Our City, Our Podcast

podcast-episode-4-kevin.mp3 trimmed

[00:00:02] We know our services and programs impact you, so let's talk about them. Together we'll learn from the people behind the scenes and get to know our city a little better. From the City of Winnipeg, this is Our City, Our Podcast.

[00:00:14] This podcast is recorded in Treaty One territory, the home and traditional lands of the Anishinaabe, Ininew and Dakota peoples and in the national homeland of the Red River Métis. We acknowledge that our drinking water comes from Shoal Lake 40 First Nation in Treaty Three territory.

[00:00:34] Your hosts for this episode of Our City Our Podcast are me, Natalie Geddes.

[00:00:38] And me, Rachel Bergen.

[00:00:40] And today we're speaking with Kevin Sturgeon. He is a senior transit planner with Winnipeg Transit.

[00:00:46] Yeah, he'll tell us all about the Winnipeg Wiggle. Listen more if you want to hear more about that.

[00:00:52] Let's make this a thing, guys. Uh, yeah. So maybe you're joining us from your walk with your dog or you're driving to work, but it sure would be appropriate if you're listening right now from a City of Winnipeg bus.

[00:01:09] Just to get us started, why don't you introduce yourself and tell us your role at the city?

[00:01:15] Uh, hi, I'm Kevin sturgeon. I am the senior transit planner for Winnipeg Transit. I was the project manager for the Winnipeg Transit Master Plan, and now I'm working on implementing the Winnipeg Transit Master Plan.

[00:01:28] And, you know, transit is in in a, you know, it's really generating in a new way. But how long have you been with transit?

[00:01:35] I've been there five years.

[00:01:36] Five years. Okay.

[00:01:38] Um, how do you like to get around the city?

[00:01:41] Um. I like to think about each trip I'm taking individually, and then decide what's the best way to get wherever I need to go for that trip. Sometimes that's the bus, sometimes it's walking, sometimes it's biking, and sometimes it's driving and sometimes it's skating.

[00:02:00] Your transportation planner, correct? Yeah. You're spoken like a true. Um, but I, um, you know, maybe somebody listening to us today on the bus, we're going to talk about transit. Um, maybe let's let's imagine ourselves and put ourselves there, starting with where's your favorite spot to sit on the bus?

[00:02:22] I like to sit in the seat right above the steps. So I go up the steps and then I sit in the first seat after the steps if I can.

[00:02:32] Good answer. Yeah, there's like a nice view.

[00:02:34] Yeah. You get to see what's going on in the front. Uh, I feel like I should go up the steps because I'm able to to leave the front part for everybody else who might not be able to go up the steps. Uh, and then I can see what's going on from from the front part of that seat and, and then make a quick exit out the back door when it's time to go.

[00:02:53] Fair enough.

[00:02:54] Um, what's your favorite route to take in the city?

[00:02:57] So I don't I don't really have a favorite route overall. But, uh, one thing I really like is that the Winnipeg Architecture Foundation made an app that you can use on route ten, and route ten goes pretty close to my house in Saint Boniface, and it narrates like a tour guide, all the historic buildings and sites that you go by on that route. And that route goes from Saint Boniface to Wolseley. Uh, so it does pass through a lot of historic areas and historic buildings, and it's just a really cool experience to be narrated to while you're riding the bus.

[00:03:34] Right. And it's a historic route, right?

[00:03:37] Yeah. And route ten is the oldest diesel bus route in Winnipeg. So it started in the 1940s. It's been very similar ever since. Uh, and at that time, of course, most routes were streetcars or, uh, electric trolley bus routes. Uh, but the number ten was the first diesel route.

[00:04:02] Oh, that's that's very interesting. Yeah.

[00:04:03] That's actually that's such a unique thing to do for a city bus, but and maybe if we can step back even further, what you know, from, from your position, what can you tell us is unique about Winnipeg and its transit system?

[00:04:15] Winnipeg has a really strong history of people using transit. And even though the ridership has gone up and down over time, uh, you know, through the 80s and 90s, when other cities ridership was going way down, Winnipeg actually stayed relatively strong. And that's. Extra interesting to me because Winnipeg doesn't have any trains. So Winnipeg is actually the busiest transit system in Canada that has no trains. Uh, you know, maybe we should have trains. There's a lot of people who think so. Um, but it's it's a very well used bus system. And we're trying to build on that success. We you know, the Winnipeg Transit Master Plan has a network redesign as its core component. A lot of cities around North America have been doing network redesigns, and usually it's starting from a position of low ridership and they're trying to grow. Uh, our reality, especially in 2019, when we started that process, was that busses were passing by people and couldn't pick them up because our system was too full. So our network redesign was starting from a position of strength, where we just can't fit any more people in our system. And so we needed to take a new look at it. And that's very different from other cities that have done bus network redesigns.

