City council’s executive committee has approved a recommendation from administration to purchase a four-year subscription for Edmonton’s transit app, giving all users access to its full suite of features. Carrie Hotton-MacDonald, branch manager of Edmonton Transit Service, said the fully featured app offers riders more trip-planning options while integrating on-demand transit service and other transportation modes, including Uber and rentable e-scooters. The subscription also unlocks the app’s Rate My Ride feature, allowing users to provide feedback directly through the platform. “That’s going to help us directly implement actions that make it even better for folks that are using transit,” Hotton-MacDonald told reporters Friday. The app’s “Royale” tier will be available to all users. Hotton-MacDonald said the upgrade will make the app “even more seamless, convenient, easy to use” while also adding an element of fun. “You can earn points for the number of trips that you’re booking. You can create user profiles. You can have different stickers and just have some fun with your representation, basically, in the app,” Hotton-MacDonald said, describing the “gamification” features included in the Royale tier. The added features will not come at an extra cost to riders. The $540,000 annual subscription will be funded within Edmonton Transit’s existing budget. Other major Canadian cities, including Calgary, give users full-time access to the Transit app’s Royale features. Mayor Andrew Knack said both riders and the city will benefit from the investment. “The users will get their money’s worth because they’ll get a much better experience. The city will get our money’s worth because the data that you get allows us to better improve the system in a much more expedited way,” said Knack, who sits on the executive committee. “We heard in the report today that we can get data daily that shows where people are identifying gaps and where people are saying this is working really well. That type of data ... means you can consistently make sure the system is getting improved, so that everyone using it feels appreciated and knows that they’re valued.” With files from CTV News Edmonton’s Jeremy Thompson
