The portion of Torontonians who drive to work has declined over the last decade while the portion commuting by public transit has increased, signalling that even without the construction of major new transit infrastructure during the past 10 years the city is moving in the right direction when it comes to decreasing residents’ reliance on the car.
According to 2016 long-form
census data released Wednesday by Statistics Canada, the share of Torontonians who drive their own car, truck, or van to work decreased by 7 per cent in the 10 years since 2006. Over the same period, the share of people commuting by transit increased by 7.7 per cent.
The Greater Toronto Area saw the same trend, although the drop in the portion of commuters who drove was less pronounced. Across the GTA, the portion of those commuting by private vehicle fell 1.8 per cent since 2006, while public transit use rose by 10.1 per cent.
The trend will be hailed as positive by policy makers intent on reducing the congestion and greenhouse gas emissions associated with private automobiles, and comes despite the fact that no major transit projects have opened in Toronto over the past decade. Line 4 (Sheppard) is the most recent addition to the TTC subway network, and it carried its first passengers in 2002.
Jason Gilmore, chief of labour statistics at Statistics Canada, said there could be a number of factors driving the shift away from cars and towards public transit. One contributor is likely that Toronto’s population is simply becoming more dense.
“The more dense your environment becomes, the more challenging it is to get around. So… it’s possible some people are deciding rather than driving through an increasingly dense environment, they’re deciding to choose public transit,” he said in an interview Wednesday.
[...]
A number of new transit projects are about to come online and could allow ridership to grow. An extension of Line 1 (Yonge-University-Spadina) will enter service next month, while the Eglinton Crosstown LRT is scheduled to open by 2021, followed closely by the Finch West LRT.
[...]
In addition to public transit use, active transportation is also on the rise in Toronto, with more than one in 10 reporting they get to work under their own power — 8.6 per cent by walking and 2.7 per cent by cycling. Both modes saw in increase compared to 2006, when 7.1 per cent of commuters reported walking, and 1.7 per cent said they cycled.
Among the three largest cities in Canada, Toronto’s census metropolitan area (CMA) had the highest portion of people commuting by “sustainable transportation,” which Statistics Canada defined as public transit, cycling, walking, or carpooling.
In 2016, 42.5 per cent of commuters in the Toronto CMA took sustainable transportation to work, compared to 40.6 per cent in the Vancouver area, and 38.1 per cent in Montreal.
“The gap isn’t huge between the three,” said Gilmore, who described sustainable transportation use in the trio of cities as “very high.”
[...]
The shift away from private vehicle commuting in the Toronto area mirrors a change taking place at the national level over the past 20 years. According to Statistics Canada, since 1996, the portion of Canadians driving to work decreased from 80.7 per cent in 1996 to 79.5 per cent last year.
