STL Le Corbusier Boulevard central stops ready for users starting October 21st

LAVAL, QC, Oct. 18, 2017 /CNW Telbec/ - Effective Saturday October 21^st, Société de transport de Laval (STL) customers will be able to use the brand new stops set up at the centre of Le Corbusier Boulevard between Albert-Duquesne and du Souvenir Boulevard. From that date forward, STL buses will use the new reserved central lane corridor exclusively, which covers a distance of approximately one kilometre. All eleven routes that use this corridor will thus be served by these central stops. A specific stop will accommodate clients at each intersection depending on the direction of their destination, northbound or southbound. A total of six new stations of 30 metres have been installed. An information team will be on site the first week of operation to accompany clients and inform passerby pedestrians and cyclists given that over 54,000 STL customers go through that important commercial artery every week.      

This project is part of a series Bus Preferential Measures (BPM) set up by the STL and financed at 100% by the Quebec ministry of transport (the Ministère des Transports, de la Mobilité durable et de l'Électrification des transports du Québec). These measures are intended to provide equipment and layout for buses to grant them priority all while helping reduce traffic congestion effects. 

ADVANTAGES OF CENTRAL RESERVED LANES

This configuration enables larger trip time savings and best operating effectiveness. Being right on the site, the central reserved lanes will help buses circulate smoother by sparing them, for example, the rush hour traffic congestion and the slowdown brought on by motorists turning right and, as a result, the right turns will also become easier for motorists.     

As a whole, preferential measures are intended to improve network performance and reliability, provide customers with more regular, punctual and rapid service and increase service in the main arteries while reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. These measures are intended to indisputably improve the public transport component vis-à-vis the use of automobiles by generating time savings of up to 8 minutes of customers.

FINANCING

The project was made possible thanks to the Quebec transport ministry's public transport assistance programme, the Programme d'aide au transport collectif des personnes, which provided the STL with 23.5 million dollars with which to set up its Bus Preferential Measures (BPM) targeting key Laval terrirtory sectors.

Also noteworthy was the effective coordination of the works with the City of Laval, which put the occasion to good use by adding additional bike path stretches, sidewalks, rejuvenating some street furniture components and replacing almost 75% of controllers on traffic lights. All five BPM components -reserved lanes, traffic signal priority lights, candlestick priority lights (white vertical bar), bypass lanes and repositioning of stops and shelters past the intersections, have now been or, will very shortly be, fully integrated into the STL's activity.

About Société de transport de Laval

Société de transport de Laval develops and operates an integrated network consisting of bus, taxibus, and paratransit transport which carries out some 20 million trips per year. The STL's regular bus network consists of 45 routes, some 2700 stops and covers over 1400 kilometres on Laval territory. The STL is among the most innovative transport corporations in North America thanks to projects such as its entirely electric 40-foot bus, the first one to ever hit the streets in Quebec, since 2013, and its Passenger Information Display System (PIDS), which has been providing real-time information to passengers regarding bus location on the network since 2010. In 2017 the STL launched its STL Quality Commitment Programme, which is a unique service guarantee in all of Canada and it is also the first public transport service in Canada to accept on-board credit card payments.

www.stl.laval.qc.ca.

SOURCE Société de transport de Laval