A disgruntled group of OC Transpo bus riders are getting ready to launch a formal advocacy group to tackle the decline of public transit in the city.
“We are trying to push OC Transpo to provide better services,” Kari Glynes Elliott, co-founder of the Ottawa Transit Riders group, said in an interview with 580 CFRA’s Rob Snow.
“It's declining, it used to be good.”
The conversation started back in August with a small group of riders talking transit woes around a kitchen table. They decided to create a group that would give a collective voice to riders frustrated with bus delays, cancellations and an overall decline in rider experienceship.
The movement started to grow after OC Transpo’s most recent schedule changes in September - the last few tweaks to the transit system to prepare for the upcoming launch of the city’s new light rail system. The changes re-directed routes running from Orleans, Vanier and Overbrook to LRT stations that are now doubling as Transitway stops.
Now, with the recent Westboro bus crash and the frigid January temperatures, Elliott said their mission takes on a new kind of urgency.
“Just the other day, they were talking about cancelling 70 buses during rush hour,” she said. “That’s bloody cold.”
More than 100 people crammed a room at the University of Ottawa on Saturday for the group’s most recent meeting that, Elliott said, was the “first step to formalize the group.”
Elliott said the group has heard a whole host of complaints from every end of the city over the last few months, ranging from accessibility issues to fare prices.
“There’s generally one bus in every neighbourhood that people are not happy with,” she said.
The Ottawa Transit Commission is tasked with developing a “safe, efficient, accessible and client-focused transit system.”
Elliott said the commission of eight city councillors “has no teeth” against future changes to OC Transpo services.
She would like to see the power shift from the commission to individual councillors, who would be able to take OC Transpo to task for cancelling or re-routing certain buses.
“I want city councillors to have some power over OC Transpo,” Elliott said. “We want them to be able to approve changes … and to say ‘your services here aren’t good enough.”
Elliott said a group of about 25 people will be sitting down in the near future to draft official bylaws and elect a board of directors.