January 2026 - AT-Network - University of Manitoba Mailing Lists

WFP Editorial: Fixing Winnipeg Transit’s core problems (Jan20'26)
by Beth McKechnie 20 Jan '26

20 Jan '26

Caution! This message was sent from outside the University of Manitoba. EDITORIAL Fixing Winnipeg Transit’s core problems https://www.winnipegfreepress.com/opinion/editorials/2026/01/20/fixing-winn… WINNIPEG Transit’s latest ridership numbers are sobering, but they should not be surprising. Between September and December 2025, average daily ridership fell by 14 per cent compared to the same period a year earlier, dropping to about 178,500 from 207,224. City officials have pointed to reduced immigration and the upheaval of a once-in-a-generation network overhaul as explanations. Both matter. But focusing too heavily on either risks missing the deeper, longer-standing problems that continue to push people off the bus in Winnipeg. There is truth to the immigration argument. Winnipeg Transit manager of service development, Bjorn Radstrom, is right to note that international students and temporary foreign workers tend to rely on transit at higher rates than the general population. Federal caps on international students have cut Manitoba’s allocation dramatically, and national immigration targets are lower than they were just a few years ago. Fewer newcomers inevitably means fewer transit riders, and Winnipeg is not alone in seeing ridership soften as a result. Mayor Scott Gillingham is correct that this is a national trend. But immigration numbers do not tell the whole story, and they do not absolve the city of responsibility. Ridership was already fragile before Ottawa changed course. Winnipeg Transit has struggled for years with problems riders know all too well: buses that do not show up on time, routes so overcrowded that drivers pass people by and schedules that cannot be relied on for something as basic as getting to work or school. These are not abstract complaints. They are daily experiences that teach people, over and over again, that the bus is a risk. The new primary network, launched in June 2025, was supposed to address some of those weaknesses by simplifying routes and focusing service where demand is highest. In principle, it made sense. In practice, however, the rollout has been painful for many riders. Some trips now take significantly longer, while others require transfers that add uncertainty and inconvenience. Evening service has been cut on certain routes, leaving students and shift workers scrambling for alternatives. City council and transit officials insist adjustments are being made each season, and that the full picture will only be clear by mid-2026. That may be true. But for riders who lost service that worked for them, patience is hard to summon. The uncomfortable reality is that Winnipeg attempted a major transit redesign without first fixing the underlying issue that undermines everything else: chronic underfunding. High-level routes are only attractive if buses come often enough that riders do not have to consult a timetable or worry about missing a connection. Reliability improves when spare capacity exists to absorb disruptions. None of that is possible on the cheap. If Winnipeg truly wants to reverse the decline, it needs to make the bus a default choice again — not a last resort. That means more buses on the road, higher frequency across the network and continued investments in transit priority measures that make trips faster and more predictable. It means acknowledging that complaints about pass-ups and unreliable schedules are not growing pains, but warning signs. Ridership will not magically rebound with warmer weather or better marketing. It will improve when people can trust that the bus will be there, on time, and often enough to fit real lives. Until the city and the province commit the funding required to make that happen, Winnipeg Transit’s struggles will continue — regardless of how many newcomers arrive or how elegant the network map looks on paper.

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WFP: Fewer newcomers, bus network overhaul blamed for ridership drop (Jan17'26)
by Beth McKechnie 17 Jan '26

