Timed-based transfers could be coming to the TTC next summer.

In a report released Friday, transit agency staff recommend introducing a new transfer policy by next August that would allow passengers unlimited travel during a two-hour window on a single fare.

According to the report, the initiative would cost the TTC $11.1 million in 2018, and $20.9 annually by 2020. The policy would apply only to passengers who use the Presto fare card, which the TTC says will replace older fare media like tokens and tickets sometime next year.

“This should not be viewed simply as an additional expense, but as part of the wider Ridership Growth Strategy that will enable the TTC to provide a high quality, flexible and competitive transit service to customers,” the report says.

TTC Chair Josh Colle, who last week co-signed a letter with Mayor John Tory and TTC board member Councillor Mary Fragedakis asking the transit agency to study timed transfers, said the report shows the idea is “very feasible from a logistical point of view and financially.”

“Obviously there’s a cost but it’s I think a reasonable one considering the benefit it provides for a lot of our customers,” he said.

The report states that allowing riders to make multiple trips on a single fare would have a “positive equity impact” on the transit system and particularly benefit low-income riders, parents or guardians dropping off kids at school on their way to work, and customers running errands like picking up prescriptions at a drug store.

Two-hour time-based transfers are used by every other transit agency in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area (GTHA) and the city’s transit activists have long pushed for the TTC to adopt the measure. TTC leadership, including outgoing CEO Andy Byford, have supported the idea but said it would be contingent on securing additional funding from council.

Jessica Bell, a spokesperson for transit advocacy group TTCriders, said the organization is “fully on board” with the timed transfer proposal.

“A two-hour fare policy is an extremely practical and efficient way to encourage ridership and help low income riders who are more likely to take advantage of this program,” she said in an email Friday.

She questioned why it will take until August to put the policy in place, however, as Presto fare cards already operate on a two-hour transfer basis at other GTHA transit agencies.

“Let's get on with it,” she said.

According to the report, Presto has advised the TTC August is the earliest the initiative could be put in place.

Once the policy goes into place, about 8 million annual trips that riders would otherwise have to pay for would become free. The policy would also attract 5 million additional trips per year. The TTC expects that it would have to add 850 weekly service hours to the system to cope with the increased demand.

If the report’s recommendations are approved, the policy would go into effect two months before a municipal election in which Tory is expected to make transit policy a major plank of his campaign.

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The TTC board will consider the report at its meeting next Tuesday, when it will also debate the proposed 2018 budget. The additional $11.1 million to start the program next year would be on top of a $37.6-million increase to its subsidy the TTC was already requesting in 2018.

The subsidy for 2017 was budgeted at $689.7 million.

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