Welcome to the Guelph Transit Route Review. Thank you for taking the time to watch this presentation and take the survey. This presentation provides you with an overview of what has been completed as part of the Route Review. Please note that the information in this presentation is also available in greater detail on HaveYourSay.Guelph.ca

As part of the Guelph Transit Business Service Review (2019), it was recommended that a full route review be completed, looking at general system changes and individual route changes. This review would also provide background for the future Guelph Transit Strategic Plan to 2040. 

The Route Review has analyzed service for the short- and long-term using industry best practices within Guelph to ensure the City’s transit needs are met. We are looking for your feedback on the proposed transit concept network.

The vision for the Route Review is: “Guelph residents have access to a competitive, convenient, and reliable transit network that meets the community’s needs today and beyond”.

What information and policies were reviewed?

A number of guiding policy documents were reviewed. In addition, data for existing routes both before and during the pandemic have been analyzed. These sources include ridership and stop activity data, on-time performance, and a survey of a sample of riders and residents conducted in mid-2020. 

What does the data tell us?

Through initial surveys with a sample of residents and riders, it was found the priorities for the route network should be more routes that take people where they need to go, quicker travel times, frequent service, and more service reliability. These priorities are in line with the goals from the guiding documents.

It was also found that many routes struggle to stay on time, and a mixture of service types is most effective for Guelph. Crosstown routes, transit priority measures such as traffic signal priority, and managing overloaded buses were topics commonly brought up by respondents. 

Before developing the network, a set of service guidelines were created. They were updated and combined from numerous documents such as the Official Plan, Service Review, and Transit Growth Strategy from 2010.

The guidelines are important because they ensure a consistent approach is made to reviewing and adjusting the transit network as the City grows. The full service guidelines are available on haveyoursay.Guelph.ca

Here are a few Quick Facts of the proposed transit concept network:

Implementation is planned to occur over 10 years (dependent on COVID-19 and Council direction).

There is an increase from 3 route types to 5 route types.

Service hours and kilometres are increased by 30%.

On-demand service continues to be used to supplement regular service.

Expanded service is provided on Sundays on several routes.

There are plans to service new growth areas such as the Guelph Innovation District, New Operations Campus on Dunlop, and the Clair Maltby Secondary plan area.

All intensification corridors have frequent transit service from multiple routes.

And all community nodes have increased service.

All data presented in this video are available in greater detail as a document on HaveYourSay.Guelph.ca. I will now give you a quick overview of what this document will contain and how to read it.

The first few pages of the document, you will first see summaries of what has been completed so far, much like the beginning of this video. 

The full service guidelines mentioned previously are provided. 

You will be shown a map of the proposed ultimate network that would exist in Year 10 of the plan. An interactive map is also provided on haveyoursay.Guelph.ca that outlines each route in detail. The static map shown here shows each route, arrows indicating direction of travel, mixed use community nodes and intensification corridors defined from the Official Plan, and key locations such as community centres, grocery stores, and transit hubs.

The plan is proposed to be phased in over 10 years. So each year, a full system map is provided such as this one. Routes that are affected that year are shown in bold, and routes not changing are shown in light colours. For example, in Year 2, routes being adjusted are Route 1 Edinburgh College, Route 3 Westmount, Route 7 Kortright Downey, Route 10 Imperial, Route 12 General Hospital, Route 13 Victoria Road Rec Centre, Route 16 Southgate, and Route 99 Mainline.

All routes that will be operating during the year you are reading about will be outlined in full detail, even if no changes are occurring. If no changes are occurring to that route that year, the profile will have a pink “No changes” stamp. 

If a route is discontinued, it will have a red “Discontinued” stamp. 

If it is a new route, it will have a green “New” stamp. 

If there are schedule changes, it will have a purple “Schedule changes” stamp. 

Where there are routing changes, a yellow “Routing changes” stamp is shown. 

Each route profile will have the route number and name, a map of the route as well as turn-by-turn directions, and a list of other routes that connect with this route either at a hub or on-street. The service frequency in minutes is provided in the Service Frequency table. Since frequency may fluctuate throughout the day, different time periods are shown. Weekday A.M. peak is generally between 7am and 10am, and P.M. peak is generally between 2pm and 6pm.. Evenings are generally considered service after 10pm. The service hours for each type of day (weekday, Saturday, and Sunday) are shown in the Service Hours table.

What’s next?

We are looking for your feedback. We want to know what in this plan works for you and what challenges you see. Would the proposed changes motivate you to use transit more often?

From your feedback, we will spend the next few months refining the proposed transit concept to ensure the best network to meet the needs of Guelph. We will then present this refined concept to Council in November this year for consideration.

If you have questions, please contact Guelph Transit by email at transit@guelph.ca or by phone at 519-822-1811.