17 Jan '26

Caution! This message was sent from outside the University of Manitoba. Bus network overhaul, fewer newcomers cited in seasonal drop Winnipeg Transit ridership plummets https://www.winnipegfreepress.com/breakingnews/2026/01/16/fewer-newcomers-b… FEWER people rode Winnipeg Transit in the fall, a trend some blame on reduced immigration and a recent bus network overhaul. Transit data shows average daily rider counts fell 14 per cent in September to December 2025, when compared to the same period of the previous year. The average rider count fell to 178,505 from 207,224. “This is on track for what I thought we would see … The fact that it’s that much, (since we) were already seeing a ridership drop for other reasons, it doesn’t surprise me. We just now need to work at addressing what the issues are, making the improvements and making sure the system’s as good as it can be,” said Bjorn Radstrom, Winnipeg Transit’s manager of service development. Radstrom said ridership began to decline several months before Transit implemented a new primary network that changed virtually every route in the system on June 29, 2025. He believes the initial reduction is directly tied to federal policy changes that reduced immigration, leading fewer temporary foreign workers and international students to come to Winnipeg. “Those are groups of people that tend to use transit at a higher rate than the general population … so that would definitely explain some of the drop in ridership,” he said. Radstrom said other passengers likely did stop taking the bus due to the network change, adding to the decline. “You’ve got the one group of people that the new system is not better for and some of them might have decided not to take transit … What’s going to drive an increase in ridership is people who have never really considered taking the bus before who now have better service available to them. But it takes time for them to learn it’s there, realize it’s there and to give it a shot,” he said. Radstrom said he hopes more people will start to discover their Transit routes have improved this spring. Mayor Scott Gillingham said many Canadian cities saw public transit ridership decline in late 2024, likely due to immigration changes. Manitoba was allotted 11,196 spots for international students this year, due to a federal cap, down from 18,951 in 2025. The latest federal immigration plan aims to add 380,000 new permanent residents across Canada in 2026, down from a 485,000 target in 2024. Those opting not to board buses due to the network changes should be aware the city is closely monitoring Transit and making changes in response to public feedback, said Gillingham. “We’re making record investments in the transit system, and it’s been a significant, monumental change (with the network) that we have introduced to transit. It’s going to take some time for that change to settle in,” he said. The mayor said the city should be able to better gauge the full impact of the network around June 2026, one year after it took effect. “We’ve made the most significant change to transit … in, really, probably the city’s history … We’ll continue to monitor the data and see what adjustments need to be made,” said Gillingham. The new network has triggered many rider complaints, with some passengers stating their routes now take far longer to complete, while others said service ends too early for them to get home from school or work. Coun. Janice Lukes, chairwoman of public works, said the city has made adjustments every season to respond to feedback, which will continue. She stressed the new network is not the only factor driving down ridership. “We didn’t expect the hit with the international students … On transit ridership, it’s a massive hit, if you don’t have thousands of people taking the bus because they’re not in the country,” said Lukes (Waverley West). The councillor said the lost fare revenue will pose a challenge to the city’s bottom line. The head of a group that has long pushed for more Transit spending said the new network was needed, even if it led some riders to stop taking the bus. “There’s no going back. This was emergency foundation repair. There is no way that we could truly grow as a city under the old system,” said Kyle Owens, president of Functional Transit Winnipeg. Rider frustration should be expected, though, because the city has long failed to spend enough money on Transit to ensure the system operates as frequently as it should, said Owens. “This changeover was not a changeover to an ideal transit system. The system is still vastly underfunded,” he said. To attract more riders, Owens suggested Transit speed up bus trips by adding more Transit corridors and bus priority signals at intersections. The signals give buses a head start before all other traffic. joyanne.pursaga(a)freepress.mb.ca<mailto:joyanne.pursaga@freepress.mb.ca> X: @joyanne_pursaga

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WFP Columnist: More and more parking spaces amid empty promises (Jan9'26)
by Beth McKechnie 11 Jan '26

11 Jan '26

Caution! This message was sent from outside the University of Manitoba. More and more parking spaces amid empty promises https://www.winnipegfreepress.com/opinion/columnists/2026/01/09/more-and-mo… I tell my teenage stepdaughter to slow the car down as the security guard approaches. I’m giving her an evening driving lesson in the most obvious venue in West Broadway — the enormous, barren expanse of concrete that is the parking lot behind the Canada Life buildings on Osborne Street. The guard knocks on the window and asks us what we’re doing on the property. I explain, but he asks us to leave. I explain we’re going to have to switch drivers but then we’d be on our way. We head out to the Hydro parking lot on Taylor Avenue, where I first learned to drive years ago. While disappointing, this less-than-warm greeting should have been expected from the company formerly known as Great West Life. For years as I passed by, I watched as the old house at 51 Balmoral St., adjacent to the parking lot, slowly rotted in place. The story goes that it was the last home standing after Great West Life flattened all surrounding dwellings during their expansion in the 1970s and ’80s. The owner was elderly, and wished only to die in the home, upon which it would be forfeited to the company and slated for demolition with the others. However, the resident lived long enough that the house was designated of historical value and levelling it was no longer an option. So, the company was saddled with a structure they wished to remove to make way for even more parking. I was on the West Broadway Development Corporation board during the years Great West Life was desperately trying to offload 51 Balmoral, lest it remain saddled with its increasingly expensive upkeep. Eventually the decision to allow demolition came to a vote for the board. I was the lone holdout against demolition that eventually resulted in Great West Life partnering with the YMCA to renovate and expand the house into a 100-space daycare, with 90 of those spaces reserved for its own employees. I recall thinking at the time, “What was so difficult about that? Why couldn’t it have repurposed it long ago instead of fighting us for so long?” But it shouldn’t have surprised me. Because the history of Great West Life/Canada Life in West Broadway is one of ceaseless unneighbourliness and willful ignorance to the needs of the community in which it conducts its business. The area upon which Canada Life now stands was once home to Shea’s Brewery, Osborne Stadium and the Winnipeg Amphitheatre, a hallowed and unheated building from where the first hockey game ever broadcast by radio was played. It was also home to an apartment building and eight heritage homes on the first block of Whitehall Avenue. All eventually made way for 450 vehicles to park. In the 1970s, Great West Life petitioned the city to demolish not only the homes on the remaining block of Whitehall, but also the homes on Good Street and on the east side of Balmoral. Its design promised condominiums and rental units, and only a modest increase in parking spaces. Of course, we got none of the housing, and parking in a decidedly immodest quantity. The result? West Broadway was gutted of its historic homes, its cohesiveness and dignity as a residential community, and, importantly, much of the mixed-income housing our city now so desperately needs. The homes that remain on Balmoral, overlooking the “graveyard” of their once-neighbours, are a testament to the fine architecture that was laid to waste in the pursuit of parking stalls and empty promises. Now, when the city has agreed to build back some of the housing that was destroyed, promised and ultimately never delivered by Great West Life, the Granite Curling Club is paying the price through the loss of its parking lot. The club has reported it's been unable to make any long-term arrangements with Canada Life to use even a portion of its embarrassing legacy of neighbourhood erasure to serve the community in which it dwells. Instead, the last companion of the original stadium and arena continues to be crowded out by the land-hungry insurance giant. The present moment offers an elegant opportunity for penance. It’s long past time to recognize that the housing being built on the Granite’s lot is a mere fraction of what Great West Life themselves promised for the neighbourhood, and trading that for the parking which replaced it is an act of neighbourhood reconciliation desperately needed if this city is to define a better path forward. With 67 years of encroachment upon the lives of the people of West Broadway, Canada Life might do well to remind themselves of an old adage: the best time to make amends is yesterday, and the next best time to do so is today. winnipegfreepress.com/rebeccachambers<http://winnipegfreepress.com/rebeccachambers>

