York Region Transit Vaughan Mills Terminal



Vaughan Mills Terminal

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Local Routes

4, 12, 20, 21, 26, 85, 87, 360, 463, 720, 760

Opening Date

November 4, 2004

Vaughan Mills Terminal is a YRT transit terminal located in Vaughan, ON. It is located in the parking lot on the northeast side of Vaughan Mills, closest to the major intersection of Rutherford Rd. and Jane St. Access between the mall and the terminal is through Entrance 3.

There are 8 bus bays in the terminal loop, most with their own shelter. Unlike Finch, there is no concession building to buy passes or tickets (though at one point they were sold at the gas station just east of the terminal), and there are no automated ticket machines on site, mainly due to the fact no Viva routes serve the terminal at any time of day. Commuter parking is available in the mall parking lot around the loop.

Vaughan Mills is YRT's second newest terminal, next to Richmond Hill Centre. It was the first transit terminal built by YRT, as all other terminals were inherited from other agencies or built and shared with another agency (such as the TTC). In addition, Vaughan Mills is the furthest west transit terminal served by YRT (when the 77 was still in operation, the furthest west transit terminal served by YRT was Bramalea Transit Centre in Brampton).

At approximately 2,550 passengers on an average weekday, Vaughan Mills Terminal is the 9th busiest transit passenger loading location in the YRT/Viva network according to the 2013 Transportation Fact Book. This is an decrease from approximately 3,250 weekday passengers from the 2011 Transportation Fact Book.

History

In June 2003, construction started on the new Vaughan Mills. This area was to become a major commercial destination, and YRT identified this, hence putting its claim in early to put a transit terminal here. The terminal opened on November 4, 2004; the same time the mall opened. Although much of the surrounding land was either parking lots or empty fields, in a few years the terminal was soon surrounded by many stores and attractions. Route 4 retreated from the terminal soon after it opened (coming back years later), but the vacated bays were filled by routes 12 and 360.

Vaughan Mills is fairly stable; it has an extra bay ready for use, but since there are not many routes nearby that could benefit from being connected to the terminal, other than layovers this bay will likely continue to go unused. With most of the land around Vaughan Mills now occupied, there is still some potential for ridership to increase, but most of any future ridership increase would come from the connecting routes, as northern Vaughan and Maple are continually being developed. It is also a popular point to transfer to services heading to nearby Canada's Wonderland (routes 4, 20, and 760). GO Transit runs route 63 along Rutherford Rd. past Vaughan Mills Mall, but it does not enter the mall or service the transit terminal.

While Viva currently does not serve Vaughan Mills, a new Viva route will be implemented on Jane St. once the Spadina Subway Extension opens in 2016, as part of the Spadina Subway Transit Strategy.