HandyDART upgrades ahead as TransLink opposes $70M annual in-house cost | Daily Hive

HandyDART improvements coming, as TransLink rules out bringing the service in-house over new $70-million annual cost

HandyDART. (TransLink)

After years of advocacy from some disability groups and municipal government officials urging TransLink to bring the HandyDART in-house as a publicly operated service, Metro Vancouver’s public transit authority launched a comprehensive feasibility and technical review of the idea.

Momentum behind the push grew following the Summer 2024 labour dispute involving Transdev — the French company contracted to operate the on-demand, door-to-door paratransit shuttle service. The near-strike raised concerns over service continuity and contributed to the B.C. NDP’s campaign commitment ahead of the October 2024 provincial election to bring both TransLink’s and BC Transit’s HandyDART services under public operation.

Earlier this month, Vancouver Mayor Ken Sim and Surrey Mayor Brenda Locke added their voices to similar calls previously issued by elected officials in seven other municipal governments across the region.

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However, at a public meeting later this week, TransLink’s board of directors is expected to approve TransLink staff’s clear recommendations not to bring HandyDART in-house — unlike the operational model of TransLink subsidiaries such as B.C. Rapid Transit Company (BCRTC), which runs the SkyTrain Expo and Millennium lines, and Coast Mountain Bus Company (CMBC), which operates the conventional bus network and SeaBus.

Calls for publicly operated HandyDART clash with TransLink’s fiscal reality

TransLink staff estimate that transitioning HandyDART to public operation would add up to $70 million annually to TransLink’s operating budget, with those costs likely to increase over time. They also note that the change would not necessarily deliver better service for riders — stating bluntly that it “provides no customer benefit.”

“The performance of each model does not vary materially across the other objectives of flexibility and customer experience,” wrote TransLink staff in their report to the board of directors.

This discussion comes as TransLink continues to grapple with significant structural operating revenue shortfalls. A temporary funding bridge was secured earlier this year through the board of directors’ larger-than-usual increases to fares, property taxes, and parking taxes, combined with a final provincial operating subsidy of $312 million over three years (roughly $100 million annually from 2025 to 2027). Beginning in 2028, the provincial government plans to introduce new legislation that will provide TransLink with an additional long-term revenue source to replace the pandemic-era subsidies.

TransLink is also facing rising cost pressures across its operations and maintenance and competing priorities, with major new operating expenses expected once the SkyTrain Millennium Line Broadway Extension, the Expo Line Surrey-Langley Extension, the first Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) lines, and other expanded bus services begin operating later this decade. All the while, TransLink services continue to see rising ridership and overcrowding issues, while the gas tax, one of its largest operating revenue sources, continues to dwindle due to the improved fuel economy of vehicles and the accelerating adoption of battery-electric vehicles.

The rising operating costs also do not cover growing capital expenses for infrastructure and fleet renewal, electrification, and expansion.

Additional provincial subsidies to support a transition of HandyDART to public operation are also highly unlikely, given the provincial government’s accelerating shift toward austerity in response to escalating annual deficits and debt.

“To address the financial impact of an in-house [HandyDART] model, additional funding and/or service reductions would be necessary,” TransLink staff warn in their report.

“The HandyDART Delivery Model Review finds that maintaining contracted operations is the most cost-effective option for taxpayers, particularly for the on-road specialized delivery of service. The Review found that bringing the service fully in-house would result in higher administrative costs and higher operating costs per trip, thereby requiring a higher taxpayer subsidy per trip. In addition to operating impacts, as TransLink does not currently operate a paratransit service in-house, there would need to be hiring of exempt staff with the expertise to manage an operation directly to provide the service effectively.”

It is noted by TransLink staff that the public transit authority’s conventional service operating subsidiaries do not have any experience with running an on-demand, door-to-door service, with the development of significant in-house experience required if an in-house operating model were to be adopted. There would also be major one-time transition costs and a risk of a deterioration in service quality during the transition period.

HandyDART. (TransLink)

Apart from the private operators for HandyDART and the Canada Line, TransLink also operates the West Coast Express privately, with the commuter rail operated by Alstom (formerly Bombardier Transportation) and the locomotives and passenger cars maintained by Via Rail.

Since 2021, the provincial government has provided TransLink and BC Transit with a separate annual operating subsidy of a combined total of $26 million to expand free public transit for youth up to age 12. Provincial officials previously publicly indicated they would like TransLink to eventually assume such added operating costs, in addition to taking on more capital costs. The expansion of free youth travel followed years of advocacy by various municipal governments.

