DARTS Hamilton Posts Deficit

The Spec has an article about the disabled bus service DARTS posting a $225,000 deficit.

I've always wanted to do a comparison of the HSR's budget the last fifteen years versus DARTS' budget. My guess is that DARTS has been rising significantly faster than the HSR budget over the years and has been taking a bigger piece of the overall public transit spending pie.

As the article mentions, the province has mandated the city provide more DARTS services. There's not a lot the city can do about that, however my point is that if people look at HSR spending and complain public transit funding in the city is flat, that's not really true when you include DARTS funding, which one should.

Hamilton's Darts Spending

Hamilton's DARTS funding for disabled public transport seems to inexorably rise every year. Here's Spec article dealing with increased funding requirements for Hamilton having to provide services for those with cognitive disabilities rather than just physical.

I would love to see how DARTS funding has changed over the years, as I'm guessing there's been massive increases over the years. It would be interesting to contrast that to funding increases for the HSR for the same time periods. Maybe that info is buried somewhere on the city's website.

Some interesting info from the article:

"Every passenger now using DARTS services will be grandfathered, Hull said. However, if a new user who would have been eligible under the previous rules — for example, with a wheelchair or scooter — is able to function on HSR buses, they will not have a spot on DARTS buses."

So at least the low floor HSR buses should limit new DARTS passengers with physical disabilities, although I would be curious to see how this plays out in practice.

Also, wouldn't it be cheaper just to use taxis for the cognitively disabled?