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I think off peak is when safety concerns are a bigger issue. A few weeks ago, it took it later in the evening and while it was ok, I saw how the ride transitioned from comfortable to not so comfortable as the train went from south to north station to station. I was quite relieved to get off when I did.
 
Capital Line reminds me of BART, a commuter rail service that uses metro-style trains, coupled with the safety issues, I'm not surprised that non-peak ridership hasn't returned to normal. And given that Oilers and Elks games likely make up at least half the off-peak ridership, that mean non-peak non-game day ridership is probably even less.

There's also a transition from not comfortable to comfortable that happens at around 6:30am. I'd rather drive in than take the train that first hour of service.
 
I tried to ride BART once from SFO and every single ticketing machine was broken, it was incredibly disappointing.
 
dkazzed said:
I'm not surprised that non-peak ridership hasn't returned to normal. And given that Oilers and Elks games likely make up at least half the off-peak ridership, that mean non-peak non-game day ridership is probably even less.
Click to expand...
There's no way that 41 Oilers games and a 9 football games generates half of off peak ridership. Not a chance. In fact, I was quite surprised how busy the Capital line was midday today, to the point that on a 4 car train there weren't many seats left at Churchill.
 
I forgot that midday was also non-peak. I considered peak 6am-6pm.

Still doesn't bode well for late evening.
 
Hello everyone, I am a new immigrant in Edmonton. Because I do not drive and I rely on public transit only. Hence I am going to buy monthly pass and would like to confirm my understanding:

1. The monthly pass cost $100. It is a paper ticket to be mailed to my home address after purchase
2. For ride on bus, I just show my monthly pass to the driver and this is OK?
3. For ride on train, do I have to do anything if I have a monthly pass?
4. Did I miss anything?
 
newcomer2023 said:
Hello everyone, I am a new immigrant in Edmonton. Because I do not drive and I rely on public transit only. Hence I am going to buy monthly pass and would like to confirm my understanding:

1. The monthly pass cost $100. It is a paper ticket to be mailed to my home address after purchase
2. For ride on bus, I just show my monthly pass to the driver and this is OK?
3. For ride on train, do I have to do anything if I have a monthly pass?
4. Did I miss anything?
Click to expand...
You can buy a monthly pass from a retailer to save waiting for it in the mail: https://www.edmonton.ca/ets/where-to-buy-fares-passes

#2 and #3 sums it up, and it is an easy way to take transit if you know for sure you'll be taking a lot of transit.

But you should really go Arc Card. Benefits:
1. It still has a "monthly pass" but rather than paying for it up front, you pay for it as you go. Once you reach $100 in a month, it no longer takes money from your card.
2. You do have to tap in and should tap out any time you take the train and bus. Tapping out is not necessary unless you're taking a suburban bus that has the possibility for a higher fare unless you tap out.
3. If you lose your card, you can call customer service and have the balance transferred to a new card.
4. You can start using it right away for partial months. It's $2.75 to use your Arc Card vs. $3.50 for cash and $2.775 to use one of 10 pack ticket.
 
newcomer2023 said:
Hello everyone, I am a new immigrant in Edmonton. Because I do not drive and I rely on public transit only. Hence I am going to buy monthly pass and would like to confirm my understanding:

1. The monthly pass cost $100. It is a paper ticket to be mailed to my home address after purchase
2. For ride on bus, I just show my monthly pass to the driver and this is OK?
3. For ride on train, do I have to do anything if I have a monthly pass?
4. Did I miss anything?
Click to expand...
Going off what @dkazzed said, their website is https://myarc.ca if you want to learn more! Welcome to Edmonton, we're better with you here :)
 
dkazzed said:
You can buy a monthly pass from a retailer to save waiting for it in the mail: https://www.edmonton.ca/ets/where-to-buy-fares-passes

#2 and #3 sums it up, and it is an easy way to take transit if you know for sure you'll be taking a lot of transit.

But you should really go Arc Card. Benefits:
1. It still has a "monthly pass" but rather than paying for it up front, you pay for it as you go. Once you reach $100 in a month, it no longer takes money from your card.
2. You do have to tap in and should tap out any time you take the train and bus. Tapping out is not necessary unless you're taking a suburban bus that has the possibility for a higher fare unless you tap out.
3. If you lose your card, you can call customer service and have the balance transferred to a new card.
4. You can start using it right away for partial months. It's $2.75 to use your Arc Card vs. $3.50 for cash and $2.775 to use one of 10 pack ticket.
Click to expand...

I have been using the Arc card for about 1 week. What I observe is that in many cases the card reader takes long time to read, like 3-5 seconds or even it does not work on buses. I am worried if I made any mistakes about "entry" and "exit" record and thus wrong fare.

