Public transit fare collection resumes on June 1

WATERLOO REGION — Public transit fares will be collected again starting June 1, but Region of Waterloo council deferred the decision to no longer accept cash payments on buses.

Grand River Transit services have been free to ride since April 1, prompted by a switch to rear-boarding during the COVID-19 pandemic to limit interaction between drivers and passengers.

“We feel that we can safely start operating the buses, protect our drivers, protect our customers and go back to collecting fares again,” Thomas Schmidt, the region’s transportation commissioner, told council at Wednesday’s meeting.

Plastic shields should be installed on buses by June 1 to protect drivers from the virus when passengers return to front-door boarding where they can tap to pay, and masks are also being provided to drivers.

Those shields are similar to what was installed at grocery stores to provide protection from COVID-19, and different from the enclosures approved in the budget to provide more security to drivers that will start being installed this year but take several years to get on all buses.

Coun. Sean Strickland didn’t understand the move to stop accepting cash until further notice, in particular considering that cash fares generate $380,000 monthly.

“That is a significant amount of revenue that I think by not accepting cash we’re putting at risk,” Strickland said. “The operators don’t handle the cash. The cash goes into a fare box.”

Peter Zinck, director of transit services, said the amount of time customers take to pay with cash is “fairly lengthy” and there is interaction with the driver, especially when there are issues with cash or issuing tickets. The goal of moving to electronic payment is to get people to move to the passenger area as quickly as possible.

“We really think it’s important to stay with a tap-and-go process to reduce the time the customers are with the operator,” Zinck said.

Strickland pointed out that usually a change to public transit is phased in, and Coun. Geoff Lorentz also called for more time before cash was no longer accepted.

“I think once we move forward with this, I doubt very much that we’ll go back to accepting cash, so I think we need to have a better program rolled,” said Lorentz, who introduced the motion to defer rather than also introduce the no-cash rule on June 1.

Coun. Berry Vrbanovic worried that not allowing cash would make it more challenging for people who are marginalized or on a low income to use public transit.

“I think before we go down this path, we need to have a broader conversation with the relevant groups that advocate for that sector,” he said.

Council passed a motion to defer the move, asking staff to undergo those consultations and come back with a report on how the plan would be rolled out. That report may take until as late as August given the summer break, Schmidt said.

“I think time is what we really need,” Lorentz said.