Thank you very much. It's a pleasure to be here. Thank you for the opportunity to be able to share some of the challenges from cities.
My comments today are really going to focus on the impact to transit agencies. I currently serve as the mayor of the City of New Westminster, but I am also the chair of the mayors’ council in Metro Vancouver, which represents the 21 mayors in the region, and the Tsawwassen First Nation.
TransLink, our transit agency, provides public transit service and support to the major road network serving 2.5 million people in the Metro Vancouver region.
We know that COVID-19 has had devastating impacts all across the country and through all aspects of society, but these impacts have been particularly acute for public transit systems. Here at TransLink, our major revenue source is transit fares, and with transit ridership down by 80%, our organization is losing $75 million per month. This is certainly not sustainable, and it is creating tremendous pressure on our transportation agency.
Despite significant declines in transit ridership, we are finding that 75,000 residents in Metro Vancouver are still very much dependent on our transit system. Our surveys have indicated that nine in 10 trips on our transit system today are related to essential services, whether that's working at a grocery store, going to a grocery store, or having to do with health care. Our service is still providing valuable essential service and essential transportation options. Also, 150,000 households in Metro Vancouver do not own a car, so there are many folks in our region who do not have alternative transportation options.
In light of the crisis that we are facing, TransLink has taken difficult steps to significantly reduce service, cutting transit service by approximately 40% in the region.
Despite these very significant impacts, which are impacting riders across our region, TransLink estimates that we are still going to be losing $40 million to $50 million per month because of the revenue shortfalls due to the crisis. I really appreciate the opportunity to come to this committee to implore the federal government to see how it can play a partner role and help support a viable transit service, not only during the crisis but also as we emerge from the crisis. Other countries around the world have already recognized that transit service is important, both at this time and during the recovery, and have developed emergency relief programs.
From the perspective of TransLink, we know that the challenges that we face in delivering public transit are challenges that are faced by major transit agencies all across the country, and that this is really a national issue.
As we deal with the crisis right now, and as we start to plan towards the recovery, we strongly feel that a viable and functioning public transit system will be necessary during both of those phases. Given that this is a national issue facing transit agencies all across the country, we want the federal government to have a serious look at opportunities for emergency relief, with a particular focus on the work that FCM has done in laying out a plan to keep public transit viable in our country.