O-Train East extension to open ‘early in 2026’

Extending the O-Train Line 1 to Orléans will take a little bit longer, with staff aiming for early next year. CTV’s Leah Larocque reports.

It will be early 2026 before transit riders in Orléans are riding the O-Train.

Interim Transit Services general manager Troy Charter provided an update on the construction of the O-Train East Extension, extending the line from Blair Station to Trim Station.

“We’ve made significant progress towards completing the testing and commissioning, as well as the integration phases of the O-Train East extension project,” Charter told the Transit Committee Monday morning.

“We continue to work with East-West Connectors on the final items that must be completed prior to achieving substantial completion. This is a very deliberate and thorough process, something we’ve talked about we won’t rush.”

Charter said once substantial competition is achieved, OC Transpo will provide an update to council before the launch of the trial running.

“I know that we are all eagerly awaiting the East extension opening for our customers, and we’re looking at doing that early in 2026.”

In response to a question from Coun. Tim Tierney, Charter said they won’t launch the system “if it’s not ready to go from a safety perspective and a reliability perspective.”

“At this point in time, a lot of things still need to go right, but it’s definitely achievable to say Q1 (January-March period),” Charter said.

“It assumes that we successfully go through the substantial competition process with the independent certifier and other experts confirming that the system is ready to go, we successfully complete trial running, there’s no safety issues that pop up or anything like that - we’re not anticipating that.”

Last month, Charter said some unspecified “deficiencies” were discovered during a documentation review and on-site assessments of the LRT extension, and the deficiencies must be remedied before substantial competition has been achieved.

OC Transpo told CTV News Ottawa the work to address included “specialized track infrastructure and sections of reinforced concrete.”

Pre-trial running will last five to 10 days, followed by the mandatory trial running that will last a minimum of 21 days.

The trial running period will “exercise and evaluate the performance” of the system’s infrastructure, vehicles, operating and maintenance personnel and operating procedures, according to staff.

Earlier this year, staff said the O-Train extension between Blair and Trim stations was expected to open by the end of 2025. The original plan called for the East extension to open in 2022, then the target date was moved to 2024.

Ridership bump

More people are riding OC Transpo buses and the O-Train this fall, with ridership in September and October the highest since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Transit Committee was told 58.4 million passenger trips were recorded in the first 10 months of the year. There were 55.8 million passenger trips in the January-October period in 2024.

There were 7.8 million passenger trips in October and 7.4 million trips in September, up from the same months in 2024.

Staff said the September and October ridership was 81 per cent of pre-pandemic levels.

August was the quietest month on OC Transpo, with only 3.6 million trips.

Bus reliability

OC Transpo’s bus reliability dropped from 98.4 per cent in August to 97.3 per cent in October.

The target is 99.5 per cent of planned trips completed.

Staff said the main issued why trips were not completed were mechanical breakdowns, a lack of available operators, on-street adjustments due to construction and road closures and no buses available.

The routes with the most trips cancelled were Route 7 (246 trips cancelled), Route 12 (338 trips cancelled), and Route 6 (356 trips cancelled).

Statistics presented to the Transit Committee showed on-time performance for frequent routes was 81 per cent in October, down from the target of 85 per cent.

O-Train Line 1 completed 99.5 per cent of planned trips in October, while Lines 2 and 4 completed 97.6 per cent of trips.