Innisfil, Ontario earns international recognition for its transit initiative, powered by Uber

With a rapidly growing population, the Town of Innisfil realized it needed to implement a public transit system for its citizens. Rather than incurring the high costs of a traditional bus transit system, the town partnered with tech giant Uber to provide 24/7 transit to its geographically diverse community. The town earned international recognition today for it’s initiative at the 2018 Transforming Local Government conference in Tacoma, Washington, taking home the J. Robert Havlick Award for Innovation in Local Government.

Tim Cane, centre, accepts J. Robert Havlick award on behalf of Town of Innisfil, Ontario at the 2018 Transforming Local Governance conference in Tacoma, WA. Presenting the award are Karen Thoreson, former Alliance for Innovation CEO (left) and Katy Simon Holland, Interim CEO (right)

Innisfil also presented their case study at the conference, highlighting their innovative partnership with Uber to provide a door-to-door, demand-based ridesharing transit service. Innisfil is the first municipality in Canada to partner with Uber and is the first community in the world to have a transit system powered by Uber, rather than buses. The town is paying for a portion of the Uber fare to provide a less expensive 24/7 transit service. Through this partnership, the town is also gathering much needed data to refine and improve the transit system in future implementation phases.

The partnership was inspired by an encounter between a town staff member and a member of the community, named Joanne. After seeing her walking routinely on his drive to work, a town staff member offered her a ride. As it turns out, she was a single mom walking to her daily shift at a local grocery store. Since a taxi fare would eat into her earnings, she chose to walk either kilometres to and from work each day. This story made its way back to the team looking at transit options, which was just as the town was grappling with the high costs of implementing a bus (the 2015 Feasibility Study determined the start-up net cost of one bus route to be $270,000 and two buses along an expanded route would have cost $610,000). The question was posed: could a ridesharing service be more cost-effective to help all of the Joanne’s throughout the widely dispersed town? From this, the concept of an on-demand ridesharing transit option was born.

A home-grown solution

Though buses are normally associated with “transit,” the town lacks the population density that makes bus transit feasible (e.g., four to seven boardings per hour were forecast along the one bus route in the 2015 Feasibility Study). To find a true transit solution for Innisfil that all residents could access, since only a portion would be within walking distance of the proposed bus routes, the team shook off notions of normal and looked for something entirely different that would work for the town.

Rather than regulating and restricting Uber and other ridesharing transit/technology companies like some other municipalities have done, the town instead had courage to embrace a partnership with a private company while recognizing that technological innovations in the transportation industry were proving to be more efficient at connecting riders with drivers. Since the town’s partnership with Uber has so far been an effective solution, this has led governments across the world to rethink how they might be able to establish similar partnerships with private technology companies to deliver public transit in a more cost-effective manner.

The partnership also has the ability to generate a tremendous amount of useful data for the town. No more spending on costly third-party studies to speculate on rider needs (locations, hours of operation, and fare rates). By starting with Uber, the town created a low-cost transit option immediately, while simultaneously collecting accurate real-world data to develop their understanding of true transit needs. We’re creating a novel transit solution today that can be further refined and improved upon into the future.

The ability to establish this innovative partnership has required significant collaboration amongst numerous stakeholders, both internal and external to the community. For example, a Community Action Committee made up of citizens and business owners was formed to explore demand-based transit solutions. Other community member like Joanne were quickly connected and tapped for their real-world perspective on the town’s transit needs. The team also met several times with representatives of the local taxi companies, as well as other companies that have expressed interest in partnering with the town. These groups have been part of the on-going dialogue to address local transit needs and the role they can play currently (e.g. providing wheel chair accessible transit solutions) and in the future once the data tells more (e.g. a fixed route van option). The town also continues to receive and consider community input, as it currently has a transit survey underway, asking residents how they are using the town’s ridesharing transit service and how they would like to see it improved.

Early experience and results

In the first two months of the service, from May 15 to July 15, 2017, the total costs to the town had been $26,462 – for a service that all residents have access to. This compares to the significantly higher Year 1 start-up costs of $270,000 for 1 bus or $610,000 for 2 buses – a service that not all residents would have had access to, since they would not have been within walking distance of the bus stops. The Town budgeted $100,000 for Stage 1 of the program, which is anticipated to last until the end of the year. This initial investment of $100,000 represents a direct cost savings of $170,000 versus the 1-bus option or $510,000 versus the 2-bus option. Another measure to highlight the cost savings is the gross subsidy per passenger – in the current demand-based service it has been $5.43 thus far versus the $33 that was forecast for the 1-bus option in the Feasibility Study. This shows significant cost savings compared to a traditional bus system.

Other findings from the first two months of service:

• 30 trips were taken on the first day of service;
• 4,868 trips taken between May 15 (launch date) and July 15, 2017 (end of first measurement period);
• approximately 1,500 different people took trips;
• the most popular destinations are already appearing (town’s employment area, recreation complex, and regional GO train station).

Overcoming obstacles

Since Uber has not ever been solely used as a community’s transit system, there have been a number of different obstacles to overcome. The more significant obstacles have involved ensuring that the service is accessible to all residents. Accessibility obstacles include:

Those without a smartphone – For those without a smartphone or unable to use the technology required for the Uber service, the town developed a call-in service for residents where staff book Uber trips on their behalf. This is done through the Uber Central platform. Knowing that residents without smartphones potentially represented a significant portion of our population that most needed public transit (e.g., seniors or low-income residents), the team hosted a rapid problem-solving group session before launch of the service to help them arrive at the current workable solution.

Those requiring wheelchair accessibility – Since Uber vehicles are not wheelchair accessible, the town also met with stakeholder groups to brainstorm and entered into a similar partnership with a local taxi company to provide wheelchair accessible trips. The same fare structure is in place for these trips.

Driver availability – Since the town is providing a 24/7 transit service using Uber, there are times when there are not many drivers available. This is an ongoing challenge and the team are currently looking at ways to address this by offering incentives for drivers to be available for trips at certain times of the day.

A transit solution for the future?

As media attention has grown, both the town and Uber have been contacted by communities of all sizes throughout Canada and the United States. These communities have been interested in establishing a similar partnership with Uber, as there is potential for it to be replicated in any community where there is a need for public transit. A partnership with Uber or with another demand-based transit or technology company can be used as both a first step to establishing a transit system (e.g. in communities with a low population density and large geographic area), as well as to find cost-efficiencies in communities with already established transit systems (e.g. to replace underutilized bus routes or to subsidize trips to existing transit hubs). Overall, the financial savings (no capital investment and low annual budget), immediacy of results, and data generating potential of the innovation hold a great deal of appeal for staff, council and most of all, residents.

The Town of Innisfil is creating a novel transit solution today that can be further refined and improved upon into the future. It is part of their goal to help create a cost-effective transit solution for residents and municipalities everywhere.  MW