Almost one yr after opening, the Heritage Valley park and experience in south Edmonton isn’t residing as much as its potential.
The lot at Ellerslie Highway and 127 Road was created to switch the beforehand crowded Century Park lot. That busy facility misplaced area to improvement.
Not like Century Park, Heritage Valley doesn’t at present have LRT service.
The Capital Line LRT is predicted to develop to Ellerslie Highway finally however an actual timeline has not been accredited.
Within the meantime, buses shuttle riders to and from Century Park totally free from 5 a.m. to 10 p.m. on weekdays.
The Heritage Valley lot boasts 1,100 stalls. The town anticipated between 2,000 and a couple of,500 riders every day on common.
At the moment, the area is seeing about 388 rides per day on common.
Final Friday, each the Edmonton Oilers and Elks have been taking part in at residence. A World Information digital camera captured simply half a dozen autos within the lot at sport time.
The town believes COVID-19 is accountable.
“Now we have a big group of publish secondary college students who take transit,” mentioned Edmonton Transit Service department supervisor Carrie Hotton-MacDonald.
“It’s undoubtedly had an influence on ridership and, once more, folks whose wants have modified, so whether or not it’s work associated, possibly they’re working from residence or their job scenario has modified.”
Hotton-MacDonald mentioned ridership is down throughout the community with demand sitting at about half of what it was pre-pandemic. She mentioned that’s in line with what different massive cities are seeing.
The brand new metropolis councillor within the space expressed concern over transit service as a complete within the space.
Jennifer Rice mentioned some areas are extraordinarily underserved whereas others are overserved. She heard from voters who mentioned the current bus community redesign made service too inconvenient.
“Individuals don’t wish to see empty buses or empty LRT. They assume it is a waste of sources,” mentioned Rice.
Rice and different new councillors have expressed a need for the bus community redesign to be reassessed.
The Heritage Valley park and experience wouldn’t be included in any second take a look at the problem. As an alternative, the town mentioned it anticipated areas will fill because the pandemic ends and LRT service begins.
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