TTC to be a part of the fare integration later this year

Students walking out of the York University Line 1 station.

by Adam Choghri

 Artie is a Seneca student. Getting to the Seneca at York campus, she says is expensive and takes a long time.   She says she has to pay $7 for her GO bus fare plus an additional $3.25 for the TTC. “…around $11-12 is how much I usually pay for the Go bus, so then I stopped using the GO bus,” Artie says she travels by bus from McCowan, and then she takes an RT and two trains just to get to Seneca@York. It takes her two hours in total. Being able to ride Go and the TTC for one fare, would really make a difference for students like Artie.

The Ford government announced that it will be doing just that. Adding the TTC to the fare integration to help save the costs passengers pay for bus fares at the end of the year.  The plan was announced in the 2023 Ontario budget,  

“Our government is working to expand this initiative to support more people commuting to Toronto.”

  It has been a long time coming. Jan De Silva, the President and CEO of the Toronto Region Board of Trade, said that she’s been seeing talks for “over a decade with little action,” being done for the TTC integration.

Courtesy of TTCRiders.ca

“But for over a decade we have seen a lot of talk with little action with no region-wide solutions. We are calling on the Province to commit to change that will help bring riders back to transit. The time for fare integration is now,” De Silva said in a statement. In March 2022, Go Transit introduced the fare integration program which included most Ontario cities to be a part of the integration. The TTC was not included on the list. 

The cities in Ontario that offer fare integrations:

  • MiWay (Mississauga Transit) 
  • Brampton Transit
  • Hamilton street railway
  • Bradford West Gwillimbury Transit
  • York Region Transit
  • Barrie Transit
  • Oakville Transit
  • Guelph Transit
  • Milton Transit
  • Durham Region
  • Grand River Transit
  • Burlington Transit

The news comes as TTC fares rise ten cents.  As of now, if you are traveling from Mississauga and are taking a GO bus to go to the Greater Toronto Area, you have to pay for the GO bus trip plus, the TTC fee when boarding, making the passenger pay a double fee.  But if you’re traveling to any other part of Ontario other than Toronto, you don’t have to pay a double fee.

Stan Cho, an associate minister of transportation spoke at a Toronto Region Board of Trade event saying once the change does take place, it’ll save the cost of travel when riding within Toronto. “This means more savings, seamless travel, and better community,” says Cho on Twitter. Jaye Robinson, who is the  City Councilor for Ward 15 Don Valley West expressed her gratitude on Twitter saying it was “one of her top priorities,” when she was the former Chair of the TTC.  “I’m very happy to see the Province moving forward on this important initiative to support a more connected Toronto region.” TTCriders wrote on Twitter saying, “…the province also needs to invest in public transit service and reverse cuts, for people to get maximum benefit from a regional network.” But they said that it would also help the Scarborough Transit users after the announcement of the closure of Line 3 in Fall 2023.

 The details for the TTC fare integration are yet to be revealed at this time.

Shelagh Pizey-Allen, who works with TTCrider, said in an email about how TTCRiders felt after hearing the news of the fare integration. “Fare integration between GO and TTC is long overdue but details of the plan aren’t available yet and riders won’t see the maximum benefit if TTC service cuts continue. In addition to subsidizing free transfers between GO and TTC in Toronto, the provincial government must continue providing transit operating funding to protect the TTC from deeper cuts this year. The TTC is facing a $366 million budget shortfall this year. A single flat fare in Toronto so that riders can transfer between GO, TTC, and UPX, would help unlock more rapid transit in Scarborough, where residents will have longer commutes after the Scarborough RT (Line 3) closes in Fall 2023.”

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