OC Transpo ridership down again, three-year lows expected for 2013

As reported in the Citizen and Sun last week, OC Transpo's ridership are down yet again for the third quarter of 2013. From the Citizen's coverage:

"According to newly released figures for July, August and September, OC Transpo gave 21.1 million rides in those months, down 3.9 per cent from the year before."

OC Transpo continues to place the blame on job cuts in the federal public service, although that seems like it's just their best guess--there are likely other factors that could be at play, including the introduction of Presto cards, the phasing out of EcoPasses, recent and continuing increases in bus fares, and construction-related transit delays.

The continued ridership decline means that OC Transpo is expecting to fall below 100 million rides for 2013, despite exceeding that number in 2012 (101 million) and 2011 (103.5 million). It's unclear at this point whether ridership will even match numbers from 2010 (99.3 million), which could mean this year will be the worst for OC Transpo since the 2008-09 winter transit strike.

No one wants to talk about that thing again...

EcoPass payroll deductions delayed until April or later

EcoPass bus passes, the employer-subsidized transit pass service deducted directly from the employee payroll and used largely by federal government employees, will not have their deductions resumed until late April, at the earliest, according to the OC Transpo official website:

ECOPASS payroll deductions have been stopped - ECOPASSES are valid on all
OC Transpo service. Payroll deductions will resume at the end of April.

One assumes this is because full service is not expected to resume until April 6, 2009, and EcoPass holders continued paying for their passes during the first few weeks of the strike. Express and Rural Express EcoPasses will not resume deductions until May 1, shortly after Express and Rural Express routes will have resumed.