Ottawa's transit agency is missing fewer buses than it used to, but OC Transpo still has ground to cover before it meets its own reliability targets.
The Numbers Are Trending the Right Way
This August, missed trips on OC Transpo's bus network fell to three per cent, a big improvement from a peak of 13.4 per cent back in January. More than 76 per cent of buses ran on time in August. A bus counts as on time if it leaves no more than five minutes late and no more than one minute early.
Broken down further, 2.2 per cent of August trips arrived more than 20 minutes late, and 0.9 per cent weren't delivered at all.
Why It's Still Falling Short
Despite the improvement, OC Transpo remains well off its own benchmarks. The agency's official targets call for delivering at least 99.5 per cent of all scheduled trips and getting 85 per cent of buses to arrive on time. August's numbers, while better, land short of both.
OC Transpo general manager Rick Leary said he'd actually like to see the system do better than the 85 per cent target, floating 95 per cent on-time performance as his preferred number.
What's Behind the Missed Trips
The most common causes of undelivered trips are mechanical issues, traffic delays and operator availability, according to OC Transpo. Those three factors have been the recurring culprits behind no-shows and late buses across the network.
To chip away at the problem, OC Transpo is now looking at new schedules for another 20 routes this winter, part of an ongoing effort to make timetables match what buses can realistically deliver given traffic and staffing on the ground.
An Ottawa Angle Riders Will Recognize
For Ottawa commuters who've spent the past couple of years budgeting extra time for late or missing buses, the shift from a 13.4 per cent miss rate in January to three per cent in August is a real, noticeable change.
The reliability gap also connects to a ridership story. OC Transpo built its 2026 budget around a forecast of reaching 82 per cent of pre-pandemic ridership levels. Instead, ridership through the first half of 2026 has actually been about 67 per cent of what it was before the pandemic. That gap matters for an agency trying to justify further investment in more frequent, more reliable service while fewer riders than expected are climbing aboard to begin with.
Ottawa riders can expect the winter schedule changes on those 20 routes to be the next visible test of whether OC Transpo can keep narrowing the space between its numbers and its promises.
Sources: Yahoo News Canada (CBC/CP wire)
