Increased ridership will fix transit safety issues: Transit advocate

Hopping on a bus is going to cost you five cents more in 2023, but a transit advocate says the fare increase is the opposite of what the city should be doing.

Carol Martin doesn't have a car and rides the bus at least twice a day, meaning transit is crucial for her to get around.

"To me, very important," said Martin. "I rely on it for work, to take my son to appointments, so yeah, I rely on it for a lot of things."

As of Jan. 1, riders like Martin will have to pay five cents more to get on the bus.

The cash cost of a bus fare will rise to $3.15, with the e-cash cost rising to $2.75.

Functional Transit Winnipeg, a grassroots group advocating for a better transit system, says the rate increase won't help with attracting riders.

"Decrease barriers to people using transit rather than increasing barriers to people using transit and increasing fares is increasing barriers to people using transit," said Brian Pincott, who's part of Functional Transit Winnipeg.

The union representing Winnipeg Transit said the fee wouldn't have to be implemented if more people didn't skimp on their fare.

"The increase could have been avoided if we had had more adherence to the fare policy in place now," said Chris Scott, president business agent at ATU Local 1505.

The union said transit safety is an issue -- suggesting the city should look at better security on buses.

It's an idea Mayor Scott Gillingham talked about in a year-end interview with CTV News.

"Those peace officers wouldn't be police officers. They wouldn't be part of the police collective agreement," explained Gillingham in the interview. "They would be a separate group, and we could deploy them on buses, in and around transit stops as well."

An idea Functional Transit Winnipeg believes isn't the right fix.

"The solution to safety, to security, to service, is to actually get people riding transit and to do so, you need to focus on the service you are providing," said Pincott.

Functional Transit Winnipeg said the city should fast-track the transit master plan already being used in order to make the service more appealing.

The group said it would also decrease wait times and improve reliability, something current riders would like to see.

"Not such a long wait between buses would be nice because there are times I've been out in the cold waiting," said Martin.

"Make it more reliable. Make it on time. You know it's always late in the wintertime," said another rider CTV News spoke with.

Along with the nickel hike to ticket fare, the city is also expanding its WINNpass program to youth and simplifying its fare system