Leary's List and the cause for (his) excitement
The City of Ottawa's new transit boss has an early plan for OC Transpo before he peels an onion
Rick Leary is excited.
Excited about the potential to improve transit.
Excited about receiving feedback.
And very excited about rebuilding confidence in Transpo.
He expressed so much excitement at his presser Tuesday, you might have expected a balloon drop as he stood with Mayor Mark Sutcliffe and transit committee chair Glen Gower.
The new “customer-first action plan” — call it Leary’s List — is based on what he learned on his first 30 days on the job. He held the presser to tee up his presentation to the transit committee on Thursday.
The headline item from the announcement was the most pressing LRT matter. Two-car trains will back in service by mid-June, Leary said. Single cars have been running on the east-west rail line since late January because of the latest snafu involving the axle bearings on the Alstom trains.
But the LRT news was part of a buffet of tasty tidbits Leary offered before he spoons out more details at the committee meeting.
The double-car news deservedly attracted most of the attention, but there were five other things Leary brought up that are worth monitoring.
1. Hooking workers on transit
Baking public transit into workplace cultures might be a big ask for Transpo, but Leary suggested the transit agency is looking at how it can work with big organizations to get more workers on buses and trains.
Part of the challenge might be incentivizing workers on the price.
Leary said Transpo is “pursuing innovative partnerships with major employers and other organizations to design fare packages that can result in additional revenues over the long term.”
Transpo has experience in this area.
The U-Pass is issued to thousands of Ottawa post-secondary students at a massive discount to the students, who can’t opt out unless it’s under specific, limited circumstances. Transpo also once ran the Ecopass program, which offered discounted transit passes to workers through automatic payroll deductions by their employers. The Ecopass ended when Presto arrived.
Transpo has struggled with tailoring fares to the needs of the post-pandemic ridership. Return-to-office plans in the federal government and other organizations might present a new opportunity for Transpo to be creative with the fare structure.
2. Getting rail bosses to the committee table
I’m not sure how this will play out on Thursday, but Leary said Rideau Transit Group (the Confederation Line builder) and Alstom (the train builder) will be at the committee meeting “to answer questions about getting back to the capacity residents expect.”
That, of course, opens the door to all sorts of questions about where the city, RTG and Alstom are when it comes to the state of LRT in Ottawa. Remember, RTG and Alstom haven’t been aligned on the LRT axle problems.
This being a municipal election year, these types of exchanges risk being dramatic if councillors are eager for some social media traction. (Imagine a question along the lines of, “So…who’s fault is all this?”).
There probably wouldn’t be a great answer, anyway.
During the presser, the Ottawa Citizen’s Aedan Helmer asked Leary about the elusive root cause for the train troubles, but the transit boss could only say “more information can be provided in the near future.”
3. Managing Transpo’s story
Leary looks willing to be the face of Transpo, though that’s unavoidable as general manager of Ottawa’s transit agency. He said customers can expect to hear regular updates about Transpo’s priorities.
“I’ve let it be known I will speak more often,” he said.
Part of that seems to be direction from city executive management wanting to tell people about all the good Transpo does, which is how Leary might have agreed to (somewhat unusually) hold a briefing with reporters before facing councillors at committee.
4. Taking a crack at unlocking ad revenue
Maximizing the ad potential on Transpo assets has been a discussion happening for years at city hall. At times, the city has been reluctant to blast ads across the transit system as it focused on getting people used to the new LRT-backboned network. There was a reluctance to create visual chaos when wayfinding was so important.
Now, the transit agency needs money. If it’s asking upper levels of government for financial support, Transpo needs to show its own ability to unlock revenue opportunities.
People are on buses and trains and waiting at bus stops and train platforms staring at screens, so, the theory might go, why not give them more screens to watch? All those eyes are revenue opportunities.
Leary is interested in “non-traditional resources” of revenue and he mentioned digital advertising more than once.
He didn’t mention this specifically, but even the concrete walls of a train tunnel could hold potential for ads.
5. Holding transit town halls
Transpo management and council members are often accused of “not actually talking to transit users.”
Well, the users will soon be prompted to do some talking.
Leary said Transpo will hold a series of town halls to gather intel from customers.
“I want their feedback and ideas of how we can improve this service and I’m sure we’re going to hear a lot from them,” Leary said.
He also said he wants to hear from Para Transpo customers, who over the years have done a decent job raising their concerns with the transit agency. That, too, will come with a new consultation process, Leary said.
Top priority is getting LRT back to full capacity, but Leary said all sorts of interesting stuff about Transpo’s bus maintenance troubles and the amount of time being spent fixing problems. Surely it will draw questions on Thursday as Leary’s List gets the political look-see.
But today, just over a month into his gig, the new transit boss is excited.
Leary said he’s about to “peel the onion” at Transpo in the coming months to understand the layers of Ottawa’s transit operations. Hopefully he can bottle some of that excitement, just in case the peeling brings him to tears.
This was good comms 101: set the stage with displays, set the agenda with a commitment and date, and call for greater input on transit from Ottawa's residents. And of course, be very enthusiastic in your messaging. But don't overdo it with balloons. They didn't. Then let local media do the rest of the communicating with the public for you. Now it's up to Jeff Leiper, Neil Saravanamuttoo, and Alex Lawson to either agree with this Action Plan or offer a counter-proposal. We are, after all, in an election period. Isn't it time for one of them to hold a presser?
What are the odds of our sleepy transit committee asking about (2), the much-vaunted but not yet delivered axle fix, or firm solutions (not the temporary measures the acting manager discussed last visit) for the spalling problem? I would say somewhere between zero and five per cent.