A new report by the transit advocacy group TTCriders suggests that the TTC’s on-time metrics don’t actually match the transit rider experience.
The report says that riders wait 50 per cent longer than scheduled on 10 routes across the city and transit users wait 30 per cent longer than scheduled on 41 routes. The issue is apparently due to “bunching” – when one bus falls behind and the bus behind it catches up.
The report found that riders on routes where “bunching” is common waited an average of four minutes longer than scheduled.
The advocacy group says its statistics were obtained via a Freedom of Information request as well as bunching calculations gathered by TransSee from TTC real-time vehicle location data.
“Transit riders should be able to trust the TTC to show up when we expect it to,” said TTCriders executive director Shleagh Pizey-Allen. “Now is the time for TTC to establish new, transparent service metrics to make sure the pilot delivers. The TTC cannot fix what it does not measure and report on.”
TTCriders are recommending the transit agency change their on-time performance metrics, which measure if a bus/streetcar is on schedule only at the departure point.
“If the same bus is late arriving at bus stops in the middle of its route, it will still be counted ‘on-time’ in TTC statistics because only the origin point is counted in the On-Time Performance metrics,” says TTCriders.
The 2025 TTC budget includes a pilot program aimed at reducing bunching and gapping on 10 of the most problematic routes with enhanced on-street presence.
