Last Thursday, I was heading home after running an errand. I had spent a busy day catching up on Politico stuff and preparing that day’s edition of Open Sources Guelph. I was tired. I wanted to get home.
So naturally, it was 7:18 before my bus left Guelph Central Station because a couple of the drivers were having, what looked like, a very pleasant conversation.
I bring this up because the day before, Mayor Cam Guthrie posted a response to some of the questions asked earlier this year at his town hall about transit. I’d like to say that this didn’t turn out exactly how I thought it would, but the fact that the response was dumped on the Mayor’s blog on the first of August is a pretty strong indictment.
Another reason I had no hope for this project is summed up in the line that answer more than a couple of questions: “This will be addressed through the Service Review.”
This has more or less been the party line when people have complained about transit for the last year, “Don’t worry, the service review will address all your concerns just as soon as its done… in January 2019.”
Not for the first time, I point out that if this were any other persistent problem in the city, council would not be waiting years for a report to come back in order to take action.
A few weeks ago, the City of Guelph announced a partnership with Red Car to provide shuttle buses from the parking lots that surround downtown to the Farmer’s Market. That’s great, but there’s already a shuttle bus that goes downtown from all points in the city, and it’s called “Guelph Transit.”
The City has jumped through incredible hoops to compensate for the short-term parking headaches downtown. Meanwhile, transit riders waiting for changes are being told that change is coming. Later.
Earlier this year, the Ward 3 Councillors Phil Allt and June Hofland brought forward a motion to restore half-hour, all-day service for a key route in their district that includes medical facilities and schools. The staff response was that in order to do that, service would have to be cut elsewhere.
This flies in the face of current thinking on transit where an examination of ridership data shows that it’s not a declining ridership that drives reduced transit service, but rather it’s the reverse. In other words, why should riders use a service that the people running said service clearly have no confidence in?
And so we come to the real issue with Transit: confidence. Are you confident your bus will come? Are you confident it will get you where you’re going on time?
Have you looked at the Guelph Transit Twitter feed lately? Every day is a tale of cancellations and adjustments.
In short, much of the problems with Guelph Transit come down to people. It’s a people problem. Some of those scheduling problems are directly related to the fact that Transit’s had trouble filling seats. The driver’s seat that is.
This is not a phenomenon that’s unique to Guelph. In fact, many transit systems are having trouble hiring. The reasons why are unknown, because who wouldn’t want a well paying, union protected job for the government that involves driving around town all day?
Whatever the reason though, not having enough drivers is why so often the #41 doesn’t run in the afternoon. Or why route #11 or #14 runs once an hour for several hours. Or why overtime costs are so high for Transit as compared to other departments at City Hall.
To be honest, I would not be surprised if some of the fault lies in me. And other people. We who register more than a few complaints like the one mentioned above. The drivers are the face of the service, and any issue, whether they’re at fault or not, is brought to them first, and likely, with peak anger.
But for every driver that takes time out to help a person in a wheelchair, as recently captured on video on the “Overheard at Guelph” Facebook page, there are a few caught chit-chatting while bus riders wait.
There are others that carry on conversations with friends and acquaintances while the bus is in motion. Distracting them. Forcing them sometimes to miss stops. And this even though there’s a big sign just above the bus driver that asks you not talk to them while they’re driving.
It’s nice that the mayor posted answers to the questions people posed, but nothing provided is about to lead to a better transit service.
How do we get more drivers onboard? And how do we get them to focus on the job as employees of a *commuter* service, and not a ride share? Those are complex questions with no easy answers, and if the service review solves them, great!
In the meantime, I and others that use Guelph Transit daily will enjoy our skepticism that nothing will really change.
