{"id":529872,"date":"2026-03-11T20:34:12","date_gmt":"2026-03-11T20:34:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/529872\/"},"modified":"2026-03-11T20:34:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-11T20:34:12","slug":"anti-crime-initiative-on-winnipeg-transit-gets-positive-results-but-significant-work-remains-police","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/529872\/","title":{"rendered":"Anti-crime initiative on Winnipeg Transit gets positive results but ‘significant work’ remains: police"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Text<\/p>\n

Listen to this article<\/p>\n

Estimated 4 minutes<\/p>\n

The audio version of this article is generated by AI-based technology. Mispronunciations can occur. We are working with our partners to continually review and improve the results.<\/p>\n

A 15-week pilot project to beef up officer presence and enforcement on Winnipeg buses and around transit stops yielded positive results, police say.<\/p>\n

The Winnipeg Transit violent crime intervention strategy launched in September<\/a> in response to growing concerns and incidents of violence and disorder on and around the Winnipeg Transit system.<\/p>\n

In 2024, a record 325 violent crimes were reported at Winnipeg Transit locations, which was nearly triple the next-highest number, in 2019, the city said.\u00a0 <\/p>\n

Spearheaded by the Winnipeg Police Service, the initiative involved WPS officers, transit staff and peace officers from the city’s community safety team<\/a>. It wrapped up Dec. 31.<\/p>\n

The police service, on Wednesday, released the results of the project. The data said total crimes decreased by 15.1 per cent, violent crimes decreased by 18.2 per cent and property crimes decreased by 15.2 per cent, compared to the same time frame the previous year.<\/p>\n

The results reinforce the value of targeted enforcement and visible presence initiatives, the news release from the police service says.<\/p>\n

\"TwoTransit safety officers with the community safety team are seen on a bus in downtown Winnipeg. (Darren Bernhardt\/CBC)<\/p>\n

\u201cThe WPS is very pleased with the results of the program. I don\u2019t think it comes as a surprise that, if we put additional resources and direct them to a specific problem or a specific area, we\u2019re going to achieve results,” Supt. Brian Miln said Wednesday at a news conference.<\/p>\n

Police officers\u00a0spent 143 hours riding buses, 101 hours patrolling on foot at bus stops and other transit locations and another 36 hours patrolling those areas in marked cruisers.<\/p>\n

They made 12 Criminal Code arrests and dealt with 98 fare evasions. Police did not say what type of enforcement was used in response to fare evasions.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have a lot of routes in Winnipeg so there was a lot of area to cover but we were Johnny-on-the-spot for a number of incidents,\u201d Miln said.<\/p>\n

During the initiative, police received 1,044 calls from transit authorities or operators. The number was 1,259 in the same time frame the previous year, the news release said.<\/p>\n

“Although the statistics and downward trends appear to show positive results, the WPS knows significant work is still required in this area to meet the goals in a long-term sustainable way,” the release said.<\/p>\n

Miln admits 15 weeks isn\u2019t a long enough sample time for a full evaluation of a program.<\/p>\n

“We’re not having a victory lap on this right now \u2026 but the stats do speak for themselves\u201d in a year-over-year comparison, he said.<\/p>\n

“Are we ever going to get down to zero in perfection? Absolutely not. But can we drive the numbers even further down to promote safety? Certainly.”<\/p>\n

To that end, officers from the Winnipeg Police Service and the community safety team will continue to provide a visible presence around the transit system “as part of their day-to-day responsibilities,” the release says, but it did not give further information about what exactly that means.<\/p>\n

Beyond that, Miln said “I don\u2019t have answer yet as to what our next steps may or may not be.”<\/p>\n

The crux of the issue, he said, is how to reallocate officers without having a negative impact in another unit.<\/p>\n

“If we direct resources in one direction, we’re going to be taking those resources from somewhere else,” he said. “It’s about finding the equilibrium \u2026 where we can achieve results in multiple areas.<\/p>\n

“We have to do that in a very calculated way. So we are working on that, but transit is a priority for the WPS.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Listen to this article Estimated 4 minutes The audio version of this article is generated by AI-based technology.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":529873,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194296],"tags":[49,48,22073],"class_list":["post-529872","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-winnipeg","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-winnipeg"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529872","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=529872"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529872\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/529873"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=529872"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=529872"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=529872"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}