[00:05:42] So how are we trying to grow our existing transit system?

[00:05:48] Well, the biggest thing we needed to do was redesign it from scratch. Our system has grown organically since the beginning, about 140 years ago, and some routes haven't changed in generations. Other routes have been added to piecemeal. But Winnipeg's never had a from scratch reorganization before, and we got to the point where the complexity of the transit system meant that we couldn't target new resources to where they were needed. And if we're going to accommodate more and more people, uh, as the city grows, or even just among people who already live here, we need to be able to. Pick them up. The busses can't be full. Um, but we also need to be able to put those new busses where they're needed. So we needed it was time to redesign the whole network. And that's what we've done. And we're working on implementing that within the next couple of years.

[00:06:57] Hmm.

[00:06:58] Um, other things that make Winnipeg unique. You know, maybe our topography or our climate. How does that play into transit planning?

[00:07:06] Um, well, I don't think the topography makes a big difference in Winnipeg. The climate, um, you know, probably doesn't make that much of a difference compared to other Canadian cities, at least, even if it is a bit colder than some places. Um, but definitely the street network, the map of Winnipeg is very unique. There's there's not really any other, uh, city with a street geography that compares to Winnipeg. You know, there's many grid cities, but Winnipeg has 11 grids.

[00:07:37] You're gonna have to explain that a little.

[00:07:40] Well, everyone sort of knows how the city reorients itself. You know, at Notre Dame Avenue, for example, is a big dividing line where the grid of the West End doesn't line up with the grid and in the North end and the Exchange District and so on. And then, you know, Fort Garry is another different grid. And so even in the parts of the city, the pre-war street pattern, many cities are in Canada are grid cities. Um, but Winnipeg has all these different grids stuck together. And, uh, when we're, when we're trying to plan bus routes, uh, you know, the high capacity, frequent bus routes, we just want them to go in a straight line. So we had to invent a concept that I call Winnipeg Street. And I think everybody from Winnipeg knows loosely what that means. You know, if you take this left, that right, this left, that right, that's really just basically going straight. We all kind of know examples like that. I call it the Winnipeg Wiggles.

[00:08:38] And I love that. Yeah, it's a throwback. Copyright Winnipeg Wiggles not to be confused with the other Wiggles.

[00:08:46] And.

[00:08:47] This this, uh, unique grid. This is just a throwback to our before. Yeah.

[00:08:52] It goes it goes.

[00:08:53] Back to the, uh, you know, the ox cart paths, the river lots, the way that the land was divided up.

[00:09:03] Actually.

[00:09:03] Last 200 years ago. Sorry to.

[00:09:05] Interrupt you. Uh, last time we were talking, you brought up something interesting about about the history, um, that that some of our, you know, our biggest roots are some of our oldest roots.

[00:09:14] Yeah, yeah. Another unique fact about Winnipeg. Some of the most important streets have their origins in walking paths or ox cart paths. Uh, in some cases, like Main Street, Portage Avenue, Pembina Highway, Saint Mary's Road, those all basically follow the other outer bends of the rivers so you could walk along the river, but take shortcuts between all the bends and bring your ox along the way and have them stop to get some water. And when the river comes close to the to the path and they all go, uh, you know, to Portage in Maine today and in the 1800s, 1700s, they were going to Upper Fort Garry or trading. And before that, uh, for millennia before that, indigenous people were also using those same paths to get to the forks for their trading.

[00:10:13] Right for sure. Um, so we've heard a little bit about our past. Um, we have this big master plan, and you've said it's the biggest overhaul we've ever done. Um, where are we headed next? Like, where do you want to see the our transit system going from here?

