Improving public transit doesn't have to be a 'war on cars'

Depending on the weather, Michael Mumford will walk, cycle or take the subway to work and back home. Roughly every two weeks, he and his wife rent a car for trips to big-box stores and for visits to relatives.

They don’t miss the car they gave up earlier this year, after realizing it had hardly been taken out of its underground parking spot for a good six months.

“We thought that maybe we don’t need to have it sitting there, just collecting dust,” recalls Mumford, a digital marketing and e-commerce professional who moved recently from a suburb in Mississauga to a hip neighbourhood just northwest of downtown Toronto. “So we decided to let it go.”

Mumford and his wife are in the minority. Canada is a country of car owners. Last year Canadians bought close to 1.9 million new cars — setting a new record for domestic vehicle sales. All told, more than 22 million light-motor road vehicles — a category that includes most car models, SUVs, pickup trucks and vans — were registered in 2015. That averages out to almost two cars per household.

Before giving up their car, Michael Mumford and his wife hadn't touched it for six months. (THOMAS BOLLMANN FOR THE GLOBE AND MAIL)

Canadians also make frequent use of their cars, particularly as a mode of work transportation. The latest Statistics Canada survey on work commutes found about four out of five Canadians, or 11.4 million workers, travelled to their jobs using a private vehicle. The figures are much higher in certain parts of Canada; in Ontario’s York region, for instance, more than 85 per cent of workers drive to and from work.

Given the impact of cars on the environment — passenger cars account for more than 20 per cent of greenhouse gas emissions from transportation — shouldn’t more Canadians follow Mumford’s lead and give up their wheels?

The question shouldn’t be about Canadians giving up their cars but rather about Canadians using their cars less, says Brent Toderian, a consultant and principal at Toderian UrbanWORKS, a Vancouver firm that provides city planning and urban design services. 

“It’s important to recognize the difference between a car-free commute and a car-free household,” says Toderian, who was chief planner for the City of Vancouver and manager of centre city planning and design for Calgary. “Many people who have gone car-free in their daily commute still have a car, and that’s okay because perhaps the goal should be to reduce the number of car trips per household.”

Canadians set a new record in domestic vehicle sales in 2015. (FRED LUM/THE GLOBE AND MAIL)

Matti Siemiatycki, associate professor in geography and planning at the University of Toronto, holds a similar point of view.

“Transportation is essential to our daily lives, and the first thing to do in any discussion about transportation is to defuse the rhetoric around the war on cars,” he says. “Instead, we need to start thinking of different modes of transportation as having different uses, and then talk about how we plan cities, so people have choices of modes of transportation that will suit the purpose of their trip at the time they’re making that trip.”

There isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution, says Prof. Siemiatycki. In an ideal scenario, the transportation network of a city or region would be comprehensive enough, so residents can get to anywhere they need to go.

For example, they might start their trip on a bus, transfer to a train, then hop out and walk the remaining few blocks to work. But in rural areas or in regions where there’s urban sprawl, transportation infrastructures often don’t extend far enough to take people from home to work and back.

“There’s often that last mile that isn’t covered,” says Prof. Siemiatycki, “so the challenge is how to get people to and from their homes in a way that reduces their reliance on their cars.”

A number of communities across the country are working to address this challenge. As examples, Prof. Siemiatycki cites the Ontario cities of Mississauga and Brampton, which are jointly building a north-south light-rail transit corridor with key connections to buses and trains.

Encouraging public transit use doesn't have to heighten the 'war on cars,' experts say. (FRED LUM/THE GLOBE AND MAIL)

But publicly funded mass transit isn’t the only solution, he notes. “In suburban areas, one of the options might be higher-occupancy vehicles. Ride-sharing provides one model, but smaller shuttle buses that provide that last mile of service could also be another solution.”

It’s easier to encourage car-free commutes, Toderian notes, when the alternatives — public transit, walking and cycling — are inviting. In fact, they need to be “delightful,” he says, enough that Canadians will view them as their transport of choice.

“In urban places, we should be designing around people, not cars,” he points out. “This means prioritizing cycling, hiking and transit and designing the city, so that it doesn’t feel like such a sacrifice to take these modes of transport.”

Michael Mumford says he doesn't miss the car his family gave up earlier this year. (THOMAS BOLLMANN FOR THE GLOBE AND MAIL)

Jennifer Fix, a Vancouver-based community and regional planning consultant, says having more amenities within neighbourhoods can spell the difference between residents hopping into their cars or just hoofing it to pick up groceries or go to the movies.

Businesses, however, need to see a certain population count before they’ll set up shop in an area. In low-population communities, this creates an imperative to focus on building density instead of geographic sprawl.

“We need to engage municipal councils, so they understand that sometimes it’s better to say no to an application for a new suburb or a large-retail format that’s very car-oriented,” says Fix. “It’s very challenging because municipalities don’t want to give the impression that they’re closed for business, but it’s important for them to connect the dots between these issues, so they can create and enforce better plans for their communities.”

Ultimately, getting people out of their cars is a challenge whose solution hinges on three key factors — the number of people living in a given area; a land-use mix that provides destinations and amenities within walking distance of homes and workplaces; and ease of navigation based on the size of city blocks and how long it takes residents to travel from one point to the next.

“Research tells us that people will get out of their cars, not because they ought to but because they want to,” says Fix. “So the goal should be to plan and build communities with transport options that will make people want to get out of their cars.”