Oh, 196 York University Rocket, covered in your dusty coat of winter filth, now is the time for rest.

It is a sunny, frigid day in winter exam season, and your flank reads, “The Farewell Tour.” Sure, it’s an ad for a movie unrelated to you, and nobody is holding back tears at Sheppard West Station, but this is the end, old workhorse. Soon you will be made obsolete by the opening of the subway, going the way of the streetcars on Bloor and Danforth.

Michelle Mawhinney, bundled up in a coat and vest in one of your red seats near the back, has been riding for 20 years, “Which is pretty sad,” she says as you sail by a tank farm. Classes are finished, so your aisles aren’t crammed with students, but your rubber floors are still damp from their boots, with patches of dried salt beneath your seats.

Mawhinney started her journey all those years ago as a graduate student “chugging along Wilson” in your more frustrating years, but now she is a political science professor, and you’ve changed, too, driving unimpeded in a dedicated lane on Dufferin, breezing westward along the hydro corridor busway that opened in 2009, shaving six minutes off your schedule each way. For her, you were a better option than driving, but I’m sorry to say she is already staring out the window at the bike path covered with snow, imagining a bike commute to work, a subway ride home at night.

Will she miss you?

She pauses for a moment, looking in the direction of the “PLEASE move back” sign, the no smoking graphic, the ad for the new subway.

“Not really,” she laughs.

But Faisal Agaha will. For these last two years, you’ve provided a 10-minute commute from his job to his home near York University, where he is in his second year of health studies. The subway will not help him, and I know you take no pleasure in the fact that he will have to take two buses for 30 minutes. With you, he was never late to his job.

Victor, who also lives near York University but studies at the University of Toronto, will also remember you fondly. His home is a 15-minute walk from the new subway at York, but for you, he only had to walk to a stop two minutes away.

As you circle back and forth — coins, thanks, transfer rip, Presto beep, coins, thanks, transfer rip, Presto beep — riders who normally would be scrolling Instagram if they weren’t being asked to reminisce, speak warmly of how you allowed them to scroll Instagram, just by being above the ground.

Hayley McIldoon, a first-year computer programming student, remembers your tricks, how she’d be standing in a line at Sheppard West Station and she’d see five of you ramble in like a posse, but then you’d disappear, like you changed numbers somewhere out of view, you old scamp. Sometimes she’d step out of the line to wait for the next bus, hoping for a seat. Usually you were prompt, but occasionally you’d dole out lessons and burn her with a 15-minute wait. Her friend Swosti Adhikari always jumped on, even if it meant standing. She hated waiting.

It’s so quiet today that you can hear Jeff Cameron whistling. Cameron likes your straightforward nature, but the TTC driver won’t miss those heart-wrenching moments when cars on Dufferin Street would turn into the dedicated lane in front of you.

“No, there are plenty of routes to drive other buses on,” he says as you move south on Dufferin, his seat bouncing up and down with the road. “I won’t be shedding a tear.”

But when his shift ends that day, you’re still on his mind.

“Come to think of it, I actually will miss it,” he says. “I guess I’ve been doing it so long, that I’ve never really thought about it going extinct.”

He will miss transporting the students safely to school, knowing he played a part in that journey, all the thank-yous along the way.

Most of those students are excited they won’t have to rush up the stairs at Sheppard West to angle for a spot in the line. What you gave them in 16 minutes, the new subway will do in eight.

When you leave campus for the final time, 2:32 a.m. Sunday, and drive through the industrial north of the city, under a waning sliver of moon, know that in your final days, along the streets you know by heart, they spoke warmly of you.

Maybe it was pre-emptive nostalgia, but most didn’t even begrudge you the lines. You were usually worth the wait.

TRAVEL TIMES TO YORK:

1978 (Subway extended to Wilson)

106 York University to Wilson to campus — 30 minutes

1980 (Express service first introduced)

106 York University (local): Wilson to campus — 30 minutes

106E York University (express, weekdays only) — 20 minutes

1995 (Before Downsview opens)

106 York University (local): Wilson to campus — 32 minutes

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106E York University (express): Wilson to campus — 24 minutes

1996 (Downsview, now Sheppard West Station, opens)

106 York University (local): Downsview to campus — 28 minutes

106E York University (express): Downsview to campus — 22 minutes

2009 (Busway opens)

106 York University (local): Downsview to campus – 28 minutes

196 York University Rocket: Downsview to campus – 16 minutes

2017 (Subway opens)

Sheppard West Station (formerly Downsview) to campus — 8 minutes

Source: TTC

Weekday daily ridership

1995: 13,000 (106)

2000: 8,600 (196) / 7,000 (106)

2004: 14,900 (196) / 6,000 (106)

2010: 20,200 (196) / 6,600 (106)

2014: 21,900 (196) / 7,700 (106)

Source: TTC