(Quebec) The financial hole of transport companies is not about to be absorbed unless there is a serious shake-up. It will take a decade before public transit ridership returns to its pre-pandemic level, estimates the Department of Transport.
In its 2023-2027 strategic plan tabled in the National Assembly on June 8, the Department has set itself the target of reaching 357 million public transit trips within four years, a threshold representing only 55% of ridership in 2019. according to its own documents.
“The return to the overall ridership level of 2019 should take place over a period of at least 10 years, corresponding to an annual growth in ridership of approximately 2.5%. It is on this assumption that the targets were estimated,” says the Ministry.
For their part, transport companies say they have found in the spring of 2023 roughly 70% to 80% of their pre-pandemic attendance. The situation varies greatly from city to city.
Why is there such a disparity between the Ministry’s targets and the data communicated by the transport companies? This is because there are two methods of calculating trips by public transport, according to the Association du transport urbaine du Québec (ATUQ) which represents the nine transport companies and exo.
The first, called “traditional”, is based on the number of tickets sold and user surveys. It is currently being used by transit companies to compare 2019 ridership to today. It is less reliable and overestimates the number of trips, acknowledges the ATUQ.
The second method is based on “electronic validation”, which allows real data to be obtained from smart cards. This is what appears in the Department’s strategic plan.
For example, the first method allows the Société de transport de Sherbrooke to say that it has recovered 100% of the ridership of 2019. It is rather 85% if we use the second method, according to its president, Marc Denault, also at the head of the ATUQ.
The transport companies have not yet abandoned the traditional method since it is still used elsewhere in the country and the federal government grants its subsidies based on attendance, according to the ATUQ. Using only the new method would result in a drop in federal assistance for Quebec transit companies.
According to Statistics Canada, which is based on the traditional method, public transit ridership represented, in March 2023, 74% of the 2019 level across the country.
On May 3, the Regional Metropolitan Transport Authority (ARTM) indicated that “at the end of 2022, traffic in the network was around 70% of what it was in 2019”. She recognizes, however, that a good part of the clientele of Greater Montreal will not return to the metro, buses or even commuter trains. “For the moment, the ARTM anticipates a loss of structural traffic of around 20 to 25%,” she estimates. It thus tends to confirm the opinion of the Ministry, regardless of the calculation method used: it will take a long time to catch up.
“The good news is that there is a commitment” from Quebec to increase attendance over the next few years, notes Marc Denault.
It’s achievable, but you’ll have to be creative and give yourself the means to get that traffic.
Marc Denault, President of the Urban Transport Association of Quebec and the Société de transport de Sherbrooke
According to the Alliance for the financing of public transport in Quebec, TRANSIT, the Ministry lacks ambition. An increase in traffic of 2.5% per year, “it’s not enough”, maintains its coordinator Samuel Pagé-Plouffe. According to him, “one of the keys to increasing traffic will always be the increase in the service offer”.
However, the government has still not managed to increase the service offer by 5% per year, a target nevertheless provided for in its 2018-2023 action plan for sustainable mobility, recall MM. Page-Plouffe and Denault. They ask that the government renew this objective.
Missed targets
In 2019, there were 649.7 million public transit trips, a peak, according to the Department’s most recent annual report. The health measures imposed due to the pandemic have caused attendance to drop in 2020 and 2021.
For 2022, marked by the Omicron wave in the first months, the Ministry estimates traffic at 331 million trips, or 51% of pre-pandemic attendance according to its data. We see that the Department expects a stable number of trips this year compared to the previous one if we compare the 2023 target and the 2022 ridership.
Has the Department chosen prudent targets given the results of the past two years?
In its previous strategic plan (2019-2023), revised along the way to take into account the impact of the pandemic, the Ministry targeted 330 million trips in 2021 and 382 million in 2022. It missed both targets.
The boom in teleworking largely explains the decrease. Users have also decided to take the wheel. The Department also noted at the end of last year that “the train sector in Montreal was particularly affected”, while workers “have abandoned public transit in favor of the automobile” in order to get to desk.
financial hole
The decline in attendance is melting the revenues of transport companies. According to the ARTM, in Greater Montreal, fare revenues reached $640.9 million in 2022, “an increase of 43.5% compared to 2021 (446.8 million), but down 31, 8% compared to 2019 (939.9 million)”.
The ATUQ estimates that the budget hole for transport companies will reach 560 million this year and 900 million in 2027. In its last budget, the Legault government granted them emergency aid of $400 million.
Next fall, the Minister of Transport, Geneviève Guilbault, will present a new public transit funding plan for the next five years. She declined an interview request.
A new source of revenue to fund public transit has just been added in Greater Montreal. The Metropolitan Community of Montreal (CMM) has extended to 450 the tax on registrations which was imposed only on Montrealers until now. This tax, which goes from $45 to $59, should bring in $125 million a year.
The Coalition avenir Québec had long been opposed to the introduction of this “tax 450”, but Geneviève Guilbault let the CMM go ahead.
According to TRANSIT, the Minister must in particular adopt a kilometer tax to replenish the fund – in deficit – which is used to finance the road network and public transport (FORT). A motorist would thus be taxed according to the number of kilometers travelled. This tax would have the advantage of applying to electric vehicles, sheltered from the gas tax.
Marc Denault raises another possible solution to increase the funding of public transit: a tax on corporate payroll, an idea raised by Minister Geneviève Guilbault herself during a mission to France, where this measure exists.