My Neighbourhood — Whitchurch-Stouffville: A Leader in Public Transit
Welcome to the suburbs! Whitchurch-Stouffville is part of York Region, and is located approximately 50 km north of Downtown Toronto.
The community of Stouffville is the urban area in Whitchurch-Stouffville, and has the largest population in the municipality.
The Town of Whitchurch-Stouffville’s website prides itself on Stouffville’s transit connections to Downtown Toronto and York Region through GO Train and Bus service and York Region Transit. But, this video explains all that and more. So, watch the video before reading the rest of this blog post to get introduced to Whitchurch-Stouffville and understand how the municipal, regional, and provincial governments are addressing the urban policy problem of public transit.
While the video makes fun the lack of public transit infrastructure, lack of access to accessible and convenient public transportation is an urban policy issue experienced in the community of Stouffville. The community continues to grow with new housing subdivisions, however the community remains spread out, and many services and stores are kept to the west end of town, with much of the housing on the east. Given its geographic location to the rest of York Region, Stouffville remains isolated from other communities. This makes it extremely hard to move around the community and travel to other communities, thus, Stouffville is a suburban “bedroom” community that is heavily reliant on cars.
Access to public transit is extremely limited in Stouffville. Key stakeholders in this issue include the Province and provincial agency, Metrolinx, York Region, and the Town of Whitchurch-Stouffville.
GO Train and Bus service connects Stouffville to Markham and Toronto, however service times are limited and service is often interrupted. Staffing shortages have also led the cancellations of many train trips on the Stouffville line, which are often replaced with less-convenient busses.
The Province and Metrolinx have committed to expanding GO Train access by building new train stations, increasing the number of tracks to allow for two-way service on the Stouffville Rail Corridor, and increasing trip frequency. However, as the video made light of, many of the improvements on the Stouffville GO line are currently happening in Markham. While this will improve public transit access for Stouffville residents, it doesn’t explicitly improve public transit access within the community, or to other communities nearby.
York Region and York Region Transit are another set of key stakeholders in this issue, however there is very limited public transit in Stouffville from York Region Transit. As the video explains, there is a bus route to the local high school in the morning and evenings, and one route to the hospital in the Markham.
A 2016 York Region Transit Future Needs Assessment Report highlights the explained improvements to GO Transit service on the Stouffville line, but doesn’t explicitly outline or describe the future transit needs of Stouffville, and how York Region Transit will address them.
There are no prominent advocacy or community groups that are bringing attention to this issue. This is unfortunate since Stouffville, being one of the smaller communities in York Region, may often be forgotten by public transit planners, and the smaller population means there is understandably less investment in serving the community.
Furthermore, as a 2018 Metrolinx report on transit access and social equity outlines, public transit networks contribute to social equity as it can expand access to housing, employment, education, and services to low-income households. Having such limited access to public transit in Stouffville in a spread out and car-dependent community does limit the opportunities for low-income households.
Lack of public transit infrastructure and accessibility, which reinforces the use of private vehicles, has environmental consequences. Cars and other vehicles emit CO2 which contribute to our overall CO2 emissions and climate change, in addition to air and noise pollution (see beginning clip of the linked video where I have to yell over zooming cars while discussing limited access to public transit — kind of ironic if you ask me).
In conclusion, the community of Stouffville is facing an urban policy issue with lack of public transit infrastructure and access. Unfortunately, improving public transit connectivity in Stouffville does not seem to be a key priority for stakeholders, however has detrimental impacts on the community.
Other Resources:
Town of Whitchurch-Stouffville Strategic Plan
