After only nine months, the Town of Tecumseh is reverting to a fixed-route transit system.
The town began a pilot project in March 2022 to examine the feasibility of an on-demand system. The pilot project was originally supposed to last one year.
Council voted to revert to a fixed route system Monday to Friday and use an on-demand system on Saturdays. The new schedule will begin on January 2, 2023.
Through the nine-month pilot project, the town found the current service area and peak demand time periods were not conducive to the on-demand approach.
"Given that most trips either start or end at Tecumseh Mall, there is constant potential for conflicting trip requests. When a trip is pushed back by any time, it makes it difficult for riders to plan their transfers to or from the Windsor transit system resulting in either missing a connecting bus or long waits for it at Tecumseh Mall. The Town received many complaints of this nature and we believe that the frustration caused by this predicament resulted in many riders leaving the system and having to find alternative transportation solutions," Chad Jeffrey, manager of planning services & local economic development, wrote in the report.
Town Administration will be conducting an assessment of the fixed route in the first quarter of 2023 and will recommend changes in a future report.