Bus After Midnight, Pt. I: the last bus of the day

Every day at midnight, transit service stops for the night, only to resume the next morning. Shutting down a transit service is more complex than it seems though, and an examination of late night service on OC Transpo reveals some patterns that are difficult to spot during the more complex daytime service. 

Evening service levels are lower than other periods for good reason. This period sees lower travel demand, and agencies schedule more service during the day when it can serve the most passengers and needs a lower subsidy, such as that seen in the TTC chart below. 

Note: while OC Transpo runs with a greater subsidy on most routes, there is no reason to believe that this pattern is different - ridership figures show lower passenger counts in the evening. 

But this is not a reason to abandon sensible late night network planning. As the chart above demonstrates, even in 2022, evening ridership was lower than it was at the peak of OC Transpo ridership in 2011. Night service often serves low income residents - service workers finshing work at the city's stores and restaurants, students returning home after late classes, and shift workers working late shifts. Additionally, many people occasionally ride late night service, and the availability of service may induce them to keep riding transit instead of switching to driving. 

This is the first of a two part series. This post will examine late night connections, especially last trips and Line 1 headways. The second post will look at the overnight bus network, focusing on coverage, scheduling quirks, and connections at Rideau Station. This will be more speculative than my usual, with some crayons in each part. 

Route 41 service snapshot - 3 to 30 November

Route 41 is a frequent route that runs from Billings Bridge to St. Laurent. The route is the primary service on Heron Road, Walkley Road, and St. Laurent Boulevard, and services Herongate and Elmvale, both low-income communities with relatively high transit use. 

The westbound service towards Billings Bridge is generally reliable, but the eastbound service towards St. Laurent has a severe mismatch between scheduled and actual runtimes, falling below the 5th percentile for much of the day. The usual afternoon peak reliability issues also make an appearance. 

Counting Buses: A Frequent Network

Frequent transit service offers many benefits for both transit riders and the city, and these are increasingly recognized by both transit authorities and by transit advocates. 

It has become a trend to designate a subset of transit routes as a "frequent transit network" or by some similar name. These range from half hourly services in some American Sunbelt sprawlburbs to ten minute networks provided in cities like Toronto and Sydney. 

With the benefits of high frequency in mind, it is important to ensure that the transit system actually runs frequent service, as opposed to changing the signs on a route with infrequent service. 

Transit Committee - 11 September, 2025

Introduction

On 11 September, 2025, Transit Committee met for its fifth meeting this year. The meeting video can be found at this link. 

Reliability continues to be the big issue facing OC Transpo. This meeting, councillors discussed reliability problems, the electric bus program and fleet assignments, and funding splits for transit priority projects, among other topics. However, while councillors talk a good game about supporting public transit, many have a track record of opposing programs which would improve reliability. In this context, empty words only calls to mind broken promises, not that of a more transit-oriented future. 

Much of the discussion was triggered by a staff report on reliability, whose contents were discussed at the meeting and are in this article. I will write a response to the report itself in a separate article. This meeting also included a Stage 2 update, which will be separate as usual. 

This is the first meeting after Renee Amilcar's departure from OC Transpo. Troy Charter, the director of rail operations, has become acting general manager pending a search for a permanent figure. 

Documents archive, all in PDF format: 

• Stage 2 Rail Transit Project [Update]
• Improving Bus Service Reliability
• Transit Committee Inquiries and Motions

There were also a large number of inquiries answered this meeting: 

• Fire Safety Code for E-Bus Garages
• O-Train Line 2 Service Schedule
• Para Transpo Eligibility Reviews and Vehicle Assignment Procedures
• Line 1 LRT Construction Road Closures
• Line 1 East Extension Bus Service

The case for the Baseline BRT

Background

In 2013, the Transportation Master Plan appeared with a Baseline BRT, stretching from Billings Bridge to Algonquin Station in the "affordable" vision, and to Bayshore in the "ultimate" concept. According to city staff, this was the highest priority corridor for BRT in the city. 

Fast forward to 2023. The first part of the Transportation Master Plan, the active transportation portion, appeared in Spring of 2023, but the release of the rest has been pushed to quarter two of this year. 

OC Transpo: a transit agenda for the New Year

It's 2025, the first segment of Stage 2 has launched, and another network semi-redesign is imminent. OC Transpo is in crisis mode again, with federal dollars not appearing, a crisis of confidence, and a city that wants to cut, cut, cut. 

What next? 

In this post, I will set out some priority items that City Council and OC Transpo should work towards. These represent my opinion only; but I believe that their implementation will go a long way in making Ottawa a transit city.