[Dan416]

It makes me angry whenever I see articulated buses on 39 Britannia. Every 20 minutes rush hour, every 32 minutes midday with articulated buses. The ridership has increased by over 3 times compared to 15 years ago, it has become one of the busiest routes in the city, but frequencies basically the same.

38/39 were the routes closest to my parents place, so I am slightly biased, but looking at the City of Mississauga report here, the 39 is neither in the top 10 of ridership nor the top 10 of overcrowded routes.

However, there must be an error in the second graphic because it lists 35 Eglinton twice. I wonder if they meant 34 Eglinton?

Source: https://www.mississauga.ca/wp-conte...nnualReport_singlpgsF_REtag_WEB_reduced_4.pdf

 

[doady]

39 had 6600 average weekday boardings in 2023. Maybe it dropped below 6000 in 2024? I don't know. I am guessing the second "35 Eglinton" in the graph is actually the 7 Airport which also runs partly on Eglinton. Or maybe they confused 39 with 35? I am surprised by the absence of 61 Mavis as well...

Regardless, I don't think it is acceptable to put articulated buses on 35 minute route. Yes, 35 minutes. I just rechecked the schedule. 35 minutes, not 32 minutes. 35 minutes with articulated buses during the midday.

It is long past time to increase the midday frequency to 24 minutes and rush hour frequency to 13 minutes. Every time new service changes come out, I expect improvements to the 39 but always nothing. Get the damn artics off of Britannia Road, please.

 

[doady]

Daily boardings, weekdays, October 2024 (vs. October 2019)

1. 35 Eglinton: 11820 (+40%)
2. 42 Derry: 11766 (+54%)
3. 66 McLaughlin: 10171 (+41%)
4. 61 Mavis: 9655 (+79%)
5. 1 Dundas: 9649 (0%)
6. 2 Hurontario: 9392 (n/a)
7. 26 Burnhamthorpe: 8291 (+52%)
8. 5 Dixie: 7992 (+9%)
9. 3 Bloor: 6881 (-3%)
10. 39 Britannia: 6538 (+47%)
11. 109 Meadowvale Express: 6384 (-24%)
12. 101 Dundas Express: 5780 (-24%)
13. 7 Airport: 5712 (+49%)
14. 107 Malton Express: 5223 (-16%)
15. 18 McLaughlin-Derry: 5071 (n/a)

Microsoft OneDrive

1drv.ms

 

[T3G]

It is long past time to increase the midday frequency to 24 minutes and rush hour frequency to 13 minutes.

Is this a frequency that would attract anyone out of the car?

Personally, I think the idea of ever waiting more than 12 minutes for a city bus, except for overnight, is ridiculous - especially when the drive time between terminal A and terminal B of the 39 is only 20 minutes. Transit fails when you have to make an appointment to be at a stop at a certain time, instead of arriving whenever under the expectation that a bus would show up in a reasonable time frame.

 

[doady]

Is this a frequency that would attract anyone out of the car?

Personally, I think the idea of ever waiting more than 12 minutes for a city bus, except for overnight, is ridiculous - especially when the drive time between terminal A and terminal B of the 39 is only 20 minutes. Transit fails when you have to make an appointment to be at a stop at a certain time, instead of arriving whenever under the expectation that a bus would show up in a reasonable time frame.

Well, 35 minute frequency on 39 Britannia obviously did not fail to attract riders otherwise I would not be talking about the overcrowding and articulated buses being used on the route. Increasing frequencies to 12 minutes would be about increasing capacity, not about reducing wait times. 12-minute frequency usually means a 6-minute wait, not 12 minutes.

Two buses on 39 Britannia to improve its midday frequency to 35 minutes to 24 minutes and take articulated buses off the route and reduce travel time by 5-6 minutes is good enough. Six more buses to increase frequency to 12 minutes just to reduce travel time by another 6 minutes, is it really worth it? Personally, I don't think so.

With such severe diminishing returns with each additional bus, it would make a lot more sense to spread those eight buses out to multiple routes instead adding them all to the 39, if reducing travel time is the only goal.

For example. two buses each on 38 Creditview and 45 Winston Churchill would increase their midday frequencies from 34 minutes to 24 minutes and 32 minutes to 22 minutes, respectively. Adding one bus on 53 Kennedy would increase its frequency from 34 minutes to 26 minutes. Even just five additional buses spread out on the 38, 45, and 53 already makes more difference than eight additional buses on the 39 would make.