There was good news and bad news for the HSR revealed in the transit budget presented late last week and some curiously missing news as well. And reconsideration of the area rating transit tax system seems to be back on the council table – especially in the view of the most vocal opponent of change – as well as some other fundamental rethinking of why transit adoption is so slow in Hamilton.
On the plus side for the HSR, there may have been slight growth in ridership last year for the first time in half a decade, we’re halfway to the target for Presto adoption, more service improvements are coming by fall, and it appears all four of the new councillors think transit is important.
On the down side the funding shortfall for capital projects has grown by over $25 million, rides per capita are continuing to fall, and the latest moves by the Ford government may jeopardize the HSR’s main revenue source. The latter refers to a provincial announcement that most post-secondary student fees will be made voluntary. If that applies to transit fees, which seem likely but isn’t clear yet, it will undermine and perhaps destroy the HSR’s innovative student U-passes.
One in eight fare dollars (over $7 million) collected by the HSR come from the McMaster U-pass which is paid for by a compulsory fee applied to all undergraduate students at the university. By charging everyone, the HSR is able to offer the students a very substantial fare discount.
There are similar arrangements with McMaster graduate students, Mohawk students and with Columbia College. HSR director Debbie Delle Vedove told councillors that the Ford plans are at the “top of the radar” for Hamilton transit officials but how exactly this will unfold is uncertain. Ward two councillor Jason Farr suggested the revenue loss might be made up by selling fares directly to the students at regular rates.
In her presentation, Delle Vedove emphasized the “good news” that ridership was up last year for the first time since 2014. But the increase was barely half a percent and that might be a result of a new passenger counting system put in place just over a year ago. While the new figures are more accurate, new ward three councillor Nrindar Nann pointed out that they are being compared to previous years when “counts” were done randomly by occasional observation of buses and were admittedly of uncertain quality.
Last year’s ridership was nearly two million lower than projected in the ten-year strategy launched in 2015, a shortfall blamed by Delle Vedove on mistakes made in assumptions. Public works head Dan MacKinnon also pointed out that the strategy called for fixing deficiencies in the first two years, and then council balked at funding year three in 2017, so this coming year is the first to actually focus on growing ridership.
Delle Vedove’s presentation compared Hamilton to four GTA municipalities (Brampton, Durham, Mississauga and York) emphasizing that Hamilton has lower fares than the others, lower costs per rider and is spending close to the same amount per capita. But she offered no direct comparisons on rides per capita.
The latter comparison was provided in last year’s budget presentation showing Hamilton falling from 48 to 44 rides per capita between 2006 and 2016 (it’s now down to 42), while Mississagua swept past it going from 41 to 51, Brampton went from 24 to 39.
Brampton’s website shows a 14 percent gain in ridership in 2018, preceded by an 18.5 percent jump in 2017. Waterloo region which has a similar population to Hamilton, expected growth of between four and five percent last year based on trends up until October.
Ancaster councillor Lloyd Ferguson angrily denounced the proposed 2019 transit budget and demanded the city “slam on the brakes” on the ten-year transit strategy and was frustrated that no one else had “sticker shock” from the planned spending. He was especially upset by Chad Collins and Maureen Wilson asking staff to provide information about area rating – queries that Ferguson took as evidence of a plan to “dump transit costs on the suburbs”.
Wilson suggested a discussion on achieving high transit ridership needs to include policies on parking pricing, emphasizing mixed-income neighbourhoods, and not overbuilding roads. The new ward eight councillor John Paul Danko argued for more HSR service while ward eight representative Esther Pauls expressed particular enthusiasm for a shift to electric buses.