The City of St. Albert says the Arc Card transit fare system implemented throughout the region last November hasn't caused a dip in its transit revenue, as it has for the Edmonton Transit System.
Edmonton's chief financial officer, Stacey Padbury, told reporters last week low transit revenues were partially to blame for a proposed 7.09 per cent property tax increase next year, 2.13 per cent higher than what Edmonton city council approved last year for the city's 2023-26 budget.
Although the bulk of Edmonton's unexpected 2.13 per cent property tax increase proposed for next year is a result of increased police funding as well as an increase to officer salaries from an arbitrator-imposed contract between the city and the police union, Padbury cited a $10 million projected shortfall in transit revenue this year as another factor behind the proposed tax increase for 2024.
In an email, City of Edmonton spokesperson Melenie Reid said the projected revenue shortfall isn't a result of low transit ridership, but rather a result of transit riders shifting towards less-expensive fare products instead of purchasing monthly passes.
Arc Cards are one example of a cheaper fare product, as transit riders can load their cards with the amount of money needed for individual trips.
“ETS is projecting a $10 million budget variance between budgeted fare revenue figures and financial performance in 2024,” Reid said. “This is due to more riders using less-expensive fare products, instead of purchasing monthly fare products.”
“The impacts are not isolated to the regional ARC Fare Payment System, and are across the entire suite of fare products ETS offers.”
Reid also explained that Edmonton bus ridership reached pre-pandemic levels early last year, however LRT ridership is still just 80-85 per cent of pre-pandemic numbers.
“[LRT] ridership has returned to normal levels during peak service but not during off-peak service (evenings and weekends),” she said. “Total ridership was at 5.06 million in September 2023, representing a 29 per cent increase from 3.92 million in August 2023 and a 14 per cent increase from 4.42 million in September 2022.”
Unlike Edmonton's experience, St. Albert spokesperson Pamela Osborne said the city isn't projecting a transit revenue shortfall, nor is low transit revenue a factor in the 5.5 per cent property tax increase proposed locally for 2024.
St. Albert's chief administrative officer Bill Fletcher told council last week about 4.7 per cent of the proposed property tax increase for 2024 is a result of the city's need to introduce transit services to the Jensen Lakes and Riverside neighbourhoods, the populations of which have recently reached the 300-person threshold needed to introduce transit services.
“It is anticipated that ridership will see an overall 5 per cent growth from pre-pandemic levels, and revenue is still expected to be approximately 9 per cent higher than original budget estimates,” Osborne said.
This year, the city's budget estimate for transit revenue was about $2.95 million, meaning a 9 per cent revenue surplus would come out to an additional $265,500.
The projected revenue surplus, Osborne explained, is largely a result of vastly improved transit ridership.
“In September 2023, St. Albert Transit’s ridership levels were 10 per cent higher than they were in September 2019,” she said. “Throughout 2023, monthly ridership levels have been variable, [as] some months have been higher than pre-pandemic levels and some were slightly lower.”
“At this time, city administration does not believe that the Arc Card will translate to lower revenue, despite Edmonton’s experience with passengers who previously purchased monthly passes but have switched over to the Arc Card.”
Reid said despite Edmonton's projected $10 million transit revenue shortfall, monthly fare product sales have been increasing recently.
“In the last two months, we have seen encouraging growth in monthly fare product sales and fare revenue may improve in the next few months should this trend continue,” she said.
