Dozens of transit-starved Liberty Village residents were expected to boycott public transport and board a crowdfunded bus service to get to work Monday morning.

The privately-run bus service, dubbed the Liberty Village Express, was scheduled to ferry about 50 passengers to Union Station during Monday’s morning rush-hour, co-organizer Brett Chang said Sunday.

The first bus was set to depart from Pirandello and East Liberty Sts. at 7 a.m. and it was scheduled to run four return trips, with the last at 9.15 a.m.

Chang, 23, and Taylor Scollon, 24, coined the concept after hearing about the neighbourhood’s transit woes.

Over the past few years, West Toronto’s Liberty Village has grown into a huge complex of high-rise apartments and townhouses.

The transit system can no longer cater for the growing population and the area is significantly under-served by public transport, Chang said.

The 504 King streetcar, which collects the Liberty Village commuters, is the busiest streetcar route in the city, carrying on average 60,000 people per day. It is often too crowded to pick up the neighbourhood residents or “they stuff them in like sardines,” Chang said.

Liberty Village resident Andrew Willis, 27, told the Star public transit was “almost non-existent” in the highly-populated area.

Fellow resident Stephen Wright said the lack of public transport was tarnishing the neighbourhood.

“There are too many people and no real regard for how the people move – it’s more about the cars,” he said.

Chang and Scollon created the company Line Six Transit to provide the community with “an alternative, faster, more comfortable and more human way to ride”, Chang said.

Commuters donate $25 per week for five rides — which is $2 more per ride than the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) $3 token.

So far, Line Six Transit has signed on 64 backers and raised $2775.

The Liberty Village Express pilot service is running from Oct. 6 to 10. If successful, it will continue to operate and the pair hopes to roll the service out into other areas under-served by the TTC, Chang said.

The TTC has a legal monopoly in Toronto, but Chang said Line Six Transit was not violating any local bylaws or competing against the commission.

“We see ourselves as complimentary to the TTC,” he said.

TTC spokesman Brad Ross has previously said the commission was not concerned with the new business venture, but that it would be monitoring the situation.

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

Chang believes Line Six Transit is one of the first crowdfunded bus services in the world.

“Communities designing transit is new to the world. We have not heard of it before,” he said.