Blow the horn for BRT

Re: Other cities build rapid transit, while we wait (Think Tank, Oct. 9); Better wait for the next bus (Oct. 15)

A strong word of appreciation for Ken Klassen and Tom Brodbeck, and the thousands of Winnipeggers who, on the street and on the doorstep, are making public transit an issue in the current election campaign.

As every major city in the world (apart from Winnipeg) has discovered, the key to effective public transit is high-speed transit corridors that take transit vehicles out of congested vehicular traffic — either via a subway or much more affordable bus rapid transit (BRT) corridors.

Despite the federal government offering billions of dollars for cities to upgrade their transit systems, Winnipeg has stalled on completing even its first BRT corridor. The southwest corridor was to be built in three phases, with the third phase running from Harkness Station (near Stradbrook Avenue and Queen Elizabeth Way) to Portage Avenue.

Though they run rapidly and efficiently on the dedicated corridor south of Harkness, once they are into downtown traffic, Blue Line buses slow to a crawl in the morass of traffic lights, car traffic and other transit routes. To make the Blue Line more predictable and truly rapid, the corridor needs to run at least as far as the University of Winnipeg. As rapid transit buses spend less time stalled in downtown traffic, buses and drivers will be freed up for other underserved routes.

One need only ride the existing legs of the southwest corridor to see what an overwhelming success it has been. At most times of the day, even long, articulated buses are full. Just as was predicted, densely populated neighbourhoods of apartment complexes are springing up all along the route. Hundreds of millions of dollars are being saved as population growth is being shifted from new developments at the outskirts of the city to established neighbourhoods with services already in place.

The city and province are about to miss the bus on the federal program for major transit improvements. It is time for us to get a move on, hop on that bus, and drive our city out of the 19th century and into the 21st.