Dozens of TTC riders held a protest outside city hall on Wednesday afternoon ahead of a commission meeting where trustees are expected to formally sign off on $15.8 million in cuts.
The cuts are being made in order to meet a request that Mayor John Tory made of all city departments, asking them to lower their operating budgets by 2.6 per cent.
The cuts include the cancellation of $1.5 million in planned September service increases that are no longer required due to declining ridership. The TTC is also reducing overtime spending, trimming its training and travel budget and placing fewer employees on standby in order to meet the savings target.
“Riders are really upset. They are upset with the service cuts coming down the pipe and also the fare hikes that we are looking at as well. It is just not what transit needs right now,” TTCriders Executive Director Jessica Bell told CTV News Toronto outside city hall. “We need more funding and we need better service across the city.”
In order to illustrate their point, the protesters staged a mock ‘race to the bottom,” wherein riders representing Tory, Premier Kathleen Wynne, TTC Chair Josh Colle and others competed in a foot race to determine who would win the title of “doing the most to worsen the TTC.”
“We are sick of the fare hikes, we are sick of the delays, we are sick of the long waits. We want improvements,” Biel said ahead of that race.
$172 M deficit in budget
Though the TTC was able to trim its operating budget by 2.6 per cent, a $172 million hole still exists in its budget for next year and further service cuts or fare hikes may be necessary to fill it should the provincial or federal governments not come forward with additional funding.
One area in which the TTC plans to find savings is to follow the lead of subway systems in a number of other cities and shift to a one operator model on subway trains, however that move will only save about $18 million annually and could prove unpopular.
One poll conducted by Mainstreet Research on Tuesday found that 67 per cent of respondents oppose eliminating the subway guard position compared to just 19 per cent who approve the idea.
The poll was commissioned by Amalgamated Transit Union Local 113.
