‘A game changer’: Ottawa’s new LRT line to improve transit time, reliability

A Trillium Line train parked at South Keys Station on Thursday, May 16. (Leah Larocque/CTV News Ottawa)

The capital’s new north-south rail line is set to open to the public on Monday to kick off the new year, and an Ottawa councillor says it will be “a game changer” for transit times and reliability.

Councillor and chair of the Ottawa Transit Commission, Glen Gower, told Newstalk 580 CFRA's CFRA Live with Andrew Pinsent Saturday that the opening of Line 2 and Line 4, originally known as the Trillium Line, puts the capital at a competitive advantage.

“(Officials at the airport are) very excited, (as) we're only one of two or three airports in Canada that will have a rail transit connection from the airport into other parts of the city,” he said.

In Canada, only Vancouver and Toronto have direct train service from the airport to other parts of the city, making Ottawa the third in the country to offer the service.

He added that it's an opportunity for the city and the airport to develop and grow.

New line to reduce travel time

Despite the opening of Line 2 and Line 4 coming online 17 months behind schedule, Gower says it’s still expected to deliver on the city’s original vision of development, expansion and connectivity. He says the opening of new stations and lines will provide residents with faster and more reliable transit systems, whether they’re going to events or to their jobs.

“The north end of this line at Bayview is at LeBreton Flats, and that's going to be the new site for the Sens Arena in a few years. So, you can just see how it's driving the development and transformation of our city along this north-south line,” he said.

“We are seeing the same thing as the line heads further east. That’ll open up in the last half of this year, and then going further west and south to Algonquin College and out to Bayshore and Moodie Drive, that'll be in early 2027, and you can see how it's already kind of directing or influencing how the city is developing.”

The opening of this line is also going to “significantly” reduce travel time for Carleton University students, no matter where they’re commuting from, he added. Gower says those students can eventually live a bit further from campus.

“Riverside South is a community that's been there for a couple of decades now, and they've never had this level of rapid transit,” he said.

“So, this is a game changer for them.”

New line to boost reliability

He explains that for the service to be reliable, out of the 8,000 scheduled trips per day, there should not be more than 40 or 50 cancelled buses. Gower says the opening of Line 2 and Line 4 is expected to boost reliability.

“The launch of LRT is a huge boost for reliability for people who are moving north-south on a bus. Now they can use a train for many of those trips. That's a huge improvement,” he said.

“For people who've been taking the buses from the west end and the south end, from Barrhaven, Kanata, (and) Stittsville, if you've been using the Kichi Zibi Mikan Parkway, that's the trip you take between Lincoln Fields and Dominion. That’s going to be reopening to four lanes.”

The system will also be getting another boost in terms of reliability, as the city is set to recruit more mechanics and receive more electric buses, he adds.

Reliability will be stabilized as the city launches new ways to its bus route network in April, he says.

For long-term reliability, Gower says, “the mayor and council will keep pushing for more investment from the provincial and federal government.”

Increase in fares vs operating costs

When asked about the increase in transit fare that came into effect Jan. 1, where a normal adult pass went up by 20 cents to become $4, Gower said fares will cover about 1/3 of the operating costs for OC Transpo this year. Property taxes will also cover the operating costs with about 66 per cent, he says.

“We’re providing a service, there’s a value to customers. Fares are required,” he said.

He notes that the city is committed to keeping fares as low as possible for everyone.

“We did freeze the student pass rate until at least Sept. 1, just to give some more time to have those discussions with students,” he said. “If that does go up by 5 per cent, it'll be a $2.86 per month increase, so pretty minimal, and of course we’ve kept the rate of the seniors pass quite low as well.”

Gower notes that the city is still committed to the U-Pass moving forward with other post-secondary institutions.

“Students are probably the biggest demographic of transit users right now, and largely it's because of the U-Pass. Every student who pays tuition, gets a free transit pass,” he said.

Some fare increases from time-to-time are going to happen, Gower added.

The first train is set to leave Bayview Station at 6:07 a.m. Gower says though he won’t be taking the first trip, many riders are expected to be on the train’s “historic first trip end-to-end from Bayview to Riverside South.”

“One thing I've been interested in over the last week or two is seeing how many people from outside of Ottawa are getting excited, like I was on Blue Sky, the social media site, and there's people from Baltimore, Los Angeles (and) all sorts of rail fans who, I think, realize how exciting this is for a city. We’ve got 19 kilometers of rail and on the main line and then the four kilometers to the airport as well,” he said.

More information about the new line is available in this article.

With files from CTV News Ottawa's Josh Pringle