Therefore, combined with the reason that I am a heavy transit user, I would like to have a monthly pass that can skip the card reading process.
 
I believe the issue is, unfortunately, that the actual IT infrastructure for ARC is based out of an Amazon Web Services facility in Montreal (can't say 100% the actual card scanning is handled in Montreal, but myarc.ca routes there, so seems like a fair bet). It takes time to relay data all the way across the country and then for it to be sent allll the way back.

I think this is also an issue with some other online services that just feel glitchier in Edmonton than other cities (Lime I suspect is affected by the same issue for example). Edmonton and Alberta generally just doesn't have that much easily accessible IT infrastructure for companies to tap. I recently needed a server for a personal project I was working on and really had to look for a provider here in Edmonton (went with Net Know, would recommend btw). The difference between a server in town vs. one in Vancouver, Toronto, or Montreal where most Canadian web services are based is night and day as far as responsiveness goes.
 
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Aaron_Lloyd said:
I believe the issue is, unfortunately, that the actual IT infrastructure for ARC is based out of an Amazon Web Services facility in Montreal (can''t say 100% the actual card scanning is handled in Montreal, but myarc.ca certainly is, so seems like a fair bet). It takes time to relay a signal all the way across the country and then be sent alll the way back.

I think this is also an issue with some other online services that just feel glitchier in Edmonton than other cities (Lime I suspect is affected by the same issue for example). Edmonton and Alberta generally just doesn't have that much easily accessible IT infrastructure for companies to tap. I recently needed a server for a personal project I was working on and really had to look for a provider here in Edmonton (went with Net Know, would recommend btw). The difference between a server in town vs. one in Vancouver, Toronto, or Montreal where most Canadian web services are based is night and day as far as responsiveness goes.
Click to expand...

Yes, this is an issue. Today, I tried to tap my Ard card in LRT station (Exiting) and it did not respond like after 5 seconds. Then I thought the machine was broken and I went to another. Just I was tapping my card on another machine, there was a "beep" sound from the original machine! This means the delay is outrageous. Finally I ended up "exit" and "entry" again. I need to tap again to have an "exit" again.
 
I wish someone in city administration had thought of server location, maybe they are not very tech savy. Could they have put in conditions about server location or speed?

Its nice we are supporting the Montreal economy here, but I wish our city would pay more attention to supporting things locally.
 
To start I'm only a hobbyist with regard to this sort of stuff, so I would recommend anyone take anything I say with a big ole grain of salt, but I would guess Vix is possibly pretty tied up in Amazon's specific technologies and tragically Amazon only operates the one location in Canada (ca-central-1). I should also mention that I'd bet the 5 second waits for the card to scan are probably also caused by issues beyond just the latency to the server (like a bad mobile connection). How much the latency is affecting things will depend a lot on how many roundtrips Vix's card technology takes to validate the transaction.

Worth pointing out as well that edmonton.ca routes to a Google server in Kansas City. 😄
(though calgary.ca does actually route to a server in Calgary interestingly)
 
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Foolworm said:
Just set the fares in crypto and have done with it. 10 Doge a ride and nobody would bat an eyelid. This can be done by introducing a good payment gateway with high-quality crypto payments processor, everything is quite simple.
Click to expand...
I agree with you that paying with crypto is the most convenient. Here are some reasons:

Speed: Cryptocurrency transactions are completed quickly and efficiently. This means that passengers can pay for travel instantly, without having to wait for confirmation from the bank.
Low Fees: Fees for cryptocurrency transactions are typically lower than fees for traditional payments. This means passengers can save money.
Security: Cryptocurrency transactions are more secure than traditional payments as they use encryption to protect data. This means passengers can be confident that their money is safe.
In your example of 10 Doge per trip, passengers can simply send this amount to the taxi driver's address. It only takes a few seconds and passengers will not pay any fees.

Of course, cryptocurrency also has some disadvantages, such as exchange rate volatility. However, I believe that the advantages of paying with crypto outweigh the disadvantages.

I believe that over time, more and more companies will accept cryptocurrencies as payment. This is due to the fact that cryptocurrencies are becoming more popular and convenient to use.
 
As per the Transit Manager, who was on speaking municipally, as long as the reader reacts to your card (positively or negatively) your trip will be recorded and fair payed.

The declined taps have more to do with the individual units not connecting to what ever system/network they upload to. They have an internal memory and will transfer their data upon reconnection.

Dallas seemed to have the exact same hardware (70% sure) , I will say they did not have the same lag Edmonton seems to have.

Also…. why cant I register my CC to my account and use it. Another feature Dallas has. Think of all the plastic Arc Cards that wouldn't be needed!
 
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