Residents and businesses in Edmonton’s Chinatown told city council’s urban planning committee on Monday that they are worried about how bus rapid transit (BRT) routes might be implemented.

Routes are being explored for 101st Street between Jasper Avenue and 102A Avenue, and Whyte Avenue between 99th Street and 109th Street. 

Concerns voiced during the meeting were largely specific to the downtown route and ranged from a potential lack of parking to safety issues.  

The city says BRT uses dedicated bus lanes to help buses function more like LRTs, without requiring the same level of capital infrastructure that an LRT project needs.

Concerns with route going through Chinatown 

Owners of businesses on 101st Street north of downtown voiced their concerns multiple times on what impact implementing dedicated bus lanes could have on them. 

Nga Van helps run the family business Thanh Thanh Oriental Noodle House. 

She said street parking along the eatery’s block was removed to make way for the bus lane in the area, which now spans three blocks.

“Since this has been enforced, we’ve seen about a 60 per cent drop in dine-in traffic and [a] significant drop in sales,” Van said.

In 2025, the city created a dedicated transit lane on the southbound side of 101st Street, between Kingsway and 107th Avenue.

“We’re not in an area where we can rely on foot traffic, so parking is critical to our business,” Van said as she raised her concerns.. 

Van said concerns around social disorder and safety in the area are impacting foot traffic. 

In response to those concerns, Ward O-day’min Coun. Anne Stevenson put forward a motion that committee recommend that city council direct administration to reinstate on-street parking on southbound 101st Street between 107th Avenue and Kingsway Avenue during daytime hours.

The motion also includes a directive for city administration to provide a report to the urban planning committee with an analysis of on-time bus performance data for the BRT changes six months after they were implemented. 

The motion was carried with a 4-1 vote. 

Mayor Andrew Knack said there is a need for more data to inform decisions related to BRT in Edmonton over the coming years.

Ward papastew Coun. Michael Janz voted against the motion because of the subsequent delay it could have on implementing BRT routes. 

Prior to Stevenson’s motion, Janz had put forward a separate motion to have administration look at the logistics of funding BRT routes as part of the 2027-2030 budget process.

The BRT for Whyte Avenue, which falls inside Janz’s ward, was largely welcomed by most speakers at city hall on Monday. 

However, some people like Andrea Donini, executive director of the Old Strathcona Business Association, told the committee that there also needs to be a larger conversation around funding projects in the area more holistically. 

“There is no clear, co-ordinated capital funding for Whyte Avenue renewal in the upcoming budget cycle, and that matters,” said Donini, who is part of a collective of community groups who have formed Prioritize Whyte Ave to advocate for projects in the area. ”Because without that funding, upgrades and renewal won’t stop — they’ll just happen piecemeal over many years, without co-ordination.”

Ward Anirniq Coun. Erin Rutherford, who does not sit on the urban planning committee, attended the meeting and spoke about what she said is the need to have equitable transit throughout the city, noting that her northwest ward does not have any mass transit lines. 

“If we actually want to talk about equitable transit and transit service, … I really think we need to have a bigger conversation about city plan concepts and if those assumptions that were made that went into our city plan — [or] mass transit plan — actually hold,” she said.