after the election, it passed once then lost the second. The first vote was conducted when one of the members of council was on vacation, so it was done again after the person came back. Also the city of Ottawa was the only city that had their money with held, there was 10 other projects in place that did not have their money with held or reviewed. Only Ottawa had this happen to them.
The positive point of the story is that the federal government is getting in trouble for not supporting a transit program. I hope this will cause the government to support even more programs. It will also hurt the governments environmental message, because they destroyed a major advancement for the Ottawa transit system. That will hopefully change their attitude and do more for the environment.
There is also a threat of a strike in the Waterloo Region by the transit workers. If you were planning on taking your significant other to some where on Valentines day by bus, be careful the buses may not be running. So yes even though there are good situations in the public transit they can all be over shadowed by politicians who only look out for themselves.
So the positive story is about the proposed expansion of bus service in the Waterloo Region. This expansion will affect the whole region. Grand River Transit will be having a trial bus service to Elmira this fall. This will of course be a trail program which would only run during the rush hours, going from Conestoga Mall to Elmira with a stop in St. Jacobs. This is truly new idea for the Region of Waterloo to have bus service to the outer communities. This bus may not make a lot of money and have the ridership to keep it in service. On the other hand the GRT is pushing the envelope of public transit. There has been the idea floated around that the new Rapid transit system would be extended to along the same route at some time. This could be a way for the GRT to build up ridership so when it goes into place there is already ridership. That is what is happening with the Ixpress, increase ridership along the route with out putting in a lot of capital of a whole system. The Region is currently looking into their options for a rapid transit system. They are looking at the routes and the type of technology, I do not know too much about the route but they should go with LRT. I hope by the end of this year they will announce what their final decision will be.
The other Public transit issue is with O-train, one of my favorite topics ever. What a terrible example of what you should do with public transit, ie it is bad, really bad. The whole process is being controlled by the politicians who are trying to one up each other, and that's not a good thing. So the new news about the issues is that the current environmental minister is under an probe about how he could have influenced the municipal election.
To give some background on the issue the O-train is LRT located in the Nations capital. It was a pilot program that did go from nowhere to nowhere, but there were more riders than they expected. So the former city council voted in favour of putting the system in place with expanded route and service. They signed a contract and were going to start it but then the municipal election occurred. This is when Mr. Baird comes in, he was asked by one of the people running in the election to with hold the money the federal government was going to spend on the system. This caused the candidate that was for the system to lose the election, which caused the system to loose a vote after the election.
If you thought it was that simple you are wrong, it is fairly complicated. Mr. Baird had no legal write to do the actions that he did, and some believe he did to get back at the former mayor who ran against Mr. Baird many times. The city had already signed a contract so they are now facing lawsuits from the companies that have signed the contracts, they want their money. The LRT was voted on twice after the election, it passed once then lost the second. The first vote was conducted when one of the members of council was on vacation, so it was done again after the person came back. Also the city of Ottawa was the only city that had their money with held, there was 10 other projects in place that did not have their money with held or reviewed. Only Ottawa had this happen to them.
The positive point of the story is that the federal government is getting in trouble for not supporting a transit program. I hope this will cause the government to support even more programs. It will also hurt the governments environmental message, because they destroyed a major advancement for the Ottawa transit system. That will hopefully change their attitude and do more for the environment.
There is also a threat of a strike in the Waterloo Region by the transit workers. If you were planning on taking your significant other to some where on Valentines day by bus, be careful the buses may not be running. So yes even though there are good situations in the public transit they can all be over shadowed by politicians who only look out for themselves.
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