Route 85 snapshot: 6th January - 2nd February

This article presents a "snapshot" of service on Route 85 between 6th January and 2nd February. All data sourced from Transsee. 

Cancellations

Over a period of four weeks, the route saw a 7.4% cancellation rate eastbound and 5.0% westbound, with an average of 5.9% in both directions. 

Headway Adherence 

Eastbound towards Gatineau: 

Westbound towards Bayshore: 

Through these charts, we can see that the 85 is generally well behaved outside of peak periods. The trips delivered generally matches the scheduled headway, and while the deviation increases westbound over the route, it is not severe outside of peak periods. Eastbound shows fewer bunching problems, but the service delivery is more variable. 

On-time performance and string diagrams

The on-time performance analysis will focus on week 2 of the snapshot period, from the 13th to the 17th January. 

Weekday average schedule adherence is good, with eastbound trips generally being between 60-90% on-time, depending on the stop; this does indicate issues with schedule writing, as trips consistently fall behind schedule. The picture westbound is less rosy; it shows more bunching, especially east of Lincoln Fields, and a less well-written schedule leading nearly half of trips to be behind schedule by the time it reaches Lincoln Fields, with some recovery west of there. 

A more granular look reveals more problems. 

In the AM peak, many trips, especially westbound, start their journey off-schedule. Both directions show evidence of inadequate running times, as on-time performance slips over the route; by the terminus, only about half of trips are running on time in either direction, with over 10% running at least 20 minutes behind. Eastbound journeys create large delays, while the westbound journeys have a much smaller increase in this period. 

Midday on-time performance is good. Eastbound remains a problem as runs fall behind schedule along the entire route; westbound trips have problems east of Carlingwood. However, the performance of most trips is good, and bunching (early trips) seems to be a bigger issue westbound. 

PM trips show the problems of the AM but in reverse. Eastbound trips are moderately delayed, with large numbers of trips running over ten minutes late, and the proportion of late trips rising from 10% at Bayshore to nearly half in Gatineau. 

Westbound is a completely different story. On time performance is abysmal, with trips starting 80% on-time (which is decent), but this falls to just 15% at Lincoln Fields before showing a slight recovery at Bayshore. Even then, trips that are 20 minutes late or more are still 10% of all trips. It's clear that the 85's peak direction trips need more running time. 

Evening performance is bafflingly poor; many trips run 5-10 minutes behind schedule, and they fall behind during the trip. This occurs in both directions. 

These string diagrams are for the 16th January, a Thursday. The entire week's diagrams are in this PDF. Weekend diagrams here. 

The peak periods, especially, display generally slow travel times; the Carling Transit Priority Measures would massively help, but the project is deferred. Otherwise, problems appear in Gatineau and the Chaudière Bridge; approaching Merivale and Holland eastbound; approaching Parkdale westbound; Carlingwood Mall; and a number of other locations that do not slow buses down by much individually, but add up to delays across the route. 

Average weekend on-time performance is actually worse on weekends than weekdays. Delays accrue in both directions, with some trips falling ten or more minutes behind schedule over their run, and in both directions, the areas near the termini see only around a 60% on-time performance. 

Have the Saturday charts, just for fun. 

Travel times

(the variation in font size is due to a quirk in my monitor and laptop screen) 

Time to get real angry. 

The bulk of the route suffers from massive schedule deficiencies, with scheduled times routinely in the bottom quartile of real travel times. This leads to things like the progressive decay of schedule adherence seen in the charts during peak periods; there simply isn't enough time written into the schedule. 

New Ways to Bus is an improvement along most of the route, adding travel times. Of course, it is removing travel time from other portions of the route, which is simply a redistribution of the problem. It does mean the undulation seen in the charts will be gone, but OC Transpo needs to add runtime, not redistribute it. This is not an improvement. This is lying to the public. With the note that the Dow's Lake-Pimisi portion of the route will no longer operate on Route 85 (instead being given to Route 8 with even less runtime), let's begin. 

In the morning peak direction, scheduled travel time is inadequate across all four sections of the route measured. New Ways to Bus will increase them on 2/3 of segments, with a decrease on the other, adding up to a 3-5 minute increase from Bayshore to Dow's Lake. 

Pay particular note to the Preston section, which with New Ways to Bus, will be scheduled below the zeroth percentile of all four weeks measured (granted, Route 8 will only travel to Preston/Carling, avoiding a Line 2 connection). Other highlights include cutting Lincoln Fields-Kirkwood times below the first quartile, and wild travel time variation across all four segments. 

AM Peak westbound trips are no better, showing massive variation in travel times west of Kirkwood for no reason I can discern. Scheduled times will drop as a result of New Ways to Bus, despite a poor on-time track record already. 

This is a good time to bring back the Carling Transit Priority Measures. These measures should extend to Bayshore, as much of the route's travel time variation (and thus required padding and delays) come from west of Lincoln Fields, where the project ends. Of course, it needs to be built first ... 

The PM period shows continuing variation in travel times, with very large tails west of Kirkwood. New Ways to Bus is an improvement in scheduled travel times, but the extra time west of Lincoln Fields, likely driven by the extreme variation in that segment, is being pared back, resulting in results that may surprise an OC Transpo management looking for reliability improvements (especially on turnaround runs and interlined routes). 

Eastbound trips in the PM period will see substantial improvements. Just don't look at Route 8. While it does not suffer from as large of problems as the peak westbound route, the eastbound 85 should see a major improvement with the Bayshore-Dow's Lake getting a straight timetable improvement. Still, the travel time variation is alarmingly large east of Kirkwood. The Carling Transit Priority Measures would greatly improve transit for 9300 riders everyday, but alas ... 

Thoughts

Given the 85's reputation for unreliability, the results of this snapshot surprised me. The 85 is fairly reliable outside of peak periods and Saturdays, but the route continues to see variable travel times and bunched trips. 

OC Transpo knows this - or at least, I hope they do. Still, New Ways to Bus provides a service cut seven days a week, with minor improvements to reliability in the directions that least need it. 

The city should: 

• Commit to stop consolidation along Carling Avenue pending a fast consultation with the community, with implementation in a year or less; 
• fast track the Carling Avenue Transit Priority Measures, which would cut travel times and delays across the route; 
• commit to a service improvement to every twelve or ten minutes during peak and midday hours, and; 
• in the long-term, seriously study rapid transit for the corridor as they have done with Baseline Road.