The city of North Bay is getting a 1.2 million dollar shot in the arm, which city officials hope will improve the transit system.
The funding will go into various projects across the city including the creation of 10 new bus shelters.
“On a day like today, you really appreciate those shelters,” noted Nipissing-Timiskaming MP Anthony Rota at the press conference at the downtown bus station on Oak Street.
About $375,000 of the funding will be implemented to create an electronic fare box system which will allow users to pay with their phone, credit or debit card.
“The payment method where you are walking into a bus, you will have a high-tech system where you won’t have to pay with cash anymore,” stated Nipissing-Timiskaming MP Anthony Rota at the press conference.
In total the transit funding will go towards 12 different projects across the city, including replacing a parabus, the installation of security cameras on buses, as well as improvements to the transit vehicle storage facility.
“The whole idea behind this funding is to make our transit system more efficient and also improve ride-ability for our clients and customers and this is going to go a long way to modernize our entire fleet,” said Mayor Al McDonald.
The funding will also help alleviate a bus stop snow removal headache that riders faced this winter.
The city will use $125,000 of the funds to install a sidewalk near a controversial McKeown avenue bus stop which riders had trouble accessing due to high snow banks.
“There’s a bus stop there on McKeown and it’s just on the grass. We need cement pads so we can remove the snow safely because when it’s on the grass and we bring the backhoe in it digs it up and gets all muddy which creates unsafe conditions for our riders, so this is going to go a long way to providing improvements to some of those challenges on those few bus stops that we heard about this winter,” added McDonald.
McDonald hopes all the projects will be completed by the start of 2018.
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