Ottawa: Bus Riders Union

The rates of transit service in Ottawa is high. How high you may ask? The highest in Canada and rising. The City of Ottawa does not seem to actually care about riders or drivers. I'm a rider so I will focus on riders issues though, drivers certainly have issues that need to be addressed as well.

Riders in Ottawa have seen higher and higher rates for OC Transpo, but I would argue that hasn't panned out into better service. I have been riding OC Transpo for seven years now and though, in some places there is more service, in the places that it is needed the service is if anything declining. Light rail is given as an answer to all problems. Instead we find the O-train barely used, but high in cost, and basically used as a token for being a bigger city. The bus riders are the ones really paying for these trains. Instead of funding better busses, bus riders fund the war profiteers of SNC-Lavalin or Bombardier.

Due to these high prices for an essential service, the anti-poverty collective Under Pressure is organizing a Ottawa Bus Riders Union. BRUs have had moderate sucess in both Los Angeles and Vancouver. Perhaps if people form a union people will actually be able to be proud of OC Transpo as a service for the people instead of being a way to make money.