TTC's 2025 budget freezes fares, increases service frequency and safety, invests billions of dollars in new vehicles and subway maintenance

Today, the TTC Board approved its 2025 operating and capital budgets that freezes fares for the second straight year, adds the most service in a decade, improves system safety and cleanliness, and invests more than $16 billion in long-term capital projects.

The $2.8-billion combined operating budgets for both the TTC conventional system and Wheel-Trans represent a 6.5-per-cent increase over the approved 2024 budgets and ensures safe, reliable, and affordable service for TTC customers.

Highlights of the 2025 budget:

• Freezes TTC fares at 2023 prices.

• Allocates $33 million to preserve and build on service increases made in 2024 and address rising demand on weekends and evenings as well as challenges posed by road congestion. The overall increased service hours will match pre-pandemic levels.

• Increases Wheel-Trans funding by $14.2 million to meet the rising demand.

• Establishes a pilot project on 11 routes across the city to reduce bunching and gapping of vehicles in real-time through enhanced on-street route management.

• Funds operating and maintenance costs for the opening of Lines 5 and 6 in 2025 as well as full-year operations on the Line 3 SRT bus replacement service.

• Creates a new subway stations management pilot program to add more staff and improve cleanliness at six priority locations (Scarborough Town Centre bus terminal, and Kennedy, Dundas, Finch, Spadina, and Lansdowne stations).

"This is a great news budget for TTC customers," said Mayor Olivia Chow. "It freezes fares and represents the most significant increase in service in a decade. It also makes a historic investments in state of good repair programs to reduce the impact of the slow speed zones, and supports the purchase of new vehicles. With this budget we are going to make the TTC the Better Way again!"

"Budget 2025 is a massive step in the right direction for the TTC," said TTC Chair Jamaal Myers. "As a daily TTC rider myself, I am proud that we are addressing two things that are important to our customers: safety and customer experience. This budget will help us build a transit system where parents don't worry about their kids using the subway at night and vehicles that arrive when they're supposed to arrive."

"I want to thank our Board and Mayor Chow for supporting considerable investments in our operations and long-term projects," said TTC CEO Greg Percy. "Bringing more customers to the TTC requires a system that is safe, reliable, and affordable, and these budgets accomplish that."

The recommended 2025-2034 Capital Budget and Plan of $16.395 billion is $5.1 billion higher than last year's Capital Budget and, represents the largest funding increase since 2019. Almost $4.9 billion of the increase is dedicated to crucial unfunded state-of-good-repair (SOGR) work, such as track safety and reduced speed zones, and projects to make all stations accessible.

The additional investments reduce the TTC's SOGR funding backlog by almost 50 per cent from $8.2 billion by 2033 to a projected $4.3 billion over the next 10 years.

Highlights include:

• 55 replacement subway trains on Line 2 with the recently announced $1.5 billion matching Federal and Provincial funding ($2.3 billion total project cost).

• Investments in approximately 700 eBuses and 950 charging systems totalling $1.2 billion over the next five years, with a total project cost of approximately $2.4 billion.

• Bus, Streetcar and Subway fleet overhaul programs directly resulting from the $500 million funding provided through the City’s reallocation of the Gardiner/DVP funding.

• Critical subway systems infrastructure (Signals, Electrical, Communication) and escalator/elevator overhaul/replacement programs, with $368 million in additional funding.

• Climate adaptation and resiliency, efficiency measures and projects that will reduce GHG emissions, key initiatives of the TTC's Innovation and Sustainability Strategy, with more than $67 million in new funding.

• Targeted station/transit priority investments of $15 million over 2025 and 2026 to improve station conditions and aesthetics; to pilot a public address system upgrade and station lighting LED retrofit at six key stations and install red paint treatment on existing city roads, intersections and TTC stations to improve transit priority and safety and support fare compliance at station entrances.

All budget reports and presentations are available at: https://cdn.ttc.ca/-/media/Project/TTC/DevProto/Documents/Home/Public-Meetings/Board/2025/January-10/1Recommended2025TTCOperatingBudget20252034-CapitalBudgetandPlan15YearCIPandREIPUpdate.pdf