Evolution of Bus Route Travel Times, 2020-2023, Part II – Steve Munro

This article is the second half of a review of the change in travel times for a selection of major bus routes, many of which are part of the RapidTO “red lane” proposal, from 2020 to May 2023.

See also: Evolution of Bus Route Travel Times, 2020-2023, Part I

My purpose is to show the drop in travel times in March 2020 co-incident with the pandemic lockdown, and the gradual recovery over the past three years. The minimum times seen in 2020 establish what we would see in the absence of road traffic, not to mention a lower passenger demand, and probably show the best case for improvement with transit priority.

Depending on when I began to track various routes, there are cases when I have some pre-pandemic data from 2018 or 2019.

The situation varies from route to route and by time of day. In many cases, travel times have returned to pre-pandemic levels or higher, and some uptick is particularly notable in 2023. An important characteristic of these routes is that they do not serve the core area, but run in Toronto’s suburbs where bus ridership is strong and work-from-home had considerably less effect on demand than it does downtown.

Routes in this article include 86 Scarborough, 116 Morningside and 905 Eglinton East Express which already run on the Eglinton-Kingston-Morningside red lanes, as well as 39/939 Finch East, 54/954 Lawrence East and 25/925 Don Mills.

Note that the charts here track travel times, not service reliability. I will turn to that issue in future articles.

86 Scarborough

The portion of 86 Scarborough charted here covers the route where it has red lane transit priority east via Eglinton and Kingston Road to Morningside. This is shared in part with 905 Eglinton East Express and 116 Morningside.

The reduced running time co-incident with the creation of the red lanes on Eglinton-Kingston-Morningside is clearly visible in fall 2020 although it occurs over several days as the implementation worked its way along the route. Other events over the past years include:

• the December 2021 combination of the holiday period and the resumed lockdown for the omicron wave,
• the January 2022 snowstorm including the extended period of return to then-normal travel times due to slow snow clearing, and
• a recent rise in travel times following the usual holiday drop at the end of 2022.

An important note here is that both the initial covid effect in early 2020 and the red lanes later that year caused relatively small reductions in travel time during most periods.

(Cases where the lines drop to zero are days with no data. The cluster in fall 2021 correspond to the TTC’s cyber security incident that took the tracking system offline.)

116 Morningside

The Morningside bus shows a pattern similar to the Scarborough bus above. The routes share red lanes on Eglinton east to Guildwood Parkway, but the Morningside route runs in mixed traffic until it reaches the red lane segment on Morningside north of Kingston Road. Both the drop at the onset of the pandemic, and then for the red lanes are visible in Spring and Fall 2020. Travel times are now back to pre-pandemic, pre-red lane levels during most periods.

905 Eglinton East Express

The Eglinton East Express shares the red lanes with 86 Scarborough to the point where these routes diverge at Kingston Road and Morningside Avenue where the 905 turns north and the 86 continues east to Meadowvale.

I do not have pre-pandemic data for this route as I was not tracking it at the time, nor for 986 Scarborough Express. The charts below show a small drop when the red lanes came into effect, although this is small. Travel times have grown slowly since 2020 and show a recent bump.

39 Finch East

Travel times for the Finch East services are plotted here between Finch Station and McCowan Road, the point where the 939 Finch Express shifts to local operation.

The 39 Finch local service shows a big drop in travel times primarily in peak periods at the pandemic’s onset, but travel times grow again from mid-2021 onward. During some periods they now exceed pre-pandemic values.

939 Finch East Express

The 939 Finch Express shows a similar pattern in the evolution of travel times from 2020 to 2023 as the local service, and during many periods are at or above pre-pandemic levels.

39/939 Finch East Local vs Express

The charts below compare median (50th percentile) travel times for the 39 local and 939 express services. During the period when express service was suspended, there is no line on the chart for it, but the space is preserved to show the local service data.

Note that in certain periods and directions there is little difference between the express and local travel times.

54 Lawrence East

Lawrence Avenue East was added to the proposed RapidTO red lane list at the behest of politicians representing both the Scarborough and North York portions. I have divided the route into three segments for analysis:

• East of Midland (the screenline catching all service east of Lawrence East Station)
• Kennedy to Victoria Park (the segment west of Lawrence East Station to the North York boundary)
• Victoria Park to Don Mills (the North York segment added at the behest of the then-Councillor and TTC Board member).

For the eastern segment, there is a small covid drop in March 2020 followed by a slow upward climb which has become more pronounced westbound in the AM peak in 2023. Other periods also show a growth to levels about the pre-pandemic era.

Between Victoria Park and Kennedy, the travel times are short and the covid effect, if any, is small. Travel times over this segment are quite consistent over time.

From Victoria Park west to Don Mills, the travel times are also quite consistent. Westbound in the AM peak shows a pre-covid rise, but this is the only period and direction where that happens.

954 Lawrence East Express

The 954 Lawrence East Express operates only in peak periods from Lawrence East Station eastward. Note that I have no pre-pandemic data for comparison and so these charts show only the evolution of travel times from fall 2020 onward.

25 Don Mills

The 25 Don Mills local service shows a drop in travel times in the covid era, but a fairly quick growth back to pre-pandemic levels in some periods.

925 Don Mills Express

The 925 Don Mills Express service shows a similar pattern to the local service above. Southbound am peak travel times are more or less back to pre-pandemic levels, while for some periods and directions, the values remain lower.

25/925 Don Mills Local vs Express

The charts below illustrate the difference between travel times on the local and express services from north of Pape Station to Sheppard Avenue. The difference in median travel times is generally about 5 minutes, although it is lower in some periods and directions.