Here’s why

In most cities, to complete a multimodal trip, you have to use one app to get public transit times, then book a well-timed ridehail to get to the station, before your train or bus. And that’s assuming you even know your multimodal options! (Good luck, tourists.) Today’s multimodal trips require so much local knowledge; so many juggled apps; so many arrival time comparisons; and so many opportunities to get snagged by missed connections.

To illustrate this point, consider our copywriter, Joe. (He takes the bulk of his ridehails after tippling beers in obscure Montreal neighbourhoods 🌚.) For Joe, doing the mental math of “the ridehail ETA is 7 minutes, the drive itself is 7 minutes, and the last metro leaves in 17 minutes. Will I make it?!?” can be daunting. So tipsy Joe gives up, and takes a ridehail the whole way home.

To ensure riders like Joe aren’t forced to make crude choices between ridehail and transit, we had to make it dead simple to take a multimodal trip. We had to design our trip planner so that public transit was at the forefront, transfers were easy, no mental math was required, and ridehail wasn’t replacing public transit for trips, or trip legs, that had no business using a car.

By integrating multiple ridehailing operators (Uber, Lyft, Via, Ola, Téo & more to come) we can offer the best ridehailing suggestions — while helping more riders unlock the efficiencies of public transit. If one ridehailer isn’t fast enough to make your train, we’ll find you one that is, where possible.

When you’re under pressure to make a transit connection (10-minute ridehail ETAs, a 15-minute window to make your train, and a 60-minute wait until the next train comes) you might reflexively say “to hell with the train” and book a ridehail, all the way home.

But with Transit’s trip planner, you can quickly find out if another ridehail service can help you make the train. You can hail the ride, pay for the trip, and arrive at the station — all without having to do mental math and juggle apps. Which secures a win for you (cheaper trip, shorter commute) and a win for your city (one less pointless car on the road).

It’s been a while since cities logged a “win” from ridehail. While ridehail services promised to connect more people than ever to public transit, recent studies suggest that ridehail is adding more car traffic and stealing rides away from public transit. ☹️

In theory, ridehailing services are perfect complements to transit. They make it easier to live car-free, knowing you can always hail a car, without needing one in your driveway. And for people in transit deserts, ridehail can connect them to transit hubs (for first- and last-mile trips.)

And it’s why — despite some misgivings — transit agencies have partnered with ridehailers like Uber, Lyft, and Via.

But it’s also why transit agencies are so psyched about transit-oriented ridehailing. We’ve taken ridehail’s “first- and last-mile” advantage out of theory, and put it to into practice. With Transit+, we now emphasise connections to transit — rather than itineraries that jealously try to capture the bulk of your miles. What’s more, we’ve integrated more operators, so agencies aren’t put in the awkward position where their “official transit app” doesn’t support their “official ridehailer”.

Forced to pick “transit or ridehail”, Transit+ now offers agencies and riders a third — and better — choice. And while still in beta, our multimodal trip suggestions are getting better every day.