Innisfil wins award for novel approach to transit

It's an affordable, busless transit system that a whole bunch of folks in the know think it's really nifty

Bradfordtoday.ca
August 22, 2018

The Peter J. Marshall Innovation Award Jury presented its highest award to the Town of Innisfil for its innovative transit solution. The award was presented at the 2018 AMO Conference in Ottawa.

Innisfil's project demonstrated all of the P.J. Marshall Award’s criteria: innovation, tangible benefits to the community, improved efficiency, innovative financing and the ability for other municipal governments to use the project’s concept.

The Town of Innisfil has a non-bus people mover system that is available 24 hours a day/seven days a week. Rather than incurring the high cost of developing a traditional bus transit system to cover Innisfil’s large geographic area, the Town is partnering with Uber and Barrie Taxi to provide a system and financial framework that provides a more affordable transit system for the municipal government while servicing the interest of its community.

Innisfil is the first municipality in Canada to partner with Uber and the first community in the world to have a transit system powered by Uber rather than buses. The Town of Innisfil estimates that they are saving $8 million dollars per year over a traditional bus system. Introducing a transit system has improved quality of life for residents. The Town of Innisfil has attracted interest from other similar communities who want to help their citizens access jobs and services.

“The jury was very impressed with the out of the box thinking of this project to help its community. It ticked every box of the award’s criteria and is worthy of this award,” said AMO Executive Director, Pat Vanini.

“We are proud to be meeting the needs of our residents while leading the way for other municipalities to start thinking differently about transit,” said Innisfil Mayor Gord Wauchope. “We thank AMO for highlighting all the amazing ways municipalities are taking an innovative approach to solving complex problems and we are truly honoured by this award.”

The P.J. Marshall Award is an annual competitive process to acknowledge municipalities who have had creativity and success in implementing new, innovative ways of serving the public. It is sponsored by AMO, the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing, the Association of Municipal Managers, Clerks and Treasurers of Ontario, the Canadian Council for Public Private Partnerships, the Municipal Finance Officers’ Association, and the Ontario Municipal Administrators’ Association.

In addition to Innisfil, the City of Vaughan also received an award this year for an innovative approach to the procurement and delivery of major service contracts.

AMO is a non-profit organization representing almost all of Ontario’s 444 municipal governments. AMO supports strong and effective municipal government in Ontario and promotes the value of municipal government as a vital and essential component of Ontario and Canada’s political system.