After years of exceeding ridership projections, the TTC has fallen behind by about 4 million rides this year — and fare revenue is about $8 million less so far than anticipated.

The overall number of riders is still growing, just not as fast as transit officials had projected when they set the TTC budget. A rough winter and an unusually high number of subway closures for construction and repairs are being blamed.

A report by CEO Andy Byford to the TTC board in August said the shortfall could be as much as 7 million rides and $10 million by the end of the year.

But ridership returned to projected levels in August, and it’s possible the TTC could make up the shortfall by the end of the year, chief financial and administrative officer Vince Rodo said Wednesday. The TTC is anticipating a $2 million to $3 million savings on diesel fuel and a $3 million drop in accident claims.

If there is in fact a shortfall at the end of the year, the city would draw on its contingency budget. It’s been more than a decade since that happened, he said.

Transit officials had projected 353 million rides to the end of August but only 349 materialized.

“That’s still 5 million higher than the same period of time last year. We’re below budget, which we never want to be, but (ridership) is still growing. It’s still already about 1.5 per cent above last year. It’s 1.5 per cent instead of 2.5 per cent,” Rodo said.

Nearly half of the shortfall — 1.6 million rides — occurred in January alone, he said.

How significantly subway closures affect ridership depends on where they occur in the system. A closure on the Yonge-University line south of Bloor St. loses more riders than a shutdown between Kipling and Jane.

“We could lose as many as 20,000 or 30,000 rides in a weekend. When you do that over a while, you get a fair number of them,” said Rodo.

Riders may also mistakenly interpret a partial subway closure — such as the one this weekend between Union Station and St. Andrew — as a complete shutdown.

The TTC usually draws about 1.1 million riders on Saturday and between 800,000 and 900,000 on Sunday, a bit better than the average weekday ridership of 1.7 million.

There have been about 21 subway closures so far this year, including this weekend. Most have been related to platform work at Union Station, track bed work between Bloor St. and Eglinton, and the re-signalling of the Yonge-University-Spadina line.

The system carried about 372 million rides around 1996. This year, the TTC budgeted for about 540 million rides. Rodo expects the final number for 2014 to end up at about 536 million.

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The TTC takes in about $1.2 billion in annual fare revenue. The city’s operating subsidy to the TTC is about $430 million this year.

The transit system had a $47.7 million surplus last year, mostly from lower than anticipated WSIB costs, accident claim payouts and depreciation on capital assets. That money went back to the city, but the TTC board voted to ask the city to use it to avoid a fare increase next year.