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WFP Editorial: Transit service must be dependable (Jan8'26)
by Beth McKechnie 08 Jan '26

08 Jan '26

Caution! This message was sent from outside the University of Manitoba. EDITORIAL Transit service must be dependable https://www.winnipegfreepress.com/opinion/editorials/2026/01/08/transit-ser… IF there’s anything worse for a public-transportation user than waiting in the winter cold for a Winnipeg Transit bus that never arrives, it surely must be waiting for a bus that does arrive but, being already overpacked with a standing-room complement of riders, passes by without stopping or opening its doors. That, however, is the reality currently faced by too many users of Winnipeg’s transit system, which last year underwent a massive reorganization of its routes and schedules in an effort to make the service more efficient, more reliable and — perhaps most important — more appealing to this city’s car-dependent population as a viable option for getting from one place to another. According to data released in December by Winnipeg Transit, the number of pass-ups — defined as when a bus is too full to allow more passengers to board, or is unable to accommodate a wheelchair either because the bus is too full or both wheelchair positions are already in use — experienced by the service last September (3,375) was the second-highest on record, eclipsed only by the 3,414 that occurred in September 2019. Between September and November last year, 6,971 pass-ups were recorded (bus operators have access to a button which is pressed when a passup occurs), compared to 5,779 in the same period the previous year. In 2019, 8,297 were recorded. “Defeating” is how one frequent rider characterized his recent pass-up experiences after waiting for scheduled buses but being unable to catch a ride home from work, adding “when it happens so frequently, it feels like no one cares and they’re not trying to fix it.” That is definitely not a description befitting a transit service that has become more efficient, reliable and/or appealing to its users. In fairness, Winnipeg Transit has been, and still is, attempting to address the deficiencies in its reconfigured system. Major overhauls such as the one the service enacted last year are bound to experience setbacks, hiccups, frustrations or whatever other term one might use to describe a failure for performance to match promise. Since the June 29 imposition of the new primary transit network — replacing the long-established model with a more streamlined configuration in which “feeder” buses connect riders with a smaller number of primary “spine” routes — Transit has made numerous adjustments, based in large part on feedback from (mostly dissatisfied) customers. But the system remains very much a work in progress, as evidenced by the recently released pass-up figures, and the reasons offered by Transit officials — including a return to full service levels on all routes (many had been reduced during the pandemic) and the fact some transit users are having difficulty adjusting to the route reorganization — will provide little comfort to those enduring the frozen frustration of being passed up by yet another overburdened bus. It also must be noted that the unacceptable pass-up rate is not the only critical issue with which the public-transit enterprise is grappling. Fare evasion and the on-board safety of both operators and passengers remain serious concerns that also affect public perception of the service and discourage ridership on buses. But nothing is more fundamental to the viability of public transport than it being readily available to those who have chosen to use it. For a full-time transit user, transit is their route to work, school or home — it isn’t optional. Leaving would-be passengers stranded at stops thousands of times per month — particularly during a winter city’s most inhospitable season — while overcrowded buses pass them by is a failure that must be addressed before Winnipeg can expect the public to get on board, both literally and figuratively, with public transportation.

