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The City is planning and designing for Edmonton’s future city-wide Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) and district bus-based mass transit routes.
As part of The City Plan implementation, the City completed a mass transit technical study (16.23 MB) that identifies a mass transit network to support a population horizon of 1.25 million people. This 1.25 million population horizon mass transit network includes continued expansion of the Light Rail Transit (LRT) network and development of bus-based mass transit to complement the expanded LRT network.
Following completion of the technical study to identify the mass transit network for the 1.25 million population horizon, the next step was identifying candidate corridors for the non-LRT (bus-based) mass transit. At the 1.25 million population horizon, 3 city-wide Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) routes and 15 bus-based district mass transit routes have been identified for development.
The following 3 Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) routes have been identified for development at the 1.25 million population horizon.
The B1 BRT route (map) will create a key north-south connection between Castle Downs and Century Park via Downtown, Whyte Avenue and the University. This route is made up of the following segments:
The B2 BRT route (map) will create a key east-west connection between West Edmonton Mall and Bonnie Doon via the University of Alberta. This route is made up of the following segments:
This route will run from Ambleside to the University following the existing and planned dedicated bus lanes on Terwillegar Drive, Whitemud Drive and Fox Drive (already partially under construction as part of the Terwillegar Drive expansion). It will extend to the University of Alberta main campus by using infrastructure upgrades along the B2 alignment.
Fifteen district bus-based mass transit routes (9 Frequent-Enhanced Corridor Service Routes and 6 Rapid Limited-Stop Node Service Routes) have also been identified for development at the 1.25 million population horizon. The City is currently undertaking work to determine the route alignments (which streets the buses will run on) for the 15 district routes.
These district routes will supplement the LRT and 3 planned BRT routes, helping extend mass transit service to all quadrants of the city and support growth at key urban centres (nodes) and main streets (corridors). Some of these district routes may eventually evolve into city-wide BRT routes as the city grows past the 1.25 million population horizon.
Local bus service will be unchanged as a result of this work, except in cases where the local bus service is redundant with the mass transit network. Local bus service generally describes the current ETS bus network which serves neighbourhoods and local destinations, and connects to other local routes and/or higher orders of transit (like mass transit).
The City uses the Project Development and Delivery Model (PDDM) model for infrastructure.
We are currently in the strategy stage for the citywide BRT routes and district bus-based mass transit routes for the 1.25 million population horizon. This stage has 4 phases.
In this first phase, we sought to determine how bus-based mass transit routes would look and operate, such as the potential vehicle, service and right-of-way combinations for different route types. We also explored if there were any opportunities for rail-based transit beyond LRT.
There are a lot of things to consider when it comes to planning and designing new transit infrastructure. Five technical studies (transit operations, land use, mobility, greenhouse gas (GHG) assessment and an equity assessment), as well as public engagement were used to ensure we are developing a bus-based mass transit network that works for everyone.
An evaluation and decision-making process that included the technical studies, public engagement as well as a set of mass transit implementation principles and policies in The City Plan, was used to inform initial route alignments (which streets the bus-based mass transit routes will run along) for the 3 Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) routes. The recommended alignments for the 3 BRT routes were presented at the August 27, 2024 Urban Planning Committee (item 7.2).
The 3 BRT routes are now moving into the concept planning stage, which involves confirming the recommended BRT route alignments and the station and stop locations. Funding for the initial concept planning for the BRT routes for the 1.25 million population horizon was approved by City Council as part of the 2023-2026 Capital Budget.
Funding for detailed design and construction will be put forward as part of a future Capital Budget cycle once the concept planning is complete. Route alignment planning for the 15 bus-based district routes is still underway. Once complete, the district routes will also advance to the concept planning phase.