Latest News

The Transport 2050 strategy lays out a plan to improve transit options in Metro Vancouver.

Photo by Hannah Scott

TransLink plan aims to revolutionize transportation

By Angel St. George

Published 12:54 PDT, Fri March 18, 2022

—

There are a variety of ways for people to get around, and TransLink’s new regional transportation strategy aims to further diversify the available choices.

The Transport 2050 strategy was created as part of TransLink’s largest-ever public engagement process and adopted on Jan. 27. Many innovations are being implemented over the next 30 years to ensure that people have safe, affordable, and reliable access to transportation.

The strategy aims to give everyone universally accessible choices to conveniently connect to opportunities without needing to rely on personal vehicles. Its goal is to make active transportation and transit competitive choices accounting for at least half of all passenger trips by 2050, with taxi and carshare accounting for most remaining trips.

Active transportation includes all human-powered forms of travel, although walking and cycling are the most common. Active transportation is low-cost, zero-or low-carbon, healthy, and efficient. The strategy aims to address affordability, accessibility, and safety concerns for human-powered forms of travel.

Rapid low-cost construction of a well-connected and continuous network of walkways and bikeways is a priority.

The plan intends to provide options that are physically accessible to everyone and physically available throughout Metro Vancouver and in on-reserve communities.

In 2020, 80 per cent of bus routes were slower than in 2015 due to traffic congestion and lack of transit priority. With increased accessibility and affordability for public transportation and an increasing number of car sharing options, including automated vehicles and robo-taxis, the time it takes to get from one place to another will be significantly improved because roads will be less congested. By 2050, people will hopefully spend 20 per cent less time stuck in traffic.

TransLink ranked Richmond’s No. 3 Road corridor 17th in a list of the top 20 corridors that generate passenger hours of delay, according to a 2019 report on bus speed and reliability. Over 65,000 riders are affected each day, amounting to just over seven per cent of Metro Vancouver’s total bus ridership.

With significant expansion of transit across the region, nearly 55 per cent of people and 65 per cent of jobs would be within a 10-minute walk of the Major Transit Network.

In addition, nearly 90 per cent of people and jobs would be within a five-minute walk of frequent transit service.

Affordability is key to incentivizing use of public transportation. Metro Vancouver is an unaffordable region to live in by Canadian and North American standards, particularly for people with lower income.

According to Metro Vancouver's 2015 Housing and Transportation Cost Burden Study, nearly half of renter households—making up 31 per cent of all households—earn $50,000 or less per year. The result is that people in this group end up spending nearly 70 per cent of their household income on rent and getting around. Members of these households are left with difficult choices about how much to spend on food, clothing, child care, and other expenses.

Each year, more than 100 people are needlessly killed on Metro Vancouver streets, 40 per cent of whom were walking, biking, or rolling while they were struck and killed. Tens of thousands more people are seriously injured every year.

The key factor in these fatalities is speed. If a person is hit by a car travelling at 55 kilometres per hour, there is a 90 per cent chance of fatality according to data cited in TransLink’s report. By reducing the speed to 30 kilometres per hour, there is only a 10 per cent chance of death.

The TransLink strategy aims to significantly reduce traffic fatalities and serious injuries by at least five per cent annually, hopefully reaching zero before 2050. This will be achieved by transitioning away from roads designed for cars towards people-first streets designed for everyone. These roads will feature reduced motor speeds, greater separation of different modes and speeds, and increased automation.

Decreasing air pollution emissions is also a major factor in the plan. Reducing greenhouse gas emissions stemming from transportation is important and weighted equally with other health-harming air contaminants such as nitrogen dioxide, volatile organic compounds, and particulate matter. This means that addressing climate change also supports better lung health, particularly for those who live on busy roads.