The leader of the official opposition at City Hall believes that time is running out to provide Quebec with a structuring transportation system, which will need to be developed continuously, as South Korea is doing in Seoul.
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Claude Villeneuve said he was inspired by the Korean experience. Leaders in transportation in the world, the South Koreans continue to constantly improve their network. “We can draw inspiration from what is being done elsewhere. The idea is not to import everything. Because we don’t have the same needs and the same abilities.”
According to him, there are lessons to be learned, even if the two situations are different. “Things have to happen,” he said about a structuring transportation project for Quebec. “And what I take away from it is two things: we must develop continuously so as not to fall behind and seek more. And secondly, once you start, people want more.”
Develop expertise
Starting work, implementing structuring methods and continuing to develop, “allows you to develop expertise,” says Mr. Villeneuve. Both from public actors, who end up getting into the habit of moving these projects forward, and from the private sector, which is becoming more agile, more competitive.”
He is hopeful that, in a few decades, we will have a complete network. “We cannot hope to have a tram network that will cover the entire city in phase one. But we can hope that over 25 years, we will be quite there.”
He agrees that what slowed down the tram project was the explosion in costs, which “is largely attributable to the stupidity it took before moving forward”, but he is not agreement with Mayor Bruno Marchand, who maintains that politicians lacked courage. “I find it easy to say that we lacked courage.”
“Politicians do what people expect of them. Was there a very strong appetite for this type of project a few years ago? There should have been one. The truth is that it wasn’t politically problematic if you didn’t build.”
Resumption at RTC
Furthermore, the RTC announced on Monday that the bus service had practically regained its pre-pandemic ridership. It “recorded the strongest recovery in ridership since 2019 for the first quarter of 2024, representing an average return of 95% of trips for the months of January, February and March“, we indicated in a press release.
It is young people who have taken public transport by storm, mainly. Student customers have returned to the buses, with a resumption rate of 115%.
“The figures revealed today [lundi] show the need of citizens of the Quebec agglomeration for public transportation, and the importance of investing to improve the offer in order to continue this momentum. This is proof that when mobility options are adapted to needs and realities, customers respond,” commented the president of the RTC, Maude Mercier Larouche.
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