Viva Purple

VIVA Purple
Overview
Type	Bus Rapid Transit
System	YRT/VIVA 1system
Status	Phase 1
Locale	York Region, Ontario (Vaughan; Richmond Hill; Markham) Toronto (North York)
Termini	York University Markham Stouffville Hospital
Stations	23
Operation
Opening	September 4, 2005.
Owner	Regional Municipality of York (York Region Transit)
Operator(s)	Veolia Transportation
Route map

Viva Purple, or the York University/Richmond Hill/Markham-Stouffville Hospital Line or the Highway 7 Corridor Line,^{[citation needed]} is a line on the Viva bus rapid transit system in York Region, north of Toronto, Canada. It is operated by Veolia Transportation under contract from the Region of York.

Route Description

There are twenty-four stations on the Viva Purple line

The VIVA purple line runs along primarily the Highway 7 corridor east of Keele Street, with the brief exception on Centre Street and on Bathurst Street. The Highway 7 corridor west of Keele Street is served by Viva Orange. Viva Purple connects with all other VIVA Lines except VIVA Blue A

Cornell Terminal

Since January 27, 2008, the VIVA Purple Line has been extended eastward to Markham Stouffville Hospital from the previous line terminus, which was McCowan. This extension involved adding 3 more stations in the line. Markham Stouffville Hospital currently acts as a temporary bus terminal for several YRT bus routes, including VIVA. This bus terminal will be moved to the intersection of Donald Cousens Way and Highway 7 sometime within the next ten years. Hence, the end point of VIVA purple will also be moved there, and the current Markham Stouffville Hospital Stop will be "skipped". This scheduled terminal is named as Cornell, and is not expected to be opened until after 2017.

List of all stations

A Viva Purple Bus stops at the Richmond Hill Centre Terminal.

From west to east:

• proposed Vivastations

Service from York University to Town Centre Boulevard began on September 4, 2005. Services extending from Town Centre Boulevard east to McCowan Road began October 16, 2005. Peak-time services west of York University began November 20, 2005. Services east of McCowan Road to Markham Stouffville Hospital was to begin on July 1, 2007, but has been postponed to January 27, 2008. Service east of McCowan Road to Cornell will replace the aforementioned service at a future date. Services west of York University was discontinued as of September 2, 2007.

vivaNext

Viva Purple using the new Warden Vivastation on the Enterprise Rapidway

Leslie Street Rapidway station under construction in May 2012

Rapidway stations feature heated shelters

Rapidways

As the Highway 7 transit corridor, the Viva Purple line will have a dedicated right of way dubbed "rapidway" for most of the route. This will enable VIVA buses to quickly pass through traffic.

The first phase of vivaNext brings a rapidway along the portion of Viva Purple from Bayview to Birchmount.^[1] The rapidway will consist of bus lanes in the median of Highway 7 between Bayview Avenue and Town Centre Boulevard, and a new bus-only road parallel to Enterprise Drive, between Warden and Birchmount, eventually extending to Kennedy in 2018.. Stations along the rapidway will be longer than existing stations, and include heated shelters protected from the elements. Later phases will extend the rapidway west to Highway 50 and east to Cornell Terminal, potentially to the Durham Region border at the York-Durham Line.

2014-2017 changes

VIVA Purple will undergo many changes between 2014 and 2017. Beginning in 2014, VIVA Purple and Pink will begin to serve the new Highway 7 Rapidway between Birchmount Road and Bayview Avenue. Also, VIVA Purple will be restructured to provide service along Highway 7 between Town Centre Boulevard and Kennedy Road. Every other trip will continue to serve Enterprise Road. During rush hours, all trips will remain on Highway 7. Also, with the opening of the Spadina Subway extension, VIVA Purple will terminate at Richmond Hill Centre, where passengers can connect to VIVA Orange for service to Vaughan Corporate Centre. New stations will also be opened at Chalmers (east of Bayview), Cedarland, Warden & 7, Village Parkway, and Schiberras/Main Street Unionville. Eventually, this corridor could be upgraded to light rail transit.

The stations of the restructured Viva Purple will be as follows, from west to east:

• Richmond Hill Centre
• Bayview
• Chalmers Road/South Park Road
• West Beaver Creek
• Leslie
• East Beaver Creek
• Allstate Parkway
• Woodbine
• Montgomery
• Town Centre
• Cedarland (A)
• Warden (A)
• Enterprise (A)
• ''Unionville GO Station (A'')
• Warden (B)
• Village Parkway (B)
• Main Street Unionville (B)
• Kennedy
• Bullock
• McCowan
• Galsworthy Drive
• Main Street Markham
• Wooten Way
• Markham Stouffville Hospital
• Bur Oak Drive
• Cornell Terminal

Future Viva stations are in italics

Service frequency

As of February 24, 2013:

• Richmond Hill Centre to Markham-Stouffville Hospital: 15 minutes at all times.
• York University to Richmond Hill Centre: 7.5 minutes peak, 15 minutes off-peak. During the summer months when less courses run at York University service is 15 minutes at all times.
• Richmond Hill Centre to Markham Stouffville Hospital: 15 minutes at all times.

However during rush hour the routes is interlined with other routes between RCH and McCowan resulting in higher average frequencies.

• Richmond Hill Centre to Warden (combined with Viva Pink): 7.5 minutes
• Warden to Enterprise (combined with Viva Green and Viva Pink): 4 minutes
• Enterprise to McCowan (combined with Viva Green): 9 minutes

Travel times

As of February 24, 2013:

• York University to Richmond Hill Centre: 33 minutes on peak periods, 28 minutes on off-peak periods
• Richmond Hill Centre to Enterprise: 28 minutes on peak periods, 26 minutes on off-peak periods
• Enterprise to McCowan: 13 minutes at all times.
• McCowan to Markham-Stouffville Hospital: 11 minutes peak, 13 minutes off-peak

These results will vary depending on the traffic volume and weather.

Security and Safety

YRT/Viva offers security, customer assistance and fare enforcement services through the YRT/Viva Transit Enforcement Team.^[2]

Viva buses are patrolled by Special Constables that have been given the power of a Peace officer to enforce the Criminal Code of Canada. ^[3] Riders must present a valid proof-of-payment through a validated ticket or transfer from a YRT bus or purchased from the onsite-ticket machine. They can also enforce applicable York Region Municipal by-laws. They are given the power to issue offence notices, summonses or court appearance notices. They perform random checks and can issue violations, fines and warnings if the By-laws are not followed.

On site security is performed through the Transit Enforcement team. There are also technological securities such as security cameras and vehicle communication systems to create a safe environment.^[4]

References