Surrey needs more east-west TransLink bus routes: City planner

Surrey needs more east-west TransLink bus routes, says City planner

R1 RapidBus at SkyTrain Surrey Central Station. (Kenneth Chan/Daily Hive)

The City of Surrey is kicking off the process of creating a new long-term public transit vision in order to better meet the growing transportation needs of its surging population.

According to the municipal government, public consultation will begin later in Fall 2024 to draft a potential plan for Spring 2025. The plan will be finalized in Fall 2025 for Surrey City Council’s approval. TransLink will then consider the municipality’s recommendations and input to implement its plans for future service improvements and expansion.

During a public City Council meeting last week, Rafael Villarreal, the director of transportation for the City of Surrey, said that the municipality’s plan will make a few assumptions, including the completion of the 16 km-long SkyTrain Expo Line extension along Fraser Highway between King George Station and the future Langley City Centre, which is slated to begin major construction before the end of 2024 for an opening in 2029.

It also assumes TransLink’s proposal to upgrade the existing R1 King George Boulevard RapidBus service into a Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) line will go ahead, with construction beginning as early as 2026. This BRT project is currently unfunded, although the BC NDP have included it in their election platform, while the Conservative Party of BC would skip BRT and instead go straight to extending the SkyTrain along King George Boulevard to reach Newton.

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TransLink’s BRT plan, supported by the City, would extend the R1 RapidBus route southward along King George Boulevard from its current southernmost terminus of Newton bus exchange to reach South Surrey and White Rock. It would also be enhanced with new bus-only lanes and bus priority measures to improve speed and reliability.

Villarreal noted BRT could possibly achieve travel times of under 40 minutes between Surrey City Centre and South Surrey.

Suggestions were made by both Villarreal and Surrey’s elected officials during the meeting that this Surrey-White Rock BRT project has greater merit than TransLink’s proposed North Shore-Metrotown BRT line and should be prioritized based on ridership statistics. Currently, the R1 RapidBus running between Guildford Town Centre and Newton bus exchange via Surrey City Centre is TransLink’s seventh busiest bus route, while the R2 Marine Drive — the bus route that would be upgraded into the North Shore-Metrotown BRT — is the 39th busiest.

Map of three new rapid transit corridors using buses. (TransLink)

Villarreal also noted the municipal government’s plan would identify the need for improved bus connections between communities within Surrey and the overall creation of a more comprehensive bus network that particularly establishes more east-west bus routes.

He suggests this is essential for Surrey’s rapidly growing population; by 2029, the City of Surrey will become BC’s most populated city when it reaches 785,619 residents — squeaking past Vancouver’s 780,075 residents, according to the provincial government’s forecasts.

Surrey is also expected to become the first BC municipality to reach one million residents — by 2042.

By 2050, the population of Surrey City Centre could reach 243,000 residents. Newton could increase to 204,000, while South Surrey would be at 148,000, Cloverdale would be at 121,000, Fleetwood would be at 107,000, and Guildford would be at 102,000. Such population growth through densification would demand for drastically improved bus connectivity.

“We have a lot of north-south connections, but our real gaps are east-west connections. Our neighbourhoods are not connected,” said Villarreal.

“As you were looking at the statistics of the projections that we have for our communities, these are going to be very big, very significant, and we don’t connect them, we’re not going to be a competitive city. So we need to start thinking how we’re going to connect these communities, because right now, moving between east and west in Surrey is really difficult.”

2024 map: Existing public transit services in Surrey. (TransLink)

2024 map: Existing public transit services in South Surrey and White Rock. (TransLink)

East-west bus route gaps within Surrey. (City of Surrey)

Villarreal also emphasized that currently, only 27% of Surrey residents are within walking distance from frequent public transit services, while this proportion is 90% in Vancouver. As well, based on TransLink data, Surrey is leading Metro Vancouver in post-pandemic ridership recovery — with ridership now exceeding pre-pandemic volumes — and 13 of the region’s top 20 overcrowded bus routes are within the municipality.

As well, with fewer east-bus route options across Surrey, it is currently faster to travel by bus to other destinations outside of the city within a comparable distance.

For example, highlighted Villarreal, the east-west travel time by public transit between Newton and Richmond City Centre is about 37 minutes, while the east-west travel time between Newton and Surrey’s Campbell Heights industrial park is about 90 minutes.

The Surrey-Langley SkyTrain extension of the Expo Line will drastically improve east-west connectivity and travel times. It will take about 22 minutes to travel between King George Station in Surrey City Centre and the future Langley City Centre Station, and seven of the eight new stations will be within Surrey’s municipal boundaries.

Villarreal also called for the improvement of bus connections to both the existing and future SkyTrain stations.

Early in 2024, TransLink launched the new R6 RapidBus along Scott Road/120 Street and 72 Avenue between SkyTrain’s Scott Road Station and Newton bus exchange, improving north-south and east-west bus connections in Surrey.

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