[00:10:34] Well, the first big step we have to finish or we have to implement the new transit network. Um, so we're really focused on that right now. Um, after that. So one of the, one of the purposes of that redesign was to be able to target resources where we need them. And so we'll make the big change, and then we'll look to where we need to put new resources. And we hope, uh, that we need a lot more resources. We hope to be attracting people to ride the bus. And so we'll see where that's happening. We have some idea of where we think it might be, but, uh, we'll see where that actually happens. And we'll look to grow, uh, from there. Uh, and then we have the whole infrastructure side. So, you know, we deal in service and in infrastructure. Uh, that's a bit different. That's unique to transit among uh, for transit. First, transportation planning goes I used to work in different elements of transportation planning, and we usually just think of infrastructure. But in transit, we're always thinking about service. If we had built the Southwest Transitway, uh, and run a bus on it once an hour, it would have cost the same amount to build. Um, but that's not what we did. We we built that, uh, major piece of infrastructure, and now there's a bus that runs on it every four minutes, and that's what people see. They want the bus to come as often as possible. Um, so the Southwest Transitway was was finished south of downtown, uh, and opened in 2020. Our next big infrastructure project would be to extend that through downtown, along with the central parts of each of the Transitways. Uh, northwest, southeast, uh, and east. And will be we have funding for the design project, not construction. Uh, to that will start in 2025. So so beginning in a couple of years, we'll be doing a design for rapid transit within downtown that includes going through Union Station, which we've heard, uh, a lot about. Uh, we mostly good things, I think. I think basically everybody we've heard from thinks that rapid transit through Union Station will be a good idea. Uh, and so that's part of that. And, and a major station at Portage and Main as well.

[00:13:08] Another full circle moment, right. That, uh, daily bus drivers or bus riders, the daily bus riders are back at Union Station. Um, like they were. Yeah, a century ago.

[00:13:19] Yeah. I mean, it was designed as a major transit hub with a bit of a different intention in mind at the time, but but it would still serve very well as a major transit hub.

[00:13:34] Uh, in, in another kind of direction, I understand, uh, Winnipeg might be leading the way in in what might be powering our busses.

[00:13:44] Yeah.

[00:13:44] Winnipeg's, uh, Winnipeg Transit is moving to electrify the transit fleet. Um, we don't have electric busses on the road right now. We did have a pilot project a few years ago, uh, appropriately, on the Watt Academy route. Um, that ended, and and now we're we're working on, uh, we have ordered new zero emission busses, both battery electric and hydrogen fuel cell. Um, but what's not, uh, as obvious to to people observing is that we, we actually are leading the way in the country or even in North America on detailed planning. Um, so some, some agencies have gone ahead and, and bought the busses and then they realized there the shortcomings.

[00:14:45] Of these electric buses.

[00:14:46] Right. And and they're different. They're different than a diesel bus. Uh, they have pros and cons. A diesel bus with a full tank can leave the garage in the morning, stay out for twenty-one hours and come back in the evening. And an electric bus can’t do that. And so how they charge, where they charge, how long they can be on the road—those are all a lot more important things to consider with zero emission vehicles than they are with diesel buses. So we have, we fortunately have, one of North America’s leading experts on the team at Winnipeg Transit, someone who came from New Flyer and she has been preparing in great detail, the plan for this transition. The goal being that once we get these buses we know exactly how to use them, where they can go, what we’re going to do with them. And we’re trying to avoid some of the growing pains that other agencies have found when they just dive in the deep end and buy a bunch of buses. And then realize that they can’t use them the way they intended to. So we know that people want to see electric buses on the road and so do we, but we also want to be cautious to make sure that we can actually use them properly.

[00:16:17] Right, for sure. It would be kind of sad to have a whole fleet of electric buses on the roads and then people can’t get on them because they run out of juice a little bit early and we didn’t anticipate that. I can imagine that would be a problem.

[00:16:32] We definitely don’t want that to happen. But even if you know you can avoid stranding people on the side of the road with a dead battery, if a bus has to drive back to the garage in the middle of the day and another bus has to drive out, then there’s an amount of overlap time when there’s one bus out of service driving back to the garage and another one’s out of service driving from the garage and that’s extra time the buses are driving, that’s extra time of operators being paid, that’s extra operating costs and we know that if we were going to increase our operating budget the most important place that people want us to put that funding is in bus frequency, not out of service buses driving around the city. And so we need to figure out well in advance what’s the most efficient way to do that so that we can avoid needing a whole bunch of new operating funding that doesn’t deliver results.

[00:17:37] Um yeah so, is there a solution to have the buses run for a longer period of time?

[00:17:44] Yeah there’s a few tools available. For one thing, this is one of the reasons we’re testing hydrogen fuel cell buses. So in the best case scenario they would be able to operate just like a diesel bus where they leave with a full tank of hydrogen in the morning and stay out on the road for twenty-one hours and come back at the end of the day. If that’s the case, if that ends up working out then that would be the easiest swap, but of course hydrogen is hard to come by. There aren’t bulk hydrogen distributors right now. So the question is where do you get hydrogen from and will the buses actually function the way that the manufacturers hope they will. And for the battery electric buses, will we initially use them on routes that only operate in rush hour and then they can come back to the garage in the middle of the day and charge, that would be a good first step. And then later on when we get to the point that a larger proportion of our fleet is getting electrified, we’ll have a better understanding of the different kinds of batteries, the different types of hydrogen fuel cell buses available. Hopefully the costs of batteries and charging infrastructure and hydrogen infrastructure will all be a bit lower. And then we’ll re-evaluate. But I’m not the expert in this topic but that’s as far as I understand it.

