Canadians are choosing transit at an unprecedented level, and more and more people understand the importance of their travel choices in improving the quality of life, reducing emissions, and easing traffic congestion. Ridership across Canada showed very strong growth in 2010, with an increase of 4.1% nationally over the previous years. This represents an all-time record, with 1.9 billion trips taken in communities of all sizes.
Indeed, it's worth noting that the increases were spread across the country in communities large and small, with many smaller Canadian communities showing remarkable growth. Much of this is thanks to the recent federal investment, which had been supported by members of Parliament from all parties and which has reached about $1 billion annually in recent years.
Indeed, it is this commitment that has enabled the renewal and the expansion of transit systems and allowed for service improvements to accommodate surging demand. Sustaining this growth and continuing to respond to the shifting transport patterns requires predictable, sustained, and targeted investment. In order to adequately respond to increasing demand, transit systems are in need of sustained infrastructure renewal, and communities where transit has not kept pace with development need a greater focus on investment.
As one example, a recent economic review by the Toronto Board of Trade concluded that traffic congestion was costing the Toronto economy $6 billion a year. In this context and as part of the finance committee's pre-budget consultation, CUTA proposes the following three recommendations in the development of the 2012 federal budget.
Number one: The federal government should develop a Canadian transit policy framework as part of the 2011 budget commitment to establish long-term infrastructure plans.
Secondly, the federal government should give tax-exempt status to employer-provided transit benefits. This would complement the current federal government tax credit for transit pass purchases and encourage employers to financially support transit commuters.
Lastly, there is a need for permanent, stable, and predictable funding dedicated to transit, and that's key. It needs to be dedicated to public transit.
By recognizing challenging fiscal environments, there are a number of different ways to accomplish this, moving forward. One way is to dedicate the equivalent of an additional cent of the excise tax to the gas tax fund, specifically to transit capital investment. This would represent a stable, predictable investment of about $400 million annually and would be supplementary to existing transit allocations.