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WFP: Highway Traffic Act amendment in effect Jan 1 - sets out rules for drivers when passing cyclists (Jan3'26)
by Beth McKechnie 03 Jan '26

03 Jan '26

Caution! This message was sent from outside the University of Manitoba. HIGHWAY TRAFFIC ACT AMENDMENT IN EFFECT A LAW passed last spring to protect highway workers and people on Manitoba roads came into force Jan. 1. The Highway Traffic Amendment Act (Traffic Safety Measures) sets out rules for drivers when passing cyclists and winter maintenance vehicles. Tow-truck drivers and roadside assistance operators can now place cones and signs to alert drivers and divert traffic from work zones. Drivers approaching or passing snowplows with blue warning lights activated must stay back 30 metres on roads with an 80 km/h speed limit or lower, and 100 metres on roads with a speed limit above 80 km/h. Drivers must not pass if the view ahead is obstructed or passing risks interfering with the vehicle or work. The law also requires a safe passing distance for cyclists. Drivers must leave at least one metre of space when passing — a requirement already in place in other provinces, including British Columbia and Ontario.

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WFP: Giving pedestrians a head start on vehicles improves safety, has no effect on traffic, city finds (Jan2'25)
by Beth McKechnie 02 Jan '26

02 Jan '26

Caution! This message was sent from outside the University of Manitoba. Giving pedestrians a head start on vehicles improves safety, has no effect on traffic, city finds https://www.winnipegfreepress.com/breakingnews/2026/01/02/giving-pedestrian… City staff are giving pedestrian head starts at downtown intersections the green light, and are working to expand the safety measure to locations further from the core. The four- to six-second delay for vehicles waiting at red lights — referred to as leading pedestrian intervals — were installed at 91 of downtown’s 111 intersections in March; 65 per cent at all four corners and the rest at two. In a report that will be presented to city council’s public works committee Thursday, David Patman, the city’s manager of transportation planning, said analyzing video taken at 10 of the intersections, both before and after the interval was implemented, found a “reduction in conflict rate” between pedestrians and drivers. “This lead time allowed pedestrians to establish themselves in the intersection and become more visible to drivers,” Patman wrote in the report, which was published online Friday. “It resulted in an increased time gap between conflicting vehicles and crossing pedestrians.” The initiative also found “no significant changes” to traffic congestion downtown as a result of the short delay. City staff are in the process of deciding how many of Winnipeg’s approximately 560 signals outside of downtown should have the interval installed. Patman said they are considering the level of risk and possible safety improvements, using factors, including the volume of crossings by people on foot, and the proximity to schools, hospitals, senior facilities and major transit stops, among others. “Candidate locations should be carefully selected to ensure that safety benefits can be achieved without adding unnecessary delay to high-volume Winnipeg roads,” said Patman. Public works chair Janice Lukes said expanding the project is a no-brainer. “I love it, because it’s virtually no cost other than the staff figuring out where to do it, and then we just change the timing of the lights in the central station,” she said Friday. Lukes said it’s important for historically dangerous streets for pedestrians be prioritized. “When you look at the map that is in the transportation master plan, streets like McPhillips (have) all these dots of collisions,” she said. The report said staff will consider safety studies, pedestrian volume and area with higher rates of poverty when deciding which streets to prioritize. Some signals, like those on Goulet and Marion streets, have upcoming reviews already planned, and will receive the new timing during those reviews. There is no added cost to implement leading pedestrian intervals and takes about 90 minutes per signal using existing staff. The project will be carried out over the next five years, with 60-75 new leading pedestrian intervals installed yearly. Approximately 275 pedestrians were involved in vehicle accidents downtown, including 13 that resulted in major injuries and eight in fatalities from 2015 to 2022. The Winnipeg Police Service said nine pedestrians died last year after being hit by vehicles. In total, there were 17 fatal crashes. Hillary Rosentreter, an advocate for safety improvements on Winnipeg streets, said she’s noticed a significant difference when walking or cycling across downtown since the leading pedestrian intervals were introduced. “You’re able to get yourself into a position where you’re most of the way through the intersection, or at the very least, extremely visible before drivers are even meant to start moving,” she said. “Visibility is a big factor in safety.” She’d like the expansion of the project reach as many streets as possible. “It’s been nice to see… I think they benefit most (in) obviously heavily pedestrianized areas, but would be valuable everywhere that people walk, so anywhere that there’s a sidewalk, basically,” she said. malak.abas(a)freepress.mb.ca<mailto:malak.abas@freepress.mb.ca>

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