FINDING THE
COMFORT ZONE Commuter and Customer Confidence Vital to Urban Density COMMUTERS’ WILLINGNESS to jump on the bus, light-rail car or subway is expected to be a driving factor in repopulating office space in some major North American markets, including Toronto, Mont rea l a nd Vancouver. Public transit wariness emerged as a com mon sentiment among respondents to JLL’s survey of C O V I D -1 9 - r e l a t e d w o r k p l a c e concerns earlier this spring, prompting the firm’s further examination of potential ripple effects for employers, businesses, parking demand, traffic congestion and the urban environment. “While at first it may appear that only a small number of North American cities have a heavy reliance on public transportation for their workforces, in reality, a considerable portion of the office 10 October 2020 | Canadian Property Management
market is concentrated in such cities,” the report observes. “This concentration of office space and office-using employment in transit-oriented markets highlights the challenge that may accompany a return to work in North America’s largest cities.” Recent studies in various major world cities have found little evidence to link public transit to COVID-19 clusters. Decline in ridership is apparent, however, with a report from the International Energy Agency citing a 50 to 90% drop globally during the lockdown months, translating to an estimated €40 billion (CAD $60.8 billion) revenue loss for transit authorities in the European Union alone. The perception of risk poses yet one more challenge for Canadian commercial landlords. Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, Ottawa and Calgary are listed among 12 markets
deemed to be transit-oriented and where approximately one third of the North American office inventory is concentrated. Notably, Toronto and Montreal rank in the top five of the 25 metropolises JLL scrutinizes for the sheer numbers and the percentage of employees reliant on public transit. More than 13% of the labour force in both urban regions are transit users, or nearly 740,000 workers in Toronto and nearly 468,000 in Montreal. Toronto registers the third highest average tally (after New York and Chicago) of weekday transit trips, at 1.66 million; Montreal has the fifth busiest system with an average of 1.34 million weekday trips recorded. “People must continue to exercise caution when on public transit because physical distancing will be a challenge,” Christine Elliott, Ontario’s Minister of Health,
