Earlier in March, as part of my quest to visit every town, city, and regional government office in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area (GTHA) without a car, I took my first on-demand transit rides in a decade. This was necessary to visit Brock Township’s municipal offices, located in the village of Cannington, north of Port Perry. (I will discuss more about this project in the coming weeks.)
Brock Township is the GTHA’s most rural and least populated municipality, home to just over 12,000. Until April 2023, GO Transit ran a daily bus service between Whitby GO Station, Port Perry, Cannington, and Beaverton (Brock’s largest community), but was cancelled after a ridership review. (GO has quietly cancelled several other bus routes that don’t cross county or regional boundaries in the last decade.) However, Durham Region Transit (DRT) offered an alternative: on demand transit.
On-demand transit is not a new idea. In the 1970s, GO Transit operated experimental dial-a-bus services in suburban parts of Toronto, offering door-to-door service to and from the nearest subway station or a designated transfer point to frequent fixed-route bus services. In Bramalea, Chinguacousy Township operated Bramalea Dial-a-Bus, which brought residents to local employers, schools, and Bramalea City Centre. The service was replaced by fixed-route services when Brampton Transit was established shortly after amalgamation, merging the dial-a-bus operation and a privately contracted transit service in the old town of Brampton.
“Trans-Cab” services continue to be used in outlying areas of communities such as Hamilton, Peterborough, and Sudbury, where transit agencies partner with local taxi companies to allow transit riders to begin or end their journey outside of urban or regional fixed-route areas, often at a premium fare.
My first on-demand transit experience was taking Oakville Transit’s “zone bus” service in 2005. At the time, there was no fixed-route Sunday bus service in Oakville, but there were four zones for which you could call and request a ride, with a bus picking you up at the nearest bus stop. If your destination was in a different zone, you would transfer to another bus at Oakville GO Station. Today, Oakville offers on-demand service during late evenings from the Oakville GO Station and in new and outlying subdivisions where there are no nearby scheduled services.
My other previous on-demand transit experience was in Winter and early Spring 2012, after I suffered a broken knee cap and had to rely on Toronto’s Wheel-Trans paratransit system. Though I was fortunate to be able to get around using Wheel-Trans during a temporary disability, it was often a frustrating experience trying to book trips, especially for social or leisure purposes. I quickly came to prefer the conventional system and used it as much as I could while recovering from that injury.
In 2024, there are over a dozen transit agencies providing on-demand transit services in Ontario and Quebec, either as standalone operations or in conjunction with fixed-route systems. You can find them in my interactive transport maps.
Modern on-demand services, though they are typically accessed by mobile apps these days, present some of the same challenges, including cumbersome booking processes as well as high demand and limited availability for next-day and same-day trips.
DRT offers on-demand transit trips for customers with disabilities (who are eligible for door-to-door service anywhere in the region), rural areas, and in designated urban areas (where pickups and drop offs are made at signed bus stops).
As Brock Township was the most distant and most difficult town hall in the GTHA to reach by public transport, I tried to book for the first day of my visits: Monday, March 11. After downloading the DRT app and inputting my information (name, email address, mobile phone number) I tried to book a return trip from Port Perry (which has a scheduled route connecting it to Uxbridge, Oshawa, and Whitby) the day before.
At one point, I was able to get an outbound trip around 12:00 PM, but I could not get a return trip after multiple attempts. After failed attempts to book each ride, the app would go back to the beginning, requiring the user to input most of the same information multiple times. I gave up and went to northern York Region instead. After midnight, early Monday morning, when one could book trips for the following day, I tried again and managed to get a return trip that met my needs for Tuesday the 12th.
Once I booked my trip, the rest of the experience was smooth. I got a text reminder of my upcoming trips, and on the app, I could track my upcoming ride, much like Uber or Lyft, with the driver’s name, vehicle description, and location. Each time, I paid with my Presto card, with DRT charging the same fare for on-demand as for conventional bus service. Drivers were professional and friendly. I was the only passenger for both trips, though they are often shared, and minibuses — such as accessible paratransit vehicles — are used for passengers with disabilities or larger groups.
I learned that the service could be quite busy and the app sometimes problematic — there is also a toll-free number that passengers can call, and that sometimes the telephone agent would be able to find matching rides that the app would not show.
I was lucky that my trip was discretionary, but I could see how on-demand transit can be difficult and/or frustrating to use.
Though DRT has restored most urban bus routes (many were suspended during pandemic-related restrictions), it still struggles to meet demand on its busiest corridors, especially those serving colleges and universities in Oshawa, Whitby, and Scarborough. A fire in one of DRT’s garages last summer hasn’t helped either. As a result, some urban areas in Ajax, Pickering, Whitby, and Bowmanville still have on-demand areas where fixed-route services have yet to be restored.
On-demand transit has its place, especially in rural and outlying suburban areas, or during times of low demand. If done right, it provides affordable mobility to people who might otherwise go without, and as an alternative to driving a car or paying an expensive taxi fare for those with travel options. Durham Region has done a good job covering the entire region with fixed-route and on-demand services, especially at night, where the urban south enjoys 24-hour transit access.
Despite Durham’s efforts, on-demand services can be costly to operate, less flexible for prospective passengers, and be frustrating to use, though they can cover much larger areas than line haul routes. Scheduled, fixed-route buses offer predictable, simple, and often faster service than point-to-point bespoke services. On-demand transit has its place, but it is only one tool in a vast toolbox of mobility solutions. This was true in the 1970s and remains true today.
Sean Marshall 