Improvements to be made to HandyDART’s private operations

According to TransLink staff, the existing privately-operated HandyDART continues to be one of the public transit authority’s “highest-performing services, with strong customer satisfaction and operational reliability.” In 2024, HandyDART services were rated 8.8 out of 10 for customer satisfaction (the second-highest score HandyDART has ever received, and exceeding the scores for conventional buses, SeaBus, and SkyTrain), and 99.6 per cent of requested trips were completed, with 91 per cent of the trips achieving on-time performance.

At the same time, TransLink staff acknowledge that — based on feedback from riders and stakeholders — there is still significant room for improvement within the existing contract model. TransLink’s board of directors is expected to approve a series of TransLink staff-recommended measures this week, outlined in the newly created HandyDART Customer-First Plan, aimed at strengthening the service.

There is also a high risk that bringing HandyDART workers in-house could result in significantly higher labour costs due to the possibility of parity requests during collective bargaining.

As of 2024, HandyDART had about 600 unionized employees working under Transdev. Currently, HandyDART drivers make $36.06 per hour, which is $0.83 more than CMBC’s commuter shuttle bus drivers.

There are 19 actions in the Customer-First Plan, including modernizing the contract with the private operator to strengthen the performance standards. As well, there will be an introduction of a new booking software to allow riders to book and cancel trips online 24/7, provide app-based real-time trip updates and vehicle location, and simplify the HandyDART sign-up process. HandyDART service hours will also be extended from the current cutoff of midnight to 2 a.m., and there will be an expansion of one-on-one travel training for how riders can optimally use the service.

TransLink will also test the use of smaller vehicles — such as sedans and vans — as opposed to the current sole usage of shuttle buses. This is intended to improve the convenience and comfort for passengers who do not need a lift-equipped shuttle, which would also result in operating efficiency gains — potentially resulting in an overall increase in service availability.

HandyDART. (TransLink)

Improvements to HandyDART trips made by taxi vehicles

As part of the Customer-First Plan, to address reliability and quality concerns, major improvements will be made to the taxi services that fulfill a sizeable portion of overall HandyDART trips.

There will be a new certification program for taxi drivers who make HandyDART trips, expanded training for HandyDART taxi drivers with new in-person sessions, expanded taxi performance monitoring and reporting, and new uniform vests for taxi drivers with HandyDART branding and visual identity and the possibility of exterior visual identifiers for taxi vehicles providing HandyDART services.

There have also been calls from advocates and some riders for TransLink to abandon the use of taxis to fulfill some HandyDART trips. According to TransLink staff, without taxis, over 271,000 trips would have been denied last year, with demand outpacing the available supply of drivers and dedicated HandyDART shuttle vehicles. Some trips not requiring a lift can be made by taxis to reduce operating costs; in 2024, the average cost per trip of service is $64 on a HandyDART shuttle vehicle and $27 on a taxi.

With a rapidly aging population, demand for HandyDART services is expected to grow over the coming decades. A large proportion of HandyDART trips are for medical appointments, with the service geared specifically for people who have mobility needs and other health conditions — in essence, people who cannot use conventional public transit services.

Currently, TransLink’s HandyDART service has 32,000 registered passengers who depend on the service to get around the region — up from the average of about 18,200 throughout the decade of the 2010s and about 19,0000 in pre-pandemic 2019. Seniors are the largest user group, with the largest age bands being people who are over 80 years old, based on previous TransLink staff reports.

However, overall HandyDART ridership has yet to fully return to its pre-pandemic levels, with the service seeing 1.18 million trips in 2023 and 1.17 million trips in 2024 — down from 1.38 million trips in 2019, but up from the pandemic-time low of 0.62 million in 2020.

In 2024, 77 per cent of HandyDART trips were made using the dedicated shuttle vehicles, and the remaining 23 per cent were performed on taxis. The most recent statistics indicate that for the month of September 2025, more than 83,000 trips (73 per cent) were made using a dedicated shuttle vehicle and nearly 30,000 trips were completed with a taxi (27 per cent) — consistent with overall recent historic trends. According to TransLink staff, the proportion of trips fulfilled by taxis is relatively low — compared to peer systems with rates of 30 per cent to over 50 per cent.

HandyDADRT. (TransLink)

Currently, TransLink has a fleet of roughly 350 dedicated HandyDART shuttle vehicles.

“Maintaining and enhancing taxis as part of HandyDART service is essential to continue meeting top rider priorities related to trip availability, travel time and on-time performance in line with practice in peer regions,” state TransLink staff in their report.

It also remains unclear to what extent the growth of ride-hailing services since 2020 — such as Uber and Lyft — has reduced demand for HandyDART, particularly for trips that do not require specialized accessibility equipment. In general, these ride-hailing services have addressed a significant level of previously unmet overall/regular travel needs that traditional taxi services were unable to fulfill, with the total number of Uber and Lyft trips now far exceeding the number of taxi trips.

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