Calgarians feel safer on transit, city surveys suggest

Calgarians are feeling a bit safer while riding transit in the city, a new survey shows. (File)

The City of Calgary is making improvements to public safety on Calgary Transit, several surveys conducted by the city are suggesting.

Officials say a safety survey, conducted between Nov. 13 and 23, 2023, found Calgarians are feeling safer while they ride the CTrain.

Seventy-two per cent of people answered positively on the survey, up from 67 per cent when the survey was conducted in May 2023.

People are also feeling safer while waiting on train platforms, the city said.

"I'm encouraged to see we have been able to move the needle on safety, and recognize we still have a long way to go to help Calgarians feel safe in and around our CTrains," said Kay Choi, community safety and wellbeing lead with the City of Calgary, in a news release.

The survey did find that 49 per cent of Calgarians are still avoiding using buses or CTrains due to safety concerns, but 75 per cent feel safer on buses than on trains.

Mayor Jyoti Gondek attributes the shift in perceptions on transit safety to the millions spent in the budget on a number of initiatives.

"By investing $15 million annually, council has already seen progress towards improved safety on transit," she said in a news release.

"Together with community and law enforcement partners, we continue to work collaboratively to address safety concerns in our growing city."

Aside from transit, the survey found more Calgarians feel the city is safer as a whole.

"(Seventy-one) per cent of respondents continue to agree Calgary is an overall safe city. More specifically, 95 per cent feel safe walking alone in their community during the day; 75 per cent at night, and two-fifths (40 per cent) of Calgarians say Calgary is 'more safe' when compared to other large Canadian cities."

Calgary's chief administrative officer, David Duckworth, says the statistics are very encouraging.

"Safety is a high priority for the city. We will stay focused on this to ensure Calgary remains one of the most livable cities, and has a safe, reliable and welcoming transit system that people want to use."

The Perspectives on Calgary survey has run three times in the past two years, with the first being between July 19 and 28, 2022.

It collects data from 500 randomly selected Calgarians and has a margin of error of +/- 4.4 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

The next survey will take place in the spring.