Free bus rides floated as way to increase transit ridership

Offering free bus rides as a way to increase the number of people using Sudbury Transit was one of the ideas brought up Wednesday at a marathon six-hour city budget meeting.

Since the city's share of provincial gas tax revenue dedicated to transit funded is based on ridership, the idea would be to get more money by increasing bums on seats through free rides at certain times.

Greater Sudbury Mayor Brian Bigger said with Greater Sudbury Transit ridership stuck at around five million a year, the city has to look for ways to increase the number to boost the gas tax revenue, which in turn could help pay for improving service.

“What would happen if we offered free rides on transit next year?” said Bigger, who campaigned on a promise to offer free bus rides to seniors during off-peak hours. “There's no other source of funding that's going to improve our situation.”

Roger Sauvé, the city's director of Greater Sudbury Transit, said the immediate impact would likely be more riders. But he cautioned that because of the way the gas tax money for each city is calculated, there's no guarantee the city would come out ahead. Currently, the city gets between $2.6 million and $2.7 million each year from the fund.

Unlike cities in southern Ontario, who are experiencing population growth every year, Sudbury's population is stagnant, he said. That means those cities are able to add riders every year, and revenue, potentially taking a bite out of any add gas tax revenue.

And Lorella Hayes, the city's chief financial officer, said more study is needed before considering the idea. With the transit department already underfunded, the loss in ridership revenue could make the problem worse.

“We'd have to do a bit of analysis (first) if we're talking about offering free rides,” Hayes said.

There was also talk of using more taxis to help ease the demand for Handi-Transit service, which cost $2.91 million in 2014, more than $350,000 overbudget. Using city taxis is actually cheaper than using Handi-Transit, councillors were told.

“A lot of people who are using Handi-Transit who mobile,” Bigger said. “They're not necessarily all in wheelchairs. There are many people who can use a conventional cab.”

“We're using taxis more and more,” Sauvé said.

The problem is when demand is highest for Handi-Transit, it's often a struggle to accommodate people who require an accessible taxi.

“And we don't high a very high number of accessible cabs in the city,” he said. “It has always been a challenge.”

They have talked to cab companies to see if they would be interested in buying more accessible taxis to accommodate Handi-Transit, but they indicated it wasn't viable.

“They simply told us that it was not worth it to them,” Sauvé said.

“Is there an opportunity to provide incentives to cab companies to buy more accessible cabs?” asked Ward 12 Coun. Joscelyne Landry-Altmann. “If we're at capacity (for Handi-Transit) now, and our population is aging, usage is only going to get higher.”

The idea was put into the “parking lot,” which is what councillors call the list of budget options they compile as the process moves forward. Staff prepares a report for items approved for the parking lot, which councillors will review, one by one, when it's time to make actual budget decisions.

Councillors are working toward passing a budget this year with a tax freeze and no layoffs, meaning they have to find $8.4 million in savings. With such a big challenge and a number of councillors going through the process for the first time, after meeting for six hours they still weren't able to get through Wednesday's agenda.

So they voted to add another meeting on Feb. 24, meaning a final budget won't likely be approved until early March.