Story - Canada - York super buses no panacea but welcome
York,Toronto,Canada -The Globe and Mail, by JOHN BARBER -Sept 7, 2005: -- I waited eagerly for an answer at Viva's new Richmond Hill Centre station yesterday afternoon, comforted by an electronic sign saying that the next Belgian-made super bus travelling south to the Finch subway station would arrive in six minutes... A quarter-hour later, the count was down to three minutes. After another 10 minutes or so, the sign reluctantly conceded that the next bus was "Due." When it finally arrived, its driver emptied all the passengers out because the bus's air-conditioning system had broken down (and, being much more advanced than ordinary Canadian-made vehicles, its windows are sealed)... By the time we eventually left on a new bus, Viva was full. Whether Viva succeeds in revolutionizing rapid transit in the Toronto region, however, remains an open question... The theory is a good one: Rather than sinking billions into a new rail system, York Region is using comparatively cheap buses running on three new express routes to lure drivers with standards of service and comfort that are said to rival conventional rapid-transit. It's all very modern and spiffy: Satellites guide the buses while computers control signal lights and on-board electronic signs count down the minutes and seconds to each new stop... Faced with traffic congestion that is already worse than anything experienced downtown, York couldn't afford the luxury of such anti-urban thinking. The truth is that you can no more have a great city without proper public transit -- or any city worth living in, for that matter -- ...
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