TransLink now second-busiest transit service in Canada

TransLink’s annual performance review published Wednesday shows 2024 was a year of growth, but transit advocates say there’s room for improvement.

Metro Vancouver’s transit service says ridership has grown to surpass the Greater Toronto Area, reaching the second-highest rate per capita in Canada, behind Greater Montreal.

The review says journeys across the whole system saw a three per cent increase over 2023, especially on SkyTrains, SeaBuses, and the West Coast Express.

In the region south and east of the Fraser River, including Surrey and Langley, TransLink says ridership grew 11.4 per cent.

Meanwhile, it says overcrowding on buses during peak hours increased by two per cent.

Denis Agar, executive director of the transit advocacy group Movement: Metro Vancouver Transit Riders, says growth is the result of investment in the service and overcrowding naturally follows.

He published his own analysis of the annual review Wednesday, saying the service is stuck in an unfortunate cycle.

When TransLink increases service on a route, Agar says it attracts riders, justifying further investment. Conversely, he says when service is cut, it “repels riders.”

He says TransLink hasn’t had the funding to increase bus service since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, despite major population growth in that time.

“Without additional funding, TransLink responded to this growth by cutting service in areas that had seen ridership drop, and shifting that service to the overcrowded areas. But over time, it appears that these changes may have become self-perpetuating,” Agar explained.

For example, he points to the Number 8 bus route on Fraser Street in Vancouver.

“It has seen the starkest ridership drop of any corridor in the region, currently at 47% of 2019 levels. In 2019, the wait for a bus was as low as 6 minutes, whereas today, the most frequent service is 15 minutes,” said Agar.

TransLink says without more funding, one of its only available tools to address overcrowding was to reallocate service from less crowded routes to those under the most pressure, admitting that it comes at the expense of service quality in other areas.

Looking forward, the review says TransLink has outlined key priorities in its 2025 Investment Plan that will “significantly reduce our structural funding deficit, keeping operations fully funded through 2027.”

The plan was approved late last month.

—More to come.