[00:19:22] Well Kevin, thank you so much. This is all just so…we’re going in such an exciting direction.

[00:19:28] Absolutely. As a transit rider, I’m just thrilled about all the changes that are coming out.

[00:19:36] You know, we often like to ask people, this is your opportunity because the conversation is so broad, to also hit on some misconceptions. Something that you see people do or you hear people say and you really wish you had the opportunity to set them right.

[00:19:56] I think there’s a lot of things about running a transit system that people don’t understand and that’s to be expected. There’s a lot of things about other people’s jobs that I don’t understand. But one of the things you see most often is, drivers don’t actually have control of the back door.

[00:20:17] No!

[00:20:18] No way!

[00:20:20] So when I banged on the door and say, Back door, back door. I’m just screaming into the void.

[00:20:28] On the vast majority of our buses, the bus driver can’t open the back door. The bus driver can turn on the little green light that lets the passenger open the door. But the bus driver can’t open the back door. So if the little green light above the door is on, the bus driver’s already done everything they can and now it’s up to you!

[00:20:52] Okay well, what a wonderful take away. That’s some news you can use everyone. Anything else you want to share? Did we miss anything? I’m sure we’re missing lots, but is there anything else you want to share?

[00:21:06] There’s a lot to know. I think one of the things we’ve been doing for the few years is we have a new system called the on-request system and it’s just in three areas of the city right now. I’m fortunate to live in one of those areas. So if I happen to be home in the middle of the day or on a weekend, I can use an app on my phone and call the bus to come and get me. And the bus will pick me up at the corner near my house. The app will tell me which corner to go and when to go. Usually it’s just in a few minutes. And I can go anywhere else in my neighbourhood. Until a few years ago, we had a similar system based on phone and many systems used to have that, many transit agencies across Canada, they used to have that in the 80s. Winnipeg was one of the last places to still have it. What was happening though was that because you were literally phoning the bus driver, the bus driver would have to pull over, answer his cell phone, ask you where you were and where you wanted to go. And we were doing this in the 2010s. The problem was that the more popular it got, the more time the driver had to spend not driving and talking on the phone, even just to tell people that the service wasn’t available. There were too many rides already being processed, so with the new system the bus driver doesn’t have to answer any phones. They follow the instruction on a tablet just like a GPS that tells them where to go. In the background the computer is optimizing all the trips, adding in the new trips, and trying to deliver as many people where they want to go as soon as possible. It’s been working out really well. People seem to really like it. For people who have limited mobility, who have qualified for Winnipeg Transit Plus, this is not a Winnipeg Transit Plus system, but for people who have qualified, it will pick them up right at their door, not at the nearest corner. But for me and for many people it’ll pick you on the nearest corner and take you to the nearest corner of where you want to go. And it’s been really popular and saved me a lot of down time and opened up access to different areas.

[00:23:46] Can you rattle off what areas that it’s available in?

[00:23:47] Right now it’s available in St. Boniface, it’s in Glenwood, Southdale, Sage Creek, Island Lakes, and the area around St. Vital Centre.

[00:23:56] And if people want to look up a little more information, where can they look?

[00:23:59] That is on winnipegtransit.com

[00:24:03] Well thank you so much for this Kevin. This was all really interesting and wow I will change my bus behavior from this point on, I will no longer scream at the, or not scream, I shouldn’t say I’m screaming, I’m not yell, I’m not yelling, but I’m calling out gently and kindly to the bus operator asking them to open the back door for me. I will no longer do that.

[00:24:25] Yeah, I’m looking at the way we move. When you’re looking in the past, you’re looking in the future…all from one bus window seat, so that’s very exciting.

[00:24:40] It’s been my pleasure. Thank you.

[00:24:41] Thank you.

[00:24:44] Join us next month when we connect with Mike Olczyk, he’s the Emergency Management Coordinator with the City of Winnipeg.

[00:24:50] Hey, summer storm season. This is going to be a great time to have this talk.

[00:24:54] Have your emergency kits ready.

[00:24:56] And before we go, we’d love to hear from our listeners. What programs and services impact you most? Email us at city-podcast@winnipeg.ca with suggestions for future episodes. Thanks for listening.