TAMRMS#: B05
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BUDGET INFORMATION REQUEST (BIR) - Book-A-Bus
Requested by: Councillor Joly
Date of Request: February 3, 2025
Date Response Due: March 3, 2025
Confidential: No
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QUESTION
recommendation
I understand that it is not uncommon for the number of Book-A-Bus trip requests to exceed capacity and that Admin will be requesting additional funding for Book-A-Bus in upcoming budgetary cycles.
Questions:
How often does this happen and for how many hours was the service unavailable in 2024?
What is the funding required to reduce the number of hours that Book-A-Bus is unavailable?
If additional funding was provided, how soon could service levels be met?
Where (on our website?) is there information about riders running into this issue, or what to do when it happens?
For my reference, 2024 service levels for On-Demand Transit state that "Services are maintained as per details published on City Website" (Trips can be booked between 6:45 p.m. to 11:45 p.m M-S, and between 6:00 a.m. to 6:45 p.m on Sunday).
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RESPONSE
Q - How often does this happen and for how many hours was the service unavailable in 2024?
A - It is common for trip requests to exceed the capacity of the program. Seats unavailable occur when the capacity of the bus deployment coupled with the scheduling algorithm used has been reached. In 2024, there were 52,731 trip requests and 7,130 cases of seat unavailable. In January 2025, the average seat unavailable percentage of trips requests by day of the week were as follows:
Sunday - 20%
Monday - 6%
Tuesday - 4%
Wednesday - 13%
Thursday - 19%
Friday - 17%
Saturday - 9%
The timing of the seat availability varies throughout the times that the service is provided. For example, on Sundays over the last 30 days, the average unaccommodated rates varied from 24% at 9:00am, 0% at 10:00 and 11:00 am, and 18% at noon. On Fridays over the same period, unaccommodated rates were 24% at 8:00pm, 20% at 9:00pm, and 0% at 10:00pm.
The City...
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