Staff Report #3
July 21, 2025
To All Commissioners
Re: Financial Update – Specialized Transit Services – Operating Budget – May 31, 2025
Recommendation
That the report be RECEIVED for information.
Background
Set out in the table below is the Statement of Operations for Specialized Transit Services for the five-month period ending May 31, 2025. The statement sets out actual to budget performance for the period.
London Transit Commission Statement of Operations – Specialized Transit Services Five Months Ending May 31, 2025 (000’s omitted)
| Description | Actual | Budget | Amount Better (Worse) | Percent Better (Worse) | |
| Revenue | |||||
| Transportation | $ 345.5 | $ 386.0 | $ (40.4) | (10.5)% | |
| City of London | 6,000.8 | 6,000.8 | – | 0.0 % | |
| Total revenue | 6,346.3 | 6,386.7 | (40.4) | (0.6)% | |
| Expenditure | |||||
| Personnel cost | 598.4 | 620.9 | 22.5 | 3.6 % | |
| Contract service cost | 5,558.1 | 5,681.2 | 123.1 | 2.2 % | |
| All other material expense | 77.7 | 84.6 | 6.9 | 8.2 % | |
| Total expenditure | 6,234.1 | 6,386.7 | 152.6 | 2.4 % | |
| Net favourable/(unfavourable) | $ 112.1 | $ – | $ 112.1 | 1.8 % | |
As indicated in the above table, the service has a net favourable operating budget performance to date of 1.8% or $112,100. An explanation of the variances is set out below.
Net Operating Costs
- unfavourable transportation revenue of $40,400 due to lower ridership than budgeted;
- favourable personnel costs of $22,500 due to timing of vacancies and less than anticipated overtime; and
- favourable contract service costs of $123,100 due to mainly to penalties applied to the service provider for not achieving predetermined daily service levels, noting the favourable Q1 service hours have been reapplied to off peak hours during the remainder of the year.
Ridership
The following table sets out actual to budget ridership and other performance related measures as well as a comparison to the same period in the previous year.
Ridership and Other Statistics Actual vs. Budget Five Months Ending May 31, 2025 (000’s omitted)
| Description | Actual | Budget | Variance | % Variance | 2024 Actual | % Variance | |
| Eligible passenger trips | 127,569 | 141,100 | (13,531) | (9.6)% | 115,971 | 10.0 % | |
| Attendant/companion trips | 14,806 | 14,700 | 106 | 0.7 % | 11,949 | 23.9 % | |
| Total Trips | 142,375 | 155,800 | (13,425) | (8.6)% | 127,927 | 11.3 % | |
| Average fare | $ 2.427 | $ 2.477 | $ 0.050 | 2.0 % | $ 2.466 | 1.6 % | |
| Service Hours | 77,725 | 77,986 | (261) | (0.3)% | 68,939 | 12.7 % | |
| Total trips per service hour | 1.83 | 2.00 | (0.17) | (8.3)% | 1.86 | (1.3)% | |
As indicated in the table above, total trips were 13,425 rides less than budget. This variance is primarily the result of rides per service hour being less than budget (12,946 trips) and fewer service hours than budgeted being provided (479 trips).
The unfavourable variance in trips per service hour is largely due to the impacts of the implementation of the new scheduling software over the first few months of the year. Service efficiency was not at expected levels in the early months as administration worked with the vendor to adjust system parameters. In addition, the new scheduling software utilizes actual drive time calculations when scheduling trips, which takes into account the travel time impacts of construction related detours, etc. The actual trips per hour will be closely monitored over the coming months and will be utilized for preparation of the 2026 operating budget with respect to anticipated ridership on the specialized service. While this will not significantly impact the operating budget, it will provide for better ridership estimates going forward.
Administration will continue to monitor the operating budget performance reporting on same on a monthly basis including providing recommendations as may be appropriate.
Recommended by:
Mike Gregor, Director of Finance
Concurred in by:
Kelly S. Paleczny, General Manager