CIVIL servants, urban planners and even the mayor's office are talking about a plan that would abolish Winnipeg Transit and replace it with an independent authority that would carry commuters throughout the city and to and from its bedroom communities on a single ticket.
"I think it's something that we should consider," Katz said. "For the City of Winnipeg, I think it's something we should look into. It has merit, there's no question about it."
During his speech, Katz spoke about creating an independent water utility for Winnipeg to administer water and sewer service while remaining outside the city's control. Asked by the Free Press if he would comment on the possibility of running a transit service on similar terms, Katz concurred.
"It's crossed my mind, absolutely," he added. "We're not there yet. But I think it is a valid suggestion. It has crossed my mind before and I've talked to a few councillors about it."
One of those councillors, Transcona's Russ Wyatt, who chaired the mayor's Rapid Transit Task Force three years ago, said he had never heard Katz offer such a forthright -- and public -- answer on the subject.
He and Katz have discussed transit many times, Wyatt said.
"This is new," said Wyatt. "That's the first time I've heard that (publicly). So, that's very positive."
A transit authority would ensure transit revenues would not go simply to the city's general revenue fund but rather would be invested in improving transit service, Wyatt said.
According to a task force finding, city transit service has not seen an increase in the number of annual hours that buses operate in Winnipeg since 1982.
The Rapid Transit Task Force looked at transit needs and suggested the city be open to agreements with surrounding municipalities about a shared transit service. The idea had surfaced several times in the past decade.
It recently caught fire again.
Two weeks ago, at a meeting of municipal officials from Manitoba's capital region representatives discussed the viability of a regional transit authority among several transportation issues, said Claudette Toupin, assistant deputy minister for Planning and Development in the province's department of Intergovernmental Affairs.
While the issue was not a top priority, Toupin admitted, it followed other rumblings the government had heard, from municipalities such as Selkirk and Springfield, that people were asking increasingly for transit service to and from Winnipeg.
While some municipalities have contracts with bus companies to shuttle residents to the Manitoba capital, there are calls for more frequent service.
"Some of those municipalities are starting to see a need for a public transit service and are starting to explore that," Toupin said. "They're starting to talk about that."
Jino Distasio, director of the University of Winnipeg's Institute of Urban Studies, who was also a member of the 2005 transit task force, is using the latest wave of interest in a transit authority to call again for governments to take action, in a piece to be published soon.
"I'd really like to see Winnipeg Transit abolished completely, taken away from the city and reinvented as the capital region transit authority," Distasio said in an interview this week. "So we can move forward with rapid transit and solutions that would benefit the capital region."
"We could get commuter trains running from here to LaSalle, to Headingley, to Selkirk," he added. "Or bus lines. These are revenue generators."
joe.paraskevas@freepress.mb.ca