It’s Not My Transit System … It’s You
“We have a lot of challenges with transit in Ottawa, as residents know. Other agencies across the country are facing very similar challenges, especially around funding.”
Transit commission chairman Glen Gower speaking at a transit conference in Ottawa
Ah the old political dodge. It’s not just us with problems. It’s like this all over.
It’s not me. It’s all of you.
Well no. Other jurisdictions are having trouble getting e-buses just like OC Transpo. But in contrast, Ottawa is witnessing the destruction of its transit and, accordingly, our transportation system. Bad transit affects traffic, too.
The spine of the transit system, light rail, is two years late and unreliable. Fixing the root cause of the LRT problem has taken six years and counting. The root cause remains a mystery to all … except maybe lawyers and insurance companies.
And then there’s New Ways To Wait, our disastrous remake of Ottawa’s troubled bus system. How to take a very bad service and make it even worse. Way da go.
So yes councillor, times are tough all over for transit, as you say. But they aren’t catastrophic all over like they are here in Ottawa. Under Gower’s leadership at transit commission, we’ve seen an unreliable rail system get later and a bus system next to dysfunctional.
All this and Gower keeps his job. In other places, such performance results in the boss departing. Or the head honcho invites the suspect to clean his desk and leave.
But not at Ottawa City Hall, where wrong is right and lousy is good and even the public relations people can’t mask the scent.
Ken Gray
For You:
Homelessness Initiative Is A Farce: PATTON
Why King Voted Against Budget Directions
Transit: Wilson Lo’s Time Has Come: BENN
Line 1: Lipstick On A Pig: WHOPPER WATCH
Army Run To Disrupt Sunday Traffic
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– The Bulldog – News Feed Enter 
There are two ebus manufacturers, Nova and New Flyer. I’m guessing to hedge their bets, the city bought from each manufacturer which of course doubled the support costs making supporting ebuses twice as expensive as it otherwise had to be. Nova bus is supported by Quebec and Federal subsidies and has closed their US production plants, and has a dismal delivery rate. New Flyer has losses around 20% of revenue and an order backlog of around $5B in electric buses and is also heavily subsidized by the federal government and the Manitoba government. Will both companies be around in 10 years? Good question. With a federal loan to the city of Ottawa of around $380M for electric buses, this amounts to indirect subsidizing except the transit system has to generate enough savings from the electric buses in order to pay back the loan. To be fair, there are other weirdness with the financing I don’t pretend to understand. The infrastructure costs are understated by half a billion dollars compared to what Montreal is budgeting so I am guessing that they are trying to slip those in somehow in the budget. It does appear to me that these electric bus costs are bankrupting OC transpo at the same time as they are trying to deal with LRT transition. In project management, #1 lesson, you only change things one at a time.
Glen Gower’s on line bio notes many skills, however none are related to transit. Perhaps now is the time for council to ask Gower to step aside as transit chair and appoint someone with the skills to manage the committee. Councillor Lo comes to mind.
Éric Alan Caldwell, chairman of the Board of La Société de transport de Montréal is quoted in the article on the CBC website “Operating costs are getting higher and higher. It’s a challenge for every transit society. And if we’re not adapting, if we’re not increasing our level of service, people will lack confidence in our system and that is the start of a [downward] spiral”.
Sounds like a concise diagnosis of OC Transpo’s woes. Failure to adapt. Not just not increasing its level of service, but decreasing it. As a result, people lacking confidence in the system. Leading to a downward spiral.
Perhaps city council would be better served by someone who insists that the senior management team of our public transit look to analogous cities, like Montreal, instead of cities that:
> are on distant continents;
> are more than five hundred years older; and
> evolved before the rise of the motor vehicle.
Added bonus for the city rate payers: lower travel costs.
Every time Glen Gower’s name appears in The Bulldog in relation to OC Transpo I begin to cringe. His comment concerning funding is a simple case of passing the buck when the buck should stop with him. As a city councilor he should be asking his fellow councilors to consider re-prioritizing the tasks currently up for review and final vote in order to free up funds. Voting down Lansdowne 2.0 would a good place to begin, thereby freeing up beaucoup de funds post haste. Let’s see how Gower votes when the final tally is taken with regards to Lansdowne. If he votes to move the project forward then we’ll know he’s not serious about OC Transpo and should be removed immediately as transit chair,
Now hold on just a darn second … Former transit commission chair Allan Hubley said it was “free money” from the federal government for e-buses now we learn we have to pay it back? What gives?
Either Hubley didn’t know what he was doing when he was transit commission chair or he “misspoke” .. So which is it? Or is it both?
Current transit chair Gower doesn’t seem to know anymore than Hubley but he’s front and center on all things transit.
It is better to keep one’s mouth closed and be thought a fool than to open it and remove all doubt.