The audit was part of the department’s 2024-25 plan – so when was it actually investigated? During the time when Ms. Amilcar was struggling with no e-buses and a slew of failing, old, buses? Graphs include March 2026 numbers, so I assume that the beginning of the up-swing of e-buses is included. And it will probably be Mr. Leary which acknowledged the recommendations. (I expect that he had already found many of these issues himself.)
I know that I shouldn’t be surprised, but when I clicked through to the adopted 2026 budget document, I found this information:
2025 Actual Operating Amounts:
$815,624,000 – Total Cost (i.e., how much was paid, from all sources, to run the transit system)
-$311,974,000 – Revenue (from all sources, but overwhelmingly rider fares, which was used to pay for transit costs)
$503,650,000 – Net City Expense (i.e., what the City had to collect from tax-payers and contribute for transit costs)
2026 Adopted Budget Operating Amounts:
$904,760,000 – Total Cost (i.e., how much will be paid, from all sources, to run the transit system)
-$413,589,000 – Revenue (from all sources, including upper levels of government, but overwhelmingly rider fares)
$491,171,000 – Net City Expense (i.e., what the City had to collect from tax-payers and contribute)
Well, isn’t that wild? The City’s share was budgeted to DROP from $503.7M to $491,2M. Yes, if everything had gone according to plan, the City would actually pay LESS of its tax revenue for transit in 2026. So, when the current Mayor says that the City’s funding for OC Transpo was increased, you can just show him these COUNCIL ADOPTED budget numbers. The increase in spending was mostly coming from the riders.
(Of course, the City will wind up spending more, since the budgeted Revenue amount was conceived during a psychedelic dream – so the City will need to cover the shortfall of income.)
Then the Audit Report tells me how much OC Transpo budgets for operating each of the three branches:
2025:
Bus - $408M
Rail - $164M
Para - $40M
2026:
Bus - $419M – an increase of 2.7%
Rail - $200M – an increase of 22%
Para - $42M – an increase of 5%
The BIG 22% jump in Rail operation cost is unexpected. I first thought that it was due to the opening of Lines 2 and 4 – but that happened in early Jan., 2025, so that cost would have already been in the 2025 number.
I’m open to ideas on why the cost to run the trains increased so much.
Interesting that the report has no mention of the 400-series routes to special events. They mention the 600-series buses.
About the Conclusions of the audit:
1. I think that anyone who has taken a bus in the last 6 months will agree that buses are unreliable. The need to re-time runs, deadheading, and layovers has been obvious to everyone but OC Transpo’s past management and City Councilors. That I believe that I have seen a recent change in the # 88 schedule, however, makes me think that GM Leary had already noticed the problem and had already begun to take corrective measures – albeit, slowly.
2. Here we find out that, when planning New Ways to Bus, the actual number of buses available was not taken into account. And that in spring 2025, OC Transpo quietly removed runs from the schedule so that fewer buses would be needed (540 buses -> 524 buses) – and they did the same thing, again, in Jan. 2026, but went even further (down to 500 buses needed). At least the new GM informed the City Council, and public, in January. The audit notes that the TTC – during Leary’s leadership time – maintained 110% bus availability. Hopefully, he can do that here. For example, if OC Transpo had 688 buses, and could keep 80% of them ready for service, then there would be 550 buses available. However, OC Transpo must maintain the correct ratio of bus types in the fleet. Having 550 regular buses is not the same as 550 high-capacity buses. As well, OC Transpo needs to allocate the correct type of bus for the various routes. In short, OC Transpo must divine what its future bus requirements will be, based on which type of bus should be run on which route; make sure they are available; and then assign appropriate buses to routes.
However, buses are of no use if there is no operator to drive them. According to Figure 7, there was a drop in bus operators; from 1640 at the end of Jan., 2025, down to 1500 at the end of July, 2025. I am open to suggestions as to why about 140 bus operators would leave during those 6 months. And It doesn’t look as if the issue will be fully resolved until the second quarter of 2027.
3. You have to know what you need to do before you try to do it; or even to know if you achieved it. And you need to be able to monitor any changes to know if you are getting closer or further from the goals. The problem is that OC Transpo has nothing to aim at. It needs guidance from the Transit Committee. The solution from OC Transpo is for OC Transpo to write its own requirements, and then tell the Transit Committee what it should be telling OC Transpo to do. And it should be ready sometime late in 2028.
A couple of things wrong here: The Transit Committee should be setting the direction and standards for OC Transpo. In their scenario, OC Transpo is telling the Committee what to say. It means that the Committee does nothing but rubber-stamp what it is handed. The Transit Committee should be doing the work here. Yes, there should be input from OC Transpo, but this is why there is a Transit Committee. The Councilors on that committee should be doing the work to figure out what OC Transpo is to be directed to do. What have the Councilors on the Transit Committee actually been doing? They get sent a report from OC Transpo. It is ‘For Information’ only. The Councilors might read the report – although, more likely, just the summary – and ask a couple of superficial questions. Then they ‘Accept’ the report, as is. Phew, done for another month.
And the other problem? Management confirms that the adaptation of the bus network to mesh with the extended LRT will be done “in alignment with those standards.” HOW? The standards aren’t coming until late 2028; the extensions open earlier than that – we hope.
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