TransLink fares failing to serve users in need

Riders deserve better, Schula Leonard writes.

A Burnaby teacher we know took her class on a field trip every day last week because it was the only week of the year when TransLink offers free service for students under 18.

Were she fortunate enough to work in Edmonton, or Toronto, she would have had the entire school year to do field trips with no worries about transportation or cost: in Edmonton and Toronto transit is free for kids (to age 12) all year long. Parents there only have to fundraise for destination entry fees and far more parents now choose to take their kids on public transit wherever they need to go, anytime.

In Toronto this policy has resulted in ridership for children doubling, and is expected to rise to 28 million this year. These cities are raising transit riders, reducing carbon and road congestion and ensuring more equal access to educational destinations that are often tax funded, like public libraries, museums, community centres or Canada Day celebrations.

Municipalities across North America and the world are funding fare structures that ensure that their public transit systems are services that leave no one at the curb. From Seattle’s free pass for students under 18 to Calgary and Edmonton’s poverty-reducing, income-based adult passes, barriers at the fare box are being examined, evaluated and reduced.

Why not in ever-so-expensive Metro Vancouver?

TransLink’s celebrated and successful UPass was implemented for all post-secondary students when the Liberal government provided supplemental funding. This made it possible for TransLink to agree and not contravene the enabling provincial legislation that requires a significant percentage of its operating revenues come from the fare box. The $41 monthly fare in Metro for post-secondary students is envied by high-school youth, who often cannot afford the monthly $53 they are charged.

We all need functional mobility for our citizens, including the youth, the poor and the working poor to thrive economically and personally.

This week, many of those Metro high school students will be back to being fined for trying to get to school, a part-time job, a food bank, or home safely on public transit. Many have multiple fines at deliberately punitive rates ($173 each while a parking ticket is $40) and are sent to a collection agency at 18, facing a ruined credit rating. Hopelessness, economic hobbling and social isolation result. What are the human and mental health costs for our youth?

It is no better for the poor. There is no transit subsidy for people on social assistance until age 60. Few can maintain the minimum balance on a Compass Card, let alone the upfront cost of a monthly pass. These significant discounts are available only to people who can afford not to take transit: those who have no alternative pay at the highest fare rate. No wonder many have multiple fines that will never be collected by TransLink.

We all need functional mobility for our citizens, including the youth, the poor and the working poor to thrive economically and personally. We do not pay upfront for our of public roads, we pay collectively. It should be the same for public transit.

There is much fanfare from the federal and provincial governments, Metro’s Mayors’ Council and TransLink about the way they have worked together to fund new infrastructure plans.

There are no affordability measures yet in those plans. These can and must be added. Surely the current provincial government and these partners can do better. If this means changes to legislation, do it. If this means applying a portion of the carbon tax to transit, do it. Whatever it takes, please do it.

Schula Leonard is a member of the education coalition #AllOnBoard, which advocates for affordable public transit in Metro Vancouver, particularly for youth age 18 and under and lower-income families.