Record number of Edmonton transit trips in 2024, safety concerns still linger

2024 was a busy year across the Edmonton transit network.

The city says 61.6 million trips were recorded on buses and LRT last year, a record. It’s 15 per cent higher than 2023.

“We’ve seen really strong ridership on those frequent transit routes, and our crosstown routes in particular,” said Carrie Hotton-MacDonald, a branch manager with ETS.

2024 was also a big expansion year for transit, adding more bus services and an increase in people getting arc cards. The city says 70 per cent of riders are now using one.

Safety still remains a top concern for riders. Hotton-MacDonald says work remains ongoing with more transit peace officers and support from police.

“We’ve got more surveillance, we’ve got more boots on the ground. With growing ridership, there’s more people around which is a natural surveillance. That in of itself deters people from engaging in those behaviours related to security, disorder, and crime.”

Edmontonians CityNews spoke to appeared to be split on whether safety is improving.

“I just think that people had other people in their way of seeing things so they think it’s more than it was,” said one Edmontonian.

Another saying, “When you’re transferring down to the older trains, the city isn’t really maintaining the [Churchill] connector. They don’t maintain the security, there’s a lot of people often on drugs, I saw someone with a box cutting knife there a few months ago.”

Turning to 2025, upgrades to ARC readers to accept debit and credit cards are still expected to be complete by the summer.

More bus services are expected by April, with more details on that to come in February.

As well, as adding multi-day passes to ARC cards and new trip-planning tools.

But what do Edmontonians want?

“I think it’s doing pretty good,” said one Edmontonian.

Another saying, “I would want them to communicate more on delays, especially with this train which they haven’t really done all too well.”