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Politicians will have a tough choice to make come budget time: fork over more cash, or cut transit service in a city starving for more.

You want more buses in industrial parks? You want discounts for kids, teens, and people in poverty?

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You’ll have to pay up, London’s transit agency is telling council.

Despite the injection of more than $103 million in transit infrastructure funding announced this week by the provincial government, the London Transit Commission is predicting a budget spike of 4.5 per cent next year just to maintain the status quo.

That’s three times higher than a 1.5 per cent target the transit agency got from city staff after council set a tax hike target of 2.7 per cent for the next multi-year budget. That budget spans 2020 to 2023.

And if council can’t provide a boost, it’ll mean cuts to existing bus service, which the commission has boosted by 18,000 hours each of the last five years.