Send an email to Vancouver for faster buses on 49th Ave!
The 49 is the third busiest bus in all of Metro Vancouver, but it’s the fifth most delayed.
What do the 49 UBC-Metrotown bus route and Heated Rivalry breakout star and Vancouverite: Hudson Williams have in common?
They’re both Canadian national treasures and they love a red carpet!
Seriously, the 49 has twice the number of daily passenger trips as the entirety of VIA Rail, Canada’s national rail system. So it should be considered infrastructure of national importance.
But the City of Vancouver hasn’t given the 49 all day bus lanes!
Let’s fix that.
More Information
There’s a lot of bus delay along 49th Ave – image from TransLink’s 2023 Bus Speed and Reliability Report
Why the 49?
With 27,000 daily passenger trips and 8,499,000 boardings in 2024, the 49 is the 3rd busiest bus route in the region, but it is the fifth most delayed corridor in the region.
(And Hudson Williams might have taken it.)
What would make transit better on 49th?
Bus lanes are a start, but we’d also like to see RapidBus or express bus treatment, frequent all-day service, all-door boarding, transit priority, and improved stops. Turning solutions like turn pockets, bans, or restrictions could also help improve transit priority.
A potential configuration of bus priority measures to improve the 49 – from TransLink’s 2023 Bus Speed and Reliability Report
Aren’t there already bus lanes on 49th Ave?
There are some, but there is only a tiny section of all day bus lanes and there’s a handful of sections that are peak hour only, so they’re only active from 7-9:30am and 3-6pm. This isn’t enough bus priority coverage lengthwise or timewise to properly address the late buses that riders experience. 49th was one of the corridors identified in the 2023 bus lane motion, and bus priority improvements there are overdue.
I don’t understand the red carpet thing, can you please explain?
In a lot of cities, the bus lanes are painted red. This is less common in Vancouver, but here’s an example in Burnaby.
Why are you making social media videos about Hudson Williams and does this actually have anything to do with him?
Hudson Williams is one of the stars of the hit TV show Heated Rivalry and he has become very famous in just a few short weeks because of his talented acting, incredible good looks and charming personality. There’s also a local connection: Hudson Williams lives in Vancouver and attended Langara College, which is on – you guessed it – 49th Ave, AND he has a short film that was filmed on the SkyTrain, so he’s definitely taken transit at some point.
(We aren’t completely sure if he’s a rider of the 49 or not but he totally could have, especially if there were bus lanes making the trip even faster.)
Please help us reach him by tagging Hudson in the comments of our videos on socials! Vancouver City Council might listen to him! They should be listening to you too, so please send them an email about bus priority on 49th!
Transit Rider Testimonials
In 2023, Movement collected anonymous responses from 49 riders, here’s what some of them had to say:
“I would like the 49 to be more frequent because it is often over crowded in the mornings. There are some days where I am skipped by 4 busses in a row, and it is the only way I can get to school. I would also like it to start running earlier so I don’t have to walk to the closest R4 at 6am.”
“Needs some way to manage overcrowding (so many pass me and I’m late to class despite going to the stop half an hour earlier.)”
“Send more. So many more. This is such a crucial line for so many people and it gets half the amount of buses sent that it should. I am so sick of getting passed five times on my way to school in the morning making me late for class.”
Have you emailed city council yet? Send a letter today: