Update: The initial TTC news release gave $111 as the price for Metropasses that UTSU sells under the Volume Incentive Program. The actual price is $107.
As expected, the Toronto Transit Commission approved on Tuesday a fare hike starting Jan. 3, 2010. Beginning in September, post-secondary students will be able to buy discounted Metropasses for $99, the same rate as high school students. Post-secondary students will pay $107 for Metropasses from January to August.
The adult fare will rise to $3 and the adult Metropass to $121. The original proposal was to raise adult Metropasses to $126. But the TTC faced a backlash, including a “rider’s strike” last Friday. The Fair Student Fares campaign collected over 6,000 signatures to protest the price hike. The Canadian Federation of Students, along with its member unions in Toronto, organized the campaign.
CFS organizer Joel Duff said the delay in getting the discount $99 passes was due to logistical issues. Student unions have six-month contracts with the TTC.
Negotiations are ongoing about the format of the discount pass. “The TTC has stated that they do not want to have their drivers looking at multiple cards, so post-secondary students will have to get the same student IDs as high school students,” said Duff. “We want students to be able to use their student cards issued by their universities.”
The new passes require photos and students would have to go to Sherbourne station to be photographed by the TTC, but student unions want to create and issue the passes themselves, Duff said.
“We already pay, as Ontario students, the highest tuition fees in Canada. This fare increase is going to make higher education even less affordable and accessible for post-secondary students,” said Hadia Akhtar, VP external for UTSU. The U of T student union currently sells an average of 12,000 discount Metropasses per month under the Volume Incentive Program, with each pass going for $96.
“We had meetings with Anthony Perruzza, Maria Augimari, [TTC Chair] Adam Giambrone, his staff and even Joe Mihevc,” said Hamid Osman, CFS’s national executive representative for Ontario and former president of the York Federation of Students. Perruzza, Augimari, and Mihevc are TTC commissioners. Giambrone is TTC chair and city councillor for Davenport. He is considering a run for mayor.
Over a breakfast meeting with Giambrone on Monday, campaigners were told that the high-school discount would be extended to full-time college and university students only, with an age cap. Last-minute negotiations convinced commissioners to re-draft the motion to include part-time students and remove the age cap, according to Dave Scrivener, former UTSU VP external.
“The students won this,” said Mihevc, councillor for St. Paul’s West. “It is a testament to the power of student organization.”
