05-27-2021, 02:28 PM
(05-27-2021, 09:15 AM)tomh009 Wrote:(05-27-2021, 06:22 AM)jeffster Wrote: Take a single senior, for example: the cutoff is $18,900, any senior that worked at all (even for a year or two) won’t qualify for transit: OAS and GIS maximums (low income seniors) is already $18,500, this is the least amount of money you can get. If you receive $90 in CPP, some of GIS will be taken away, and likely leave you with an income around $19,000/year. What I saying is, the only seniors that might qualify are those that came to Canada and don’t qualify for much or any OAS, GIS and CPP. If you were born and raised in Canada, you won’t get this transit discount.
The region needs to look at how they can get young riders to use the transit, and cheap transit is one way. If you’re a student, and even taking a yellow bus, give them a ride for $1.50 or less, so when they are done with school, they are more inclined to us a bus, rather than buy a car. Get them hooked at a young age.
Yes, basically the program gives a 50% discount to seniors who are living on OAS+GIS only (or equivalent), and none to ones who have substantial other income. Currently all seniors get a 16.7% discount on the monthly passes. While the cutoff is too low it's still far better than the current reduced fare system. A graduated approach to the discounts would be better but I think to make this work the region would need to get the income data from CRA as a manual system gets way too complex. Maybe they are working on this? Or maybe CRA won't do it as a matter of policy? Don't know.
Current student pass is $75, or around $0.90/ride assuming you ONLY use it for getting to school and back. The future discounted pass is about $0.55/ride, and the undiscounted still not much over a dollar. If you're looking at a few-times-a-month usage scenario, the discounted fare (with the card) is $1.49, which meets your criteria.
Overall, moving to this system is the right direction. Hopefully, with experience, it can be expanded and improved in the future.
I'm curious, do any of the discount apply to tickets? Transit passes are great for those who ride frequently, but discounted tickets would also be a good option for